Hey Mom, I Want My Own P.Site

P.site. Witty, eh? It’s short hand for psionics site. I have noticed that every newbie decides to make a psionics site. Then they try to advertise it by saying “hey! Come to my new forum. It B awesome!!!!1!1!!one!!eleven111!” They then procede to spam boards all over the place and it earns them a bad name. So, okay, I’m done ranting I suppose. This isn’t really a rant, more like a post trying to help those newbie who want to create their own psionics site.

To begin with, create a “main idea” of your site. It needs a focus. General p.sites never do well. Want to know why? Because it is totally IMPOSSIBLE to create that much content on one site. You’d need 2-3 articles per subject, and that’s just more subjects than one person can handle.

Next, you need content. It generally looks better if you (the owner) create most of the content. If other people contribute an article or two, that’s okay, just don’t totally rely on someone else to control your content. Everyone wants a forum where people can give feedback etc. but they skip ahead. You can’t do that! You have GOT to come up with content first. When writing your content, please be careful. Don’t use txt talk, or leet. You need to write as if you will be graded. The goal is to edit it to the point where you get an A, don’t settle for a B. Put spaces between your paragraphs, not indentions. Indentions are fine in a book, but when writing for the internet, it makes it look like a long block of text. No one wants to decipher that, believe me.

The next most important thing is colours/font. Make your p.site aesthetically pleasing. Don’t make me want to run screaming, in the other direction. If I can’t read your content I will leave. It’s as simple as that. If no one will read your articles, it doesn’t matter how many you have, your site will fail.

Put your forum in a good place. Don’t try to code your own forum. For the most part they turn out ugly, or complicated to use. Don’t create your own template. This will either take you hours (which is time taken away from writing valuable content) or turn out disgusting. Believe me. This is why I discourage beginners from using Proboards. It forces you to make your own layout. Chose something easier, like Takeforum or BoardZero. When making the boards, limit yourself to about 25. Over that, you will have an endless wall of boards that will never get posted in. Sub-boards are your friend. That way you can have your 25 boards but it will look like you only have 15. Each board needs a post telling what is to be posted in the board, and at least one post to start conversation.

Down to the hardest thing for most people; advertising. There are two basic ways to advertise: spam as many boards as possible, or become an active member of as many boards as possible then add the site’s link to your signature and make ONE post in the APPROPRIATE board. The first one seems easier, but it’s not. Spammers are discouraged (as I’m sure you know). Most people are members of more than one forum, so if they see your spam, they’ll warn all their other communities that you might be coming with spam. So it will get instantly deleted.

Oh wow. This post went really fast! I hope I helped a little. :p