Trying Something Different

thiggins · Apr 13, 2016

sfx2000 said:
One more thing - how about a twitter block on the lower right hand corner quadrant to tie things all back together?

I don't understand this suggestion.

sfx2000 · Apr 13, 2016

on the home "landing" page - right now there's an empty block in the layout - lower right hand side - on this page, it shows as the "New Threads" block - so either a twitter block, or add the New Threads block there...

sfx2000 · Apr 13, 2016

here... lower right hand below "Sign up"

L&LD · Apr 13, 2016

Please, no twitter, or any other nonsense to use this site. And adding that is just noise for people coming either to the main site or to the forums for information.

Please don't support the latest fads on your site... the posts (both in the forums and the main site) are the meat and potatoe that keeps people coming back. Not the latest social craze to sweep the young and the bored.

sfx2000 · Apr 13, 2016

L&LD said:
Please, no twitter, or any other nonsense to use this site. And adding that is just noise for people coming either to the main site or to the forums for information.

Please don't support the latest fads on your site... the posts (both in the forums and the main site) are the meat and potatoe that keeps people coming back.

Have to understand that page-view matter for a Webmaster/Site-owner - I'd be willing to bet that SNBForums at the moment is driving more traffic...

SmallNetBuilder is more than just the forums - Tim's working, at least in my view, to balance the traffic across the sites, and both have terrific amounts of value... editorial/review content on the main site, and the tremendous amount of hive-mind wisdom here on the forums, present company included...

It's a fine line, and Tim is working hard to balance it - provide constructive feedback rather than just saying - NO...

sfx2000 · Apr 13, 2016

Now if Tim can keep the Ad Banner guys from breaking things - the dead-zone up top, where some ad providers behave well, but others don't - this would help out a bunch for the layout if the CSS works...

I suppressed the ad just to show the empty space... clean that up and it might be good to go...

john9527 · Apr 13, 2016

There is another forum site I visit regularly that has about 4X the amount of ads (actually ads and sponsor links) and has one of the best layouts I've seen. The ads don't bother me at all and actually get a few clicks from me (and is a site I don't feel the need to adblock)..

There is a single navigation bar that follows the top banner ad (which is about 1/3 of the size of the ad here). The rest of the ads run in a vertical bar down the entire right side of the page taking only about 1/8 of the width of the page. As you scroll through the forum threads, there is always a group of ads visible, but it's not at all intrusive. Just a suggestion.

sfx2000 · Apr 13, 2016

john9527 said:
There is another forum site I visit regularly that has about 4X the amount of ads (actually ads and sponsor links) and has one of the best layouts I've seen. The ads don't bother me at all and actually get a few clicks from me (and is a site I don't feel the need to adblock)

I think as long as the ads are relevant and load fast - folks won't adblock things here...

L&LD · Apr 13, 2016

sfx2000 said:
Have to understand that page-view matter for a Webmaster/Site-owner - I'd be willing to bet that SNBForums at the moment is driving more traffic...

SmallNetBuilder is more than just the forums - Tim's working, at least in my view, to balance the traffic across the sites, and both have terrific amounts of value... editorial/review content on the main site, and the tremendous amount of hive-mind wisdom here on the forums, present company included...

It's a fine line, and Tim is working hard to balance it - provide constructive feedback rather than just saying - NO...

I did provide constructive feedback. 'No' is always an option (that shouldn't be ignored).

I can understand the need for ads. I do not understand the need to 'follow', 'like', or whatever the latest 'thing' to do will be six months from now from another website that monetizes itself by selling the users 'stats' (and hopefully not their personal info).

L&LD · Apr 13, 2016

john9527 said:
There is another forum site I visit regularly that has about 4X the amount of ads (actually ads and sponsor links) and has one of the best layouts I've seen. The ads don't bother me at all and actually get a few clicks from me (and is a site I don't feel the need to adblock)..

There is a single navigation bar that follows the top banner ad (which is about 1/3 of the size of the ad here). The rest of the ads run in a vertical bar down the entire right side of the page taking only about 1/8 of the width of the page. As you scroll through the forum threads, there is always a group of ads visible, but it's not at all intrusive. Just a suggestion.

Could you link it please?

john9527 · Apr 13, 2016

L&LD said:
Could you link it please?

Sure....and actually, my memory was a little flawed in one respect, there are two navigation bars, a top one more site general, and a lower more user/forum oriented.

http://www.corvetteforum.com/forums/c5-general-103/

L&LD · Apr 14, 2016

john9527 said:
Sure....and actually, my memory was a little flawed in one respect, there are two navigation bars, a top one more site general, and a lower more user/forum oriented.

http://www.corvetteforum.com/forums/c5-general-103/

Thank you. Yup! I can live with that.

RMerlin · Apr 17, 2016

Looking at the News page now that it has a few entries on it, I like the idea. Allowing a more direct interaction between the news and the forums is nice to drive discussion - the trick is to find the best way to expose those news to the forum visitors.

stevech · Apr 17, 2016

When does Adobe Flash content actually go away from the web sites? Replaced with HTML5?

kvic · Apr 18, 2016

I would re-define "Featured" to posts that will stay on top (until un-flagged). And add a new tag "News" that will have posts fed to Home.

Then, for example, this post will have "Featured" and "News"

Weaselboy · Apr 18, 2016

thiggins said:
We're making a few changes to tune up the SNBForums experience.

Is there a way to get an RSS feed of news articles with this new layout?

The RSS link at the bottom of the page is giving me a feed of all new forum posts, and not the news.

thiggins · Apr 18, 2016

New RSS Feeds box added in right column

Weaselboy · Apr 18, 2016

thiggins said:
New RSS Feeds box added in right column

That's the ticket. Thanks!

Did you just add that, or was I missing it before?

thiggins · Apr 18, 2016

Weaselboy said:
Did you just add that, or was I missing it before?

Just added it

sfx2000 · Apr 18, 2016

thiggins said:
New RSS Feeds box added in right column

Recommend not doing this, as my RSS feed-reader uses their own ads, and I'm sure others do as well - and this will hurt page views here...

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