[//Aneurysm\\]

Basic Forum Layouts

Tired of getting negative comments because your forum layout looks sloppy? Are you tired of members asking where certain forums are located? Never fear, making a good forum layout is much easier then you think. For starters, here are some good tips

1)Get a good skin that has nice buttons to them.
2)For a forum just starting out. Try not to have too many forums. Save some of your ideas for later uses once your forum gets more populated.
3)Make clear, easy to read, and fun forum descriptions
4)Use good grammer!

The Skin of your forum will greatly affect the way people see your board. Some people might have a darker screen then yours and they might not be able to read the font, especially if its all black or dark grey. Try to get a skin that fits the mood and theme of your forum. Custom skins work great! It is also a good thing to get matching buttons for your skin. Having a great green skin is useless if you have bright red buttons. It will completly ruin the look. Try to get buttons and forum markers that flow together.

Alright, now that you have your skin, buttons, and forum markers all flowing great together. Its time to discuss some of your forums you wish. Your first forums you should make are News and Rules forums. Your should have 1 seperate forum that holds all the rules of your board. Be sure to make your rules easy to read. You should also have a forum that holds the latest news and announcements of your board. A good forum to use in this catagory is a Welcome board. Welcome boards are great ways to let your members say hi to other members and introduce themselves. Last but not least for this section is a great idea to either make a seperate forum, or combine it with the news forum, a forum that lets your members post suggestions and/or questions they have of your forum.

Those forums are the main forums that every forum should have. After you make that, its now time to make a catagory for whatever the theme of your board is. If its a Gaming board then making forums that have to do with gaming (Look at my forum if you want). If its a GFX forum then make forums that showcase GFX, requests, or whatever interesting ideas you have. But remember to save some of your ideas for later uses because your members might get bored with the forums you have now.

The next catagory should be your lounge or off-topic board. If you run one of those boards where it is basically about everything, then put this in any order you wish. Your Lounge forum should have a forum that is just for General Disscussions. These forums are great for talking about whatever you wish and whatever comes to mind. Sub-forums are your friends. I would suggest making a sub-forum for games. No, not video games, but forum games that you can play. For instance, the Your Banned, This or That, Hell Yeah or Hell No, and Rate that "..." above you are all great games to get your forum's post count higher. Along with that forum you can combine it with a Spam forum where people can rant on and on about anything they wish and make absolutly retarted posts. Another forum you can add to the Lounge catagory would be a Media board. The Media boards are excellent places for gaming gurus, movie fanatics, and music junkies to hang out at. They will be some of the most popular forums on your board. Another forum that no board should go without is a Plug your Forum forum or a Forum Advertising forum. These forums are great for getting members to come to your forum because lots of members join simply to advertise. I would advise putting post restrictions on this forum so your members will have to post a little to post in it.

When making forum descriptions. Its a great idea to use proper grammer. Making typos like ahve and hte are common and easy to understand, but they really can destroy the look of your board. Try to proofread all your typing. Some other forums you can add would be a GFX catagory. I added one of these to my forums, and I have gotton about 30% of my members because they see the GFX boards. You can also add forums that help out IF modifications and administration (like TSL). For gaming forums, an RPG section would do wonders because RPGs are loads of fun for members.

Ahh! Now how does your board? Are you now getting high ranks in layout now? Well thats good because those simple forums are key forums staples that no forum should not have. Remember to save some of your forum ideas for later uses, and not to have too many forums. Why you ask? Too many forums can make your new members feel overwhelmed and they won't know where to post. So, what are you waiting for? Get fixing up your board to make it look like a hot supermodel.

-Submitted by //Aneurysm\\ on 10-9-05. This may not be posted anywhere with out my permission

[Hector]

Your such a fine writer man. This is was well thought out, with some attitude throwen into it. I have now doubt that this will definatly be on Mike's final list.

[//Aneurysm\\]

You really think so?

[Hector]

Originally Posted By: //Aneurysm\\ You really think so?

Yup. No joke, try writing professionally. Send your stuff to Game Magz and such.

[//Aneurysm\\]

Hmmm....I would but I know I won't be able to get any money from them. My reviews take so long to make by the time I finish them, the game is about a month or 2 old....

[Hector]

Well, the professionalls get the game how many months in advance? Lol, they get plenty of time to write there reviews. Just give it a shot, no harm in trying.

Send a company your Half-Life 2 review. It's really something.

[//Aneurysm\\]

HL2's been out for nearly a year.....

IDK. I guess Ill see what they say.....

[Hector]

It doen't matter how old the game is man. Just show them how good your review is so they know what your capable of.

[SteveS]

An excellent article thoughtfully written. I fully agree with Hector - send examples of your work regardless of the age of the subject. One thing, though, run it through a spell checker first, eh?

[//Aneurysm\\]

Yes. I will definetly proofread it a little more. Spell CHeck doesn't get everything.

[SnaKKer]

You people are making me want to write an article or two, I certainly have enough to write about from ETC o0

Nice read.

[Michael]

Originally Posted By: Hector Your such a fine writer man. This is was well thought out, with some attitude throwen into it. I have now doubt that this will definatly be on Mike's final list.

All posted articles will be added to the final poll