Managing Online Forums: A Must Read!
If you have been following my blog you know that a couple of weeks ago Patrick O’Keefe contacted me via Twitter to see if I would be interested in reviewing his book; Managing Online Forums, I said of course without even hesitating. I used to listen to Patrick’s podcast that he used to do a couple years ago. It was a shame when he stopped. Well I finally finished reading it from cover to cover and ready to give it my full review.
So onto my review:
Whether you are a seasoned forum owner, just starting out or thinking about staring a forum this book is for you. It is an easy guide from choosing a topic along with a domain name and to setting up a forum without getting to technical and moves on to how to manage and deal with difficult members as well as choosing and managing your staff and much more.
The chapters are well thought out and planned so whether you’re either thinking about or just starting a forum you will be able to read along as you’re starting the process. One thing that I did find myself doing was taking notes, not just for this review, but for my personal use.
Patrick uses real life experiences that he has dealt with and gives plenty of examples from developing your forum guidelines, to examples of dealing with those difficult members and how you should manage your staff. These real life examples include e-mails that he uses when there has been a forum violation or dealing with an absent staff member. All are there for you do read and implement them on your own forum.
One of the curious things that he states in the book is that he does not have a feedback/suggestion forum for his members and he gives a reason that he/administrator has the final say and you shouldn’t let your members decide what should be implemented into your forum. The other thing is that most problems could only be fixed by him/administrator so now he just asks that people contact him directly and he can deal with the suggestion or feedback first hand. I kind of like this idea because as I have seen on other forums, including mine, once a member comes up with a suggest on what to add or implement everyone starts commenting and then your almost left in the position to have to implement the suggestion.
I could go on and on about this book, but I am telling right now this is a must read and I will be pulling off my shelf from time to time.
* The above is my own personal opinion and I did not receive any compensation other than the book itself.
Popularity: 86% [?]
eComXpo worth it?
The past few years I heard good and bad things about the eComXpo and for the past couple of years I have been busy or on vacation, but this year I thought I would go ahead and sign up and see what its like.
There are really not that many sessions that interest me; but one of them is the GeekCast Live crew. I just find them entertaining and looking forward to seeing what they have to say. Other than that I just might spend most of my time in the exhibition hall.
The one thing that I don’t see is an updated list of exhibitors, they have a list from October 07 show, but that doesn’t help. I would like to plan out a little before the show of who I want to visit. Hopefully they will have a list soon.
So have you signed up or have you gone in the past? What are you opinions? I know it’s not going to replace the face to face networking, but what the heck.
If you haven’t heard about the eComXpo, take a look around and if you’re attending look me up, I will be there, well virtually.
Popularity: 27% [?]
Next Seattle Affiliate Marketers Meet-up scheduled
The next Seattle Area Affiliate Marketers Meet-up is scheduled for July 12th at 2:00 at the Barnes & Noble Bookstore at University Village.
We had a great turn out for the first ever meet up and I would love to see another great turn out.
So if you’re in the Seattle Area come and join us. It’s free and you will learn some great tips and meet with some great folks.
If you want to join us, sign-up over at Meet-up or to find out more information.
Hope to see you there.
Popularity: 31% [?]
New Office Set-up!
It’s been a little busy around the house lately, first the kids just got out of school at the end of last week and one of the big things we did is bought all new office furniture for the office this weekend.
Getting new furniture is a great thing. But removing the old furniture and setting everything back up is a pain, but rewarding in the end.
Since we replaced everything in the office, it took some time to get it all put back together and getting back to work. Still have a few things to do here and there.
We have ordered new carpet and should be here in a couple weeks and we are working with a fish store to work on a new fish tank set-up. Yes that is what is in front of the desks; it was a 250 gallon saltwater fish tank till it leaked.
Here are a couple of shots of the new set-up:
Popularity: 31% [?]
Creative Vado Winner!
I donated a prize of a Creative Vado Video Camera over at Trisha Lyn’s blog and she has picked a winner…
It’s Jeremy Botter! So Congratulations to Jeremy.
Your Creative Vado camera will be arriving soon. Make sure you send me your first video!
Popularity: 30% [?]
