HockeyForum.ca

[Jacksplat]

Hi.

I need help or advice.

I haven't made a website in almost ten years, Back when HTML was good enough. Now I have upwards of 500 domains. I have several I'd like to develop into money making sites. They don't need to make alot, but I'll try just the same.

To start myself off I'd love to develop HockeyForum.ca into a top forum for hockey, NHL (of course). I've looked around and see that Hockeyforums.com is the only good forum for such a topic.

I need to know what to do, where to start, how to maximize traffic, and earn the most possible in adds.

To offer the members something, I do have alot of collectable items instock I can use for raffles, prizes, and so on. Including card sets, rookie cards, autographs on cards, pucks, etc... totalling about 2000 lbs in cases. hehe.

If anyone wants to advise me it would be greatly appreciated, If anyone wants to partner up with me, I can offer a split.

Thanks for any participation.

Kevin.

[nts]

That's a wonderful domain name for a hockey forum. I'd pick up a copy of IPB or vBulletin, whichever you prefer, I'd recommend IPB, but vB is great too. The best way to divide the boards up IMO, would be:

Site News
- Announcements
- Suggestions

General Hockey
- General Hockey chat
- Equipement
- Junior/other teams and leagues

NHL
-Eastern Conference
- Teams as subforums (Tampa, NY, etc.)
-Western Conference
- Teams as subforums

General
- General Chat
- Introductions

That's probably a good way to layout the forums, just need to put up ads around forums like here, advertising the prizes for posting. If you need any assistance, I'd be happy to help you out.

[DNGeeks]

Lets not forget to add the AHL, as it gained popularity during the hockey strike.

You could also add a forum for olympic hockey when the time comes around.

One thing you don't want to do is to have a bunch of empty forums. Wait until you're busy to open more specialized forums such as a forum for each team. If forums are seen as empty then users will shy away.

Giving away prizes is an excellent way to promote the site and to keep users there. You could give away a prize for the most posts in a month or the best image uploaded. You can use an image gallery which allows users to vote on images.

Get your friends to post in the forum daily, ask for users here to post for F$. Posts are the most important aspect of running a forum. If there are no posts then no one will show up and start posting. They need a boost to start them off.

Make your forum rules specific, and if necessary post them in each subforum.

That should help you a bit.

[Jacksplat]

Believe it or not, DNGeeks and nts your posts help alot. Also got a helpfull PM.

Much appreciated.

Keep it coming everyone, I can use all the advice and info I can get.
I don't want to make more than one attempt at this. So I'd like to get it right the first time. There is nothing worse than having a forum with the only post being from the admin making his first post.

Kevin.

[nts]

Glad you found the posts useful. Good luck with the site, I'm certainly going to become a member .

[P10n33R]

I would be glad to help out with this project if you need a hand.

[Jacksplat]

Email me.. maybe we can work something out

555-1212@rogers.com

Kevin.