XenForo 2.0 Discussion

[drastic]

It really depends on the crowd, 80% of our customers want a familiar feel otherwise their users make a fuss. Each niche or market can be vastly different and taking to much of the "ten year old forum" feel away can be a bad choice. Being able to provide rich content and being unique in your niche or market is a key to success. Trying to make a forum something it isn't doesn't usually turn out well.

Why aren't those forums growing much faster? What I can't grasp is that we have Facebook login enabled, market on Facebook, and the people STILL don't sign up. It takes like 4 seconds with Facebook login enabled, so what's stopping those people? Is it the look? Is it the presentation of content? It's really a mystery that we should try figuring out. You'd think with Facebook login and a few links that people share/like, they'd be all over it. But there's something preventing them and we need to figure that out.

Most people are also content with repeating the same thing over and over as long as it "works" - but in regards to social media - this is not working to our advantage and we need to be competitive with their UI and ease-of-use.

Forums were massive back in the day. We could open forums and droves of people would show up outta nowhere.

We CAN pull those massive crowds back in, but we have to think forward and evolve.

As long as the functionality is there (or ability to code it in), then a good/creative designer can work wonders anyway.

Just something for people to think about when they're struggling to grow a forum they spent a few hundred on and can't figure out why no one's participating or they're not earning any cash back. Dumping money into projects and not seeing a return on investment kinda stinks.

@Davyc - spend a few moments on any social media site and look where the content is. It's in the center.

Look here. The center of the page is often blank. Is that a visual roadblock for new visitors? Are they getting lost? Not sure what to do? Think the site is broke? I'm not sure...


What we did on one forum was condense all nodes, label things under prefixes, then display this page as the "forum." We cut down on the need to browse nodes, made the blank center smaller, displayed full titles, etc - it helped, but I think it can be even better with a thumbnail preview or even exploring a grid layout (depending on your niche). A third column COULD be an answer. Or a smaller screen size...


Was talking to @Russ ages ago about a 3 column setup (not sure if they released one yet), but I envisioned it looking something like this - which is much closer to that of Facebook and Twitter. It puts the content in the center where a majority of social media users are used to looking. This isn't a perfect look, but it helps present things in the center where many social media people are used to seeing them. And of course, any designer here could take this "idea" and come up with something that actually looks good. My MS Paint work is pretty crappy.




It's NOT that we want to be social media, but rather we should use social media's success and design in our favor. We can give people an experience that feels familiar and possibly mimics what they might be used to. It might raise their comfort level a bit and get them signing up more than they used to.

Social media is destroying forums and we would be exceptionally stupid and stubborn to not observe what they do and find pieces of it to integrate into forums and give them a more modern feel. They don't need to look super pretty, just be easier to use and display content better.

It's worth being open minded, exploring, and observing what made social media so successful and finding ways to integrate their success into our own projects.

Things that don't adapt over time usually become irrelevant.

 

[Jake B.]

Look here. The center of the page is often blank. Is that a visual roadblock for new visitors? Are they getting lost? Not sure what to do? Think the site is broke? I'm not sure...

You can set your forum to use a fixed width, and this is much less noticable, without a fixed width it's even worse on a large display (Currently using 27" 5k imac)

 

[BassMan]

What we did on one forum was condense all nodes, label things under prefixes, then display this page as the "forum." We cut down on the need to browse nodes, made the blank center smaller, displayed full titles, etc - it helped, but I think it can be even better with a thumbnail preview or even exploring a grid layout (depending on your niche). A third column COULD be an answer. Or a smaller screen size...

Depends on forum niche, but this solution is useful and looks attractive. But still, I'm ok with forum like it is.

 

[James]

@drastic that's an excellent write up that does set ones mind wondering. Half of the issue is your demographic though. You don't go on social media for intelligent conversation or long posts, but I do believe we should utilise more social aspects (trending topics, etc) and highlight the social aspects of forum use more to entice more people.

A lot of the time people won't join if they're looking for a solution; they'll read it and move on!

 

[Paul B]

Those screenshots look like typical click-bait headlines to me, but then that seems to be the trend these days, rather than any meaningful content.

 

[TPerry]

Forums were massive back in the day. We could open forums and droves of people would show up outta nowhere.

BBS's were massive in the day. Technology and needs change.

 

[BassMan]

but then that seems to be the trend these days, rather than any meaningful content.

Agree with that.

 

[Steve F]

Why aren't those forums growing much faster? What I can't grasp is that we have Facebook login enabled, market on Facebook, and the people STILL don't sign up. It takes like 4 seconds with Facebook login enabled, so what's stopping those people? Is it the look? Is it the presentation of content? It's really a mystery that we should try figuring out. You'd think with Facebook login and a few links that people share/like, they'd be all over it. But there's something preventing them and we need to figure that out.

Most people are also content with repeating the same thing over and over as long as it "works" - but in regards to social media - this is not working to our advantage and we need to be competitive with their UI and ease-of-use.

Forums were massive back in the day. We could open forums and droves of people would show up outta nowhere.

We CAN pull those massive crowds back in, but we have to think forward and evolve.

As long as the functionality is there (or ability to code it in), then a good/creative designer can work wonders anyway.

Just something for people to think about when they're struggling to grow a forum they spent a few hundred on and can't figure out why no one's participating or they're not earning any cash back. Dumping money into projects and not seeing a return on investment kinda stinks.

@Davyc - spend a few moments on any social media site and look where the content is. It's in the center.

Look here. The center of the page is often blank. Is that a visual roadblock for new visitors? Are they getting lost? Not sure what to do? Think the site is broke? I'm not sure...
View attachment 139329

What we did on one forum was condense all nodes, label things under prefixes, then display this page as the "forum." We cut down on the need to browse nodes, made the blank center smaller, displayed full titles, etc - it helped, but I think it can be even better with a thumbnail preview or even exploring a grid layout (depending on your niche). A third column COULD be an answer. Or a smaller screen size...
View attachment 139330

Was talking to @Russ ages ago about a 3 column setup (not sure if they released one yet), but I envisioned it looking something like this - which is much closer to that of Facebook and Twitter. It puts the content in the center where a majority of social media users are used to looking. This isn't a perfect look, but it helps present things in the center where many social media people are used to seeing them. And of course, any designer here could take this "idea" and come up with something that actually looks good. My MS Paint work is pretty crappy.

View attachment 139331


It's NOT that we want to be social media, but rather we should use social media's success and design in our favor. We can give people an experience that feels familiar and possibly mimics what they might be used to. It might raise their comfort level a bit and get them signing up more than they used to.

Social media is destroying forums and we would be exceptionally stupid and stubborn to not observe what they do and find pieces of it to integrate into forums and give them a more modern feel. They don't need to look super pretty, just be easier to use and display content better.

It's worth being open minded, exploring, and observing what made social media so successful and finding ways to integrate their success into our own projects.

Things that don't adapt over time usually become irrelevant.

I guess it comes down to how much work you want to do and how much money you want to throw at it. I cannot comment on why your users don't engage. A constant change in design doesn't seem like the correct approach though. FB, Twitter and the others can get away with it simply because they don't just have 100-2500 users viewing the site they have millions.

I think the underlying core of XenForo is excellent for customizing. We removed all our nodes in favor of a widget with prefixes as well but we have ended up back with a traditional layout. Can't say I liked it as it just felt unorganized but it really wasn't since you could click a prefix at anytime to sort by game. I just feel with the site you previously had (not sure you still have it), a forum wasn't what you needed.

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

Why not give people the options by allowing more than one view style/method/etc. Is there anything preventing that? One person might prefer a standard forum interface. Another might like a thread list with infinite scroll and prefix sorting/etc. I'm sure there is a way to make both happen on one site and be best of both worlds.

 

[BassMan]

Why not give people the options by allowing more than one view style/method/etc. Is there anything preventing that?

I believe it's because of maintenance. Too complex isn't always the right way. The core must be "simple" and functional, for all the rest there are add-ons, many of them are high professional. But one thing I miss on XenForo is more offical add-ons, but I know there's maintenance again.

Maybe XenForo can hire another 5-10 developers and we'll all get what we want till end of summer

 

[drastic]

Those screenshots look like typical click-bait headlines to me, but then that seems to be the trend these days, rather than any meaningful content.

Headlines are different for everyone. And yeah, for our particular need, they were always a bit click-baity because that's what worked on Facebook. Except I didn't go FULL click-bait - the titles really would lead to actual content for us. I didn't have it in my soul to pull the nonsense others do.

The point isn't the headlines, but what can we do to get these registrations and interactions up? Why do people come to our sites and NOT register? Even awesome sites with great content struggle.

Sometimes when we struggle, we have to look at what works for others and optimize it for our own needs. Make our own version of it...or even better, take what we like/what works for many others and formulate something custom for ourselves and our goals.

I suppose the point of my lil rant was for us to not be too stubborn and stuck in our old forum ways. If we don't evolve, then we will surely go away.

We don't have to become social media, but we can look at what makes them successful and find ways to integrate their success into our own projects.

 

[drastic]

@drastic that's an excellent write up that does set ones mind wondering. Half of the issue is your demographic though. You don't go on social media for intelligent conversation or long posts, but I do believe we should utilise more social aspects (trending topics, etc) and highlight the social aspects of forum use more to entice more people.

A lot of the time people won't join if they're looking for a solution; they'll read it and move on!

Great point! How do we KEEP the user? Should we require a registration to see the answer? Should we ask for an email or a Facebook like? People who come and go treat the content like a blog article. How to we spark that interaction?

I'm guilty of it myself. I look for an answer to something, then read it and leave. I don't ever comment or join the forum. But I'm also a webmaster and we think a little different than normal surfers. Normal surfers sign up for everything, so why not us?

Is there a question/answer addon here? Or perhaps a "vote up the best reply" or "reply with the most likes" moves to the top kinda addon?

 

[Davyc]

spend a few moments on any social media site and look where the content is. It's in the center.

Not only have I spent considerable time on SM I've actually dropped forums in favour of a FB clone - several of them in fact, and spent a fortune in the process. You can guess what happened - zilch! And these were touted as the best FB clones - so even offering people a duplicate of what they use daily ended up with only a few joining; same as what happens to most forums. It's an unknown number of factors that stop people from joining any site, not just a forum site. Time, intelligence, the wherewithal to actually learn a new system, the desire to engage with strangers as opposed to family and friends already known, and more. It's not just one aspect of forums or how you feed the information to visitors. I Tweet on FB to a linked topic and there's loads of visitors reading - they come because what I Tweet has an interest for them, but they don't stick and look around - they wait for the next Tweet that guides them to the next topic. I've even added an addon that shows them similar topics on the same page that they're currently viewing that may also be of interest them, but do they click them and go see what else is there for them - no! Is this link blindness or tunnel vision?

In a few days I'm cutting off visitor access to see if that will urge them to register (I doubt it) and if they do register, hope that they then participate and engage (which I doubt again). There's not going to be a magic answer to this question of why people don't join and participate - its the way it is in this era; if you want to be as popular as FB and Twitter then you have to be the next best thing and there's people out there with access to more clout than we will ever have, but another success story like FB/Twitter hasn't yet emerged on the scene. And when/if it does and it's a success, that will be another hammer blow to forums.

Does that mean we should give up? Hell no! What we ought to be diverting our energies towards finding those people who genuinely want to use a forum and who are interested in the niche you're promoting and welcoming them aboard. That's no easy task, but it is where we need to be right now. Not copying FB/Twitter because that will never work - the graveyard of clones out there is testament to that.

As I said in a previous post along the ways, if any developer can surmount this insurmountable looking problem facing forums, I'll take my hat off to them (and probably eat it too lol).

 

[drastic]

You know what they say, if there's already a clone, then you're too late.

The magic trick might be the old grass roots method and personally inviting people and taking the long slow path to growth.

Was the clone you tried named something with the word Fox? If so, I had that quite some years ago and while the coding was good, it seemed like every module in it was half done or not thought out very well.

I posted a picture somewhere before. It was a conversation in a Facebook group for bloggers. The person asked about commenting on posts, and the overwhelming answer was that people weren't commenting because they didn't want to sign up. "I'm not signing up just to leave a comment" and my thought was guest posting that grabbed an email address and invited them later.

Let them participate right away (check for spam of course), but capture their email address so we can invite later and let them register when they're not too busy.

 

[Davyc]

Dolphin, Kootali, Fox and Social Engine - so you guessed good in saying Fox lol.

What amuses me about those who say 'I'm not signing up just to leave a comment' - they'll do it on Twitter and Facebook, but can't be bothered to do it on your site, why? Ignorance and laziness. Ignorant because they are unaware that this is the way the system works (and admins don't want a spam free-for-all) and laziness because they've already done so at least twice and doing it again taxes them. Even giving them the opportunity to use their FB or Twitter info and simplify the process is too much effort for them to work with.

On reflection, when I come to think of it, it's not really a software problem (forums are creaking and ancient is often the cry), it's a people problem. Look at the quality of the posts on Twitter and FB - 'here's a picture of my arse what do you all think - Mwahhaha!' 'Here's a video of me off my face'. Really intelligent! In effect, the likes of FB and Twitter have dumbed people down and impressed upon them that all they need is the intelligence of an amoeba to use their system. You have to ask yourself, is this the quality of members that I want on my site? I'd rather have 20 good, intelligent participants who generate interesting conversations, than have 500 morons filling the spaces with crud.

So is it really the software at fault? Or is it the people online? It's much easier changing software in comparison to trying to change people. This may seem like a very cynical viewpoint, but one that is well-founded as well as a sad indictment to people in general that everything needs to be easy to use and then it needs to be made easier still and then it needs to do it all for them so they don't have to bother. Can some kind developer create an add-on that generates members and then goes on to generate topics and replies? We could then do away with people and the problem is solved.

Rant over - I'm still looking forward to XF2 and what it has to offer up - and I will still make sites based on XF software in the hope that one day things may change for the better.

 

[drastic]

Good points!

Although I want a mix of quality and quantity. Just enough brains to keep it going, but tons of zombies coming in and out to run my ad impressions up. Or, tons of brains would essentially be better.

It probably is a people problem more than anything. Either that or we need to post more selfies of our butts and maybe we'll get a big following!

I just got a new sign up using the way I mentioned earlier - just asking someone if they want to join. She actually signed up too. Now if she comes back, that's a different story!

 

[CTXMedia]

The landscape has changed. Mobile proliferation has turned people into consumers, rather than creators. Social platforms give them lots of content to click on and flick past, and glance at, and headline, but it's not content that begs any thought or discussion or interaction - it's just "stuff". There's oodles of it, everywhere. It lasts for milliseconds and then it is binned in favour of the next bit of fluff. And there are countless apps that suck it down onto your device and ping you and push it at you; connect your friends to it; connect you to what your friends are consuming. It's great. No effort required at all. You don't have to do a thing - just wait a few seconds for the next spurious, over-exaggerated, faux headlined bit of fluff to arrive. Be it pictures, videos, or those countless (and meaningless) life-affirming junk phrases about sorting out or what's "important" in your life.

No thanks. Give me a discussion anyday.

 

[Davyc]

Either that or we need to post more selfies of our butts and maybe we'll get a big following!

That made me both LOL and shudder at the same time.

The landscape has changed. Mobile proliferation has turned people into consumers, rather than creators. Social platforms give them lots of content to click on and flick past, and glance at, and headline, but it's not content that begs any thought or discussion or interaction - it's just "stuff". There's oodles of it, everywhere. It lasts for milliseconds and then it is binned in favour of the next bit of fluff. And there are countless apps that suck it down onto your device and ping you and push it at you; connect your friends to it; connect you to what your friends are consuming. It's great. No effort required at all. You don't have to do a thing - just wait a few seconds for the next spurious, over-exaggerated, faux headlined bit of fluff to arrive. Be it pictures, videos, or those countless (and meaningless) life-affirming junk phrases about sorting out or what's "important" in your life.

You nailed it! 100%

 

[Mike]

A good portion of the last few pages have been dedicated to a discussion we already split out of this thread once because it's a huge discussion itself: https://xenforo.com/community/threads/the-future-of-forums-vs-social-media.114387/ (Which has nearly 200 replies and if it gets picked back up, it'll probably get more. )

A lot of the points being brought up here are better discussed--and have been brought up--in that thread. I haven't found a great split point to move the posts here into that thread, so I think I'm going to leave them (unless I see a clear path). However, I think it'd be better to continue any further discussion about the social media comparison in that thread rather than here.

 

[CTXMedia]

Fair point @Mike - perhaps we need a distraction ... another XF2.0 mini-reveal?