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Hello,

I came here to learn from the best.

I started a new website, the basic idea is that you can share stuff (34 different categories) on it.. say you found an awesome new phone, you post about that.. or maybe you found a really funny image today, you can share that as well.

It has more features like votes, ranks, etc.

The idea of the website was researched initially, it was built to hook users and to get people to interact and post.

...but well, that failed - I am getting a lot of hits daily (for a new website), from 1000 to 5000 hits per day, mostly from search engines, whats going wrong is that, people come on the site, read the content they were looking for and.. leave!

My question is that, in general terms. What do you think can be done about that? what research I need to do? What can I do in technical terms of the site?

I think the main thing thats making people go is that they don't understand what the website is about, maybe they just find what they are looking for and leave because they have no idea that you can register and get involved.. how can I highlight on that?

My website: Here

p.s: Yes I do have a nice register button, I am getting *some* registrations but its nothing compared to the number of visits.

Thanks, and looking forward for your replies!

This is always an issue. You can make it so only members can view links or images?

So is this a forum, blog, or your own creation? Sounds like a forum/image board to me, and those are often hard to get members for (but lead to a lot of views regardless of member count); otherwise I would have a different signature!

Laugh: That is actually not a very bad idea, I am trying my best to not restrict what guests can see, but a small blur on stuff might get them to register.

Quinlan: My own creation, it is not a forum in a sense that you cannot make a discussion on it, you can share something like reddit for example, but instead of a discussion people either comment, favorite it, rate it, recommend it, etc.

The best websites give you a preview of what to expect, then have the best of the stuff only available by becoming a part of the site. Registration comes after a point of interest from the viewer. You need something that other sites can't offer, and you need to try and be unique. All these people making general forums exactly like SF won't get anywhere after a while. It's all the same, why not just stay on SF? Thats the point i'm trying to make.

Just as an idea, maybe only allow certain options to guests (easy option) or have a watermark on images and the like (more improbable). Even just something like advertising a contest to members (something a big user of the site would want to donate so they're more popular) could be enough. Could you PM me the link to the site? I'm interested!

Hm, the whole idea of restricting guests to content is not that good actually, even this site does not use it. So I am holding back on that one for now.

Here is what I did so far (today only):

- Fixed an IE bug that did not show the nav bar correctly (If I had one wish, it would be to uninstall IE from every single PC.)

- Edited the register button text to "Get Started Today!".

- Made the 'add post' and reply buttons available for guests, but when they click them they are asked to register in order to start posting

Lets see where that goes, hoping for an increase.

Take example of a successful forum. Follow in their footsteps, and their techniques may result in success in your situation.

Good luck!

(01-15-2011, 11:33 PM)0x00 Wrote: [ -> ]Hm, the whole idea of restricting guests to content is not that good actually, even this site does not use it. So I am holding back on that one for now.

Here is what I did so far (today only):

- Fixed an IE bug that did not show the nav bar correctly (If I had one wish, it would be to uninstall IE from every single PC.)

- Edited the register button text to "Get Started Today!".

- Made the 'add post' and reply buttons available for guests, but when they click them they are asked to register in order to start posting

Lets see where that goes, hoping for an increase.

You should put up a link in your main post so that others can give you direct feedback on what you can improve on for your site to become a success.

If you think about it, do you not want the views and traffic to your website from some of the members here reviewing your website to help you out, even if they dont have any advice?

I figured adding a link would seem like a bad attempt to advertise my site here, but here its: Here