I know I just got back, and don't have much room to talk, but it seems like AU is running quite slowly. Many of the boards haven't had posts since the new year, and Claric hasn't logged on since then either. We need to find some way of drawing people into AU; a way of revitalizing the community, you could say.

Advertisement is an obvious idea, but it's risky; I've seen many boards swamped with spam because they trolled a thread on another forum. Personally, I have little idea how the process actually works. That's why I'm asking you what your ideas are. My hope is that we can register 20 new members by July. I have some plans, and I might run some by Fox later.

In this thread, vocalize your ideas and thoughts. I want to know what you're thinking, and how you feel, and I'm sure Fox would like to also.

cool... just thought i'd let u know i've read this and gonna get my brain into thinking gear and reply later... :)

Couldn't agree with you more LC.

One thing I might suggest is placing the address and a link in your signatures on any other forums you go to. In a standard font, they aren't too big that they have to be removed, and you'll be amazed how many people notice those little links in people's sigs.

true, i think we just need to advertise in any way we can.

The sad truth is that we are never going to be as big as, say, Legends Alliance, and a lot of writers are on things like Fiction Press, Fanfiction.net or Writing.com.

I am amazed this place is still as active as it is, but we must all do our best to make this place even more active.

even if it isn't going to be that active the more the better, as i said before we just need to advertise everywhere we can and then hope.

So, as CyanideWyrm said, can anyone think of any ideas to boost members and activity OTHER than advertising?

Trust me on this: site spamming leads to forum spamming. I've seen it happen before, and have done it myself. It would be nice if you could spread the site through word of mouth, but I know many of you might not have friends who would be interested, and those that are may already be here. I've put a link in my signature to the site at other message boards I frequent.

i didn't mean that we spread it everywhere over sites but perhaps that we make a post to advertise it on the sites we are on.

If you are a well respected member of a board, and wouldn't be punished or scrutinized for posting the link, then I guess there's no harm in doing so.

Just try not to step on too many toes, Kai.

lol, i'm sure i'll be fine

Erm, I'm not sure if this would excatly boost members, but its an idea I had. We often talk about books that we've read, and I thought it would be nice to have a section of the site where members can write reviews on books they have read, really liked and would recomend to others. Then when you are stuck for a book to read you can go there and get some ideas.

I guess its not strictly writing related, but most writers love reading as well

^_^

That is a good idea. i've been meaning to rant about the Farseer trilogy. If you want, aleana, start a thread in here about it. If it gets too big or too confusing, we'll give it a separate forum

and we could have music reviews in the music section. Gemz could review G4 :P

BOOKS!! I could review millions!

Believe it or not I' actually reading the One of my friends lent it to me, and I lent him Artemis Fowl (READ IT TF!!) because we have opposing tastes in books.

I'm new here, and i'm trying to step on any toes. However, maybe another skin as an option could come in handy. Its just that this one is so anoying.

Also, if any of you go to University or highschool, go into the library at your school and see the librarians, if you ask poilite enough they may allow you to put up some posters in there. That way you might get the school bookworms to come here.

There may also be a website for this sort og thing, where people can advertise writing forums especially. That would really boost up the traffic.

You could try getting us on google, although i dont know how thats possible.

Just a few suggestions.

skin???
all sounds gd...? :)

what did happen to all our skin options anyway?

The skins option went wrong. Mainly because I put the chooser in. We had a range of skins, and i even posted the code so that you could make your own.

However, within a month, it got stuck on one skin, and i offered the choice of skins and this one was chosen. So how many people don't want this skin?

I personally want to find a skin that looks like a book or something writer related. If anyone can find/make one, please let me know.


As for posters, goose, I've suggested that everyone do something similar at the top of every page in this forum. Now i know that I have put flyers up at uni, but who else has? Hmm?

I put up about 150 posters around my high school; I stuck them just about every place you could imagine. Then I had to go around and take them all down, because I didn't have "proper authority" to put them up. Now I'm basically waiting for the heads-up to put them up again, which may take as long as two weeks.

Affiliation is always another option. We could try affiliating ourselves with another site.

*cough* LA *cough*

Fox, You have a bit of standing on the site, if you were to propose to DJ/Chik/Khuff an affiliation with the site, where we link up like ZL, then we will have the added bonus of that HUGE amount of traffic. They may of course say no, but its worth a shot. Give them something they want, like a revived RPG section with some "hot shot" writers, and well, you never know. You may have to make DJ a mod or admin here, to get him to agreee, but the result may be a beautiful partnership.

Just another Idea. What do y'all think?

I think that's a very good idea. After all, the original members here were LA people. It would certainly bring in a few more members.

I have to say, i think it's a long shot. The sites that LA is affiliated with are all Zelda based, and this is not. Plus, I imagine that a lot of users try to affiliate their forums with LA - what makes ours so special?

But I will DEFINITELY go on LA and PM them. if it works, it would be fantastic!

What do you think, Cyanide?

The reason we are so special is that we are a forum where people can come and grow as writers. LA has become more than just a Zelda site now, its become a whole community of people who may even have no interest in Zelda whatsoever.

Just think, Contro, Life, The Commons, The Dorms, have nothing to do with Zelda. You need to argue that we can make the RPGs what they once were at LA. We are a community of 50 writers that can get that section of the site back on its feet. (We may not have 50 active members, but we need not mention that.)

Give it everything you have, in the PM because if we can get this deal done, we'll never have to worry about getting people to the site anymore. I know, i'm new, and no expert at this sort of thing, but we can make this bigger than even the RPGs used to be.

It's a great idea. I'll PM Khuffie tomorrow.

I TRIED doing a new skin, but everyone demanded this one back. Any requests skin-wise? I'll do what I can to make a cool new one ^_^

Actually, DL, this IS your skin! The original is hidden away in my laptop. Do we want that one back?

I need help with the PM, peeps.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Khuffie,

I am writing to you with regards to a suggestion by one of the members of my forum, Authors United.

[I realise you might think this is an April Fool's joke, what with it being April the First over here, but it's after noon, so i assure you this is genuine ;) ]

Our forum, originally started by LA member, Clairc, is dedicated to writers. We provide advice for writers from feelow writers. We have monthly writing competitions, a dorm system and a fairly active RPG forum. We are also in desperate need of members.

The suggestion was this: affliation with the Legends Alliance network.

If this happened, our writers would be able to inject some life into the LA RPG forum, and of course, we would make you, DJ, or another LA representative an admin on our forum to assist this partnership.

???ewhat next?

Yours,

BatchGC

I meant another new skin that's like, swish and new and funky and timeless.

No idea about letters, sorry

i really want a skin that makes the forum look like a book, or something writing related, but i don't want it to look cheesy.

I'm also getting bored of the colour blue.

What does everyone else think?

i think some kind of icons or pics around the site or over the site would be good.

Good PM Fox, very good. Post up the response when you get one.

Get a bookish skin, like a botepad or something, just please get rid of this one, it hurts my eyes, MY EYES!

I really dont mind the blue but surely theres other writting forums or sites we could ask to advertise on?

A book looking skin would look awesome. Maybe even have the posts bits of parchment.

Anyway advertising around the net is almost a definite. You won't get by with just sitting and waiting trust me. I advertised at just one place once and the forum was dead within a week.

On the subject of google that shouldn't be much a problem as since this is an invisionfree board it gets advertised there automatically. I'll bet if you search for Reviving AU in google you will find it. Just maybe on the 50th page but it's there and it gets closer to the first page with the more places that have linked to the site. As google is sorted with the amount of popularity. The more links linking to AU the more popular it gets and the closer it comes to the first page.

Affilates is another option that was mentioned before. Get your self an affilate button similar to this...

... then ask other large forums if they wont to affiliate. The only problem with that is quite a lot of the larger forums don't have affiliates.

Personally I've never had the spam overload thingy and haven't really worried about it. If there is a spam overload whatever you call it kick out the people causing it with no questions asked. Once you pick up a steady amount of members then leave it as that and if you get it right you'll find that that the amount of members leaving will be almost the same as the amount coming in. If your getting way to many then get rid of a few advertisements.

Also theres the option of internet directorys such as this one... http://www.dmoz.org/
... that's one of the big ones and would suggest it.

Now these are all just ideas so don't go bananas over it or at me at that matter as I repeat these are just ideas.

And they're great ideas, Grogdon, and I'll be looking into them!

Another idea would be to find out where and how the current members found this place and see which one has worked best.

I'm pretty sure most of our members were invited here. I personally know 90% of the active members, and they brought friends on here.

Any new suggestion for the skin, post them here

personally I hate the idea of a book skin :P But thats just cos simple designs work best, in my experience.

Yeah, but a book skin would be quite simple.

i like the idea of that scripty type one- that sounds cool. Maybe need something to show its about reading books etc...? :)

I have to agree with DL in this, whilst in principle it sounds like a good idea i doubt you could get a good skin based on it.