[zidergirl]

We have a member base of 900+ and theres a fair few that havent ever posted.
Someone on the forums has asked about pruning these non posters from the member base , as it doesnt look to good for our site.
Has anyone else done this or have any thoughts on it?
He also mentioned it takes up precious bandwidth. which we dont think it can.
thanks for any help :happy:

[SteveS]

Only an issue if you have limited bandwidth on the forum, surely, but then only if all are posting, so then you're better off with a hardcore of regular posters, a fringe of sometime posters, and a goodly number of lurkers You see, having lurkers boosts your member numbers and don't harm your forum, unless they're stealing from it!

[Michael]

I think it is entirely dependant upon the nature of the site. For example if a site like TSL has a large amount of non posters this doesnt mean they are active just that they would rather partake. I guess it is all down to how relevant you want your board statistics to be.

[ShinLi]

You mean in like deleting member accounts? (yeah my english ins't that great yet XD)

Well, you could also do it this way.

Search up all the members with 0 posts, look at when they registered, and to when they last we're active. If they never got active afterwards, or only a few day after, and then never came back. I think it's save to delete those accounts, as they have forgotten you. Maybe it will help cleaning numbers up a bit, but won't let you leave with 100 members or sumthing.

You can also do the same way, but then for the earliest members who signed up and never got active.

[Andy]

I think its bad it shows your forum lacks in members and although it might be active most new members dont look at that too much.I'ved been at a forum that had 120 members when i joined about 2 years ago i went back and my account was gone and they had 100 members and no post.


What im syaing is that it makes your board look bad even more that same board now declared themselves dead all admins are gone.

[KingSpade]

It would really depend on your personal preference, though if you are going to remove older accounts with 0 posts, I would suggest only removing those that have not visited in 4-8 months. Chances are if they have not vested additional interest in this period of time, they're not going to or have already forgotten about the website.

If it's a case of forgetting, you can alternatively e-mail your member base. Keep them up to date with what's going on within your community and then if they are still not posting, follow the above ruling and remove them.

[n3x]

... Really, pruning the members is bad for the forums. No offense to ya, but what will these inactive members effect the forums as? Really, its only done in a member database of 5k + members. I just don't think its necasarry. But if the site has lots of mods / lag / flash animation, it may be nesasary to get rid of unused parts of the boarsds, images, and members.

[Moparx]

I personally purge 0 post accounts from my forum monthly.

However, before I do I send an email halfway through the month to the members reminding them about our forum. I try to find out if they are having any technical difficulties or simply don't want to visit. If it is the latter I ask for ways that I can make the forum more enjoyable for them.

If they do not respond or visit the forum after the month is up the account is deleted. I do not delete any account that at least one post.

[Michael]

Originally Posted By: n3x ... Really, pruning the members is bad for the forums. No offense to ya, but what will these inactive members effect the forums as? Really, its only done in a member database of 5k + members. I just don't think its necasarry. But if the site has lots of mods / lag / flash animation, it may be nesasary to get rid of unused parts of the boarsds, images, and members.

I agree, if you have a large member database which is actually effecting site performance or eating up your bandwidth then of course action needs to be taken. But at the moment for a forum with 900 members i dont see this being too much of an issue.

[gregsbaby64]

Originally Posted By: Michael I agree, if you have a large member database which is actually effecting site performance or eating up your bandwidth then of course action needs to be taken. But at the moment for a forum with 900 members i dont see this being too much of an issue.

We have a REALLY small member list right now. We were growing slowly, then I started cracking down on the non-posters which on our board is a lurker. I put something in the FAQ about not posting for so many days or visiting and not posting. Lurking is not something that's really done on the board, as it's a chatty bunch of ladies. I simply put the gals in the "awaiting email registration" user group, then shoot them an email as PM's cannot be picked up once they are in that group. If after 30 days they haven't responded I simply delete them. I personall would rather have a small active board than one with 100's of lurkers. Especially since some of our topics are about our families.

[Michael]

Originally Posted By: gregsbaby64 We have a REALLY small member list right now. We were growing slowly, then I started cracking down on the non-posters which on our board is a lurker. I put something in the FAQ about not posting for so many days or visiting and not posting. Lurking is not something that's really done on the board, as it's a chatty bunch of ladies. I simply put the gals in the "awaiting email registration" user group, then shoot them an email as PM's cannot be picked up once they are in that group. If after 30 days they haven't responded I simply delete them. I personall would rather have a small active board than one with 100's of lurkers. Especially since some of our topics are about our families.

I agree completely, having a community is much more important then having impressive stats to churn out at any given moment to sound impressive and important. As always the issue of quality over quantity prevails

[Photog]

i never prune members... many members chose to login and just not post. thats their choice.

plus having them remain as members gives you a larger member base total which in turn will lure new registrants. for example if i saw two forums on the exact same content, but one has 100 members and the other has 1200. id register one the one with 1200 not really caring how many of those actually dont contribute etc. it just seems that forum is more established.

also large member numbers comes in handy when selling advertising...

i dont prune or remove etc. i keepem all! hehe

[Photog]

also one last thing... i send out cool monthly newsletters for several reason...

the first and foremost important reason is to try to respark interest in those members that have 'forgotten' about our forum. everytime i send one out we always get a bunch of people that have not been on in a long while come back and begin to contribute.

getting members is half the battle of having a successful forum so why prune or eliminate ones you already have simply because they dont contribute... just try to entice them to get back and contribute.

[Michael]

Originally Posted By: Photog also one last thing... i send out cool monthly newsletters for several reason... the first and foremost important reason is to try to respark interest in those members that have 'forgotten' about our forum. everytime i send one out we always get a bunch of people that have not been on in a long while come back and begin to contribute. getting members is half the battle of having a successful forum so why prune or eliminate ones you already have simply because they dont contribute... just try to entice them to get back and contribute.

Exactly, most users are usually just lurking away so to delete their account when infact that could an active "user" of your forums is just unfortunate and only loses you members. To those who like their member statistics to be accurate and a relevant portayal of who you are active members you'll soon find that it can become difficult to differentiate between who active and who is inactive, of course though if disk space is an issue then purging is really your only option, although i think that pruning posts is a much better way of ridding yourself of some excessive bandwidth.