Salutations...
I'm setting up a brand new forum. I'll be starting completely from scratch as far as traffic is concerned.

The forum will be aimed at providing support to sufferers of a particular nasty form of Vasculitis which means some of them are pretty darn sick. With this in mind, I'm trying to strike a balance between keeping the whole thing as simple as possible to understand, keeping out spammers and optimizing the site for the inevitable influx of millions of people (ok...maybe I'm exagerating a little ).

I've decided on just two addons in VBSEO and VBAdvanced. I'm fairly confident that these will be at the very least a good start from what I've read here.

What do you lot think? Do the above two sound like a good combination? Do I need both or just one?

Opinions on that and any other suggestions welcome.

Thanks...
Androo

It can be tempting to go overboard with vB Hacks, but vbSEO and vbAdvanced are too very solid mods that are both very powerful - my advice is to only add hacks that will add value to your forum.

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Bryce R [[ BLOG ]]
The Blogging Café - Blogging Forum
Do you run a forum? Check out my forum owners blog.

I want vBSEO but can't afford it and because my site doesn't make any money, I can't justify buying it so I use ZOINTS SEO which while not as robust as vBSEO, works for the cheapskate in me. vBAdvanced gave me loads of headaches... It is VERY powerful and I've seen some wonderful things done with it, but you really do have to know how to use it to use it effectively. In the end, I had to rip it out and 301 the index until I can think of a replacement.

As to what I think are essential mods... It really depends on what you plan on doing with the site. If you are going to have articles/reviews/links/etc... GARS (which I use and love) and vBDynamics (which I don't use but have heard wonderful things about) are great.. Stay away from things like Reviewpost... Support is superb when they want to help you, but 9 times out of 10, they tell you it's your fault and don't help... On top of that, you're paying $99 for a script that hasn't had an update in over 3 years.

Another mod I couldn't live without is iTrader which adds an eBay style feedback system if you are going to have any sort of trading/selling/buying activity on the site. It's very old and Jason has said he was going to update it for the past god knows how long, but to be fair, it's a mod for 3.5x and it works brilliantly to this day.

In terms of keeping out spam, isBot is a great mod that has saved my bacon more times than I care to count, though I don't know if it works with 3.7 yet since the new CAPTCHa feature at registration seems to defeat them for the time being.

And finally, I'd say the Welcome Headers is a great mod as well since it helps with SEO and helps bring users in if used effectively. I haven't edited mine for years, but I have seen one here that I think is brilliant and may modify for my uses.

As bdude says, the initial reaction of new board owners is to add as many bells and whistles as they can find on vB.org. The best thing to do is to sit down and really examine the things you want to offer your community and give them just that and resist the urge to go over board because the consequences of having 40 million modifications may not be apparent now, but after and update (especially one that requires templates to be reverted) is nothing but headaches... Especially if they never get updated and no longer work with a new version of vB... Hell hath no fury like a community who got used to a modification but can no longer use it because it's deprecated!

In any event, good luck with your new board... I've been running vB for over 6 years now and I don't think I could ever not run one now... Even with the headaches that users bring!

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MumsOnline - It's not who you know, it's what your kids think you don't know!

Thanks both for your replies.

I'm not looking to make money from this, just a good SEO ranking so people know it's there and maybe a decent main page that explains what it's all about. I'm even considering not changing the style too much and leaving it almost as default. I think the default style is nice and clear and if I try and make it too fancy I'll just confuse the unwell people that will be using it.

To tokenyank: yeah, I'm quite happy with the CAPTCHA features in the current version as far as stopping bots is concerned. Time will tell I guess. Also, you're right about upgradeability. The last thing I want to be doing is wasting time on a broken upgrade because a mod won't work :-)

To bdude: thanks for the advice. I might even hang back on VBAdvanced for a while although admittedly I should read more about it before I decide.

Andrew

Andrew, I started going 'hack crazy' when I started my forums (two months old now), but I've been actually removing some here and there because they don't add much value as Bryce mentioned.

Now, I've been doing some banner exchanges here and there and had a travel company sign on as the 'official' travel company of my boards and I'm starting to generate some hits because I have them pushing my site just as much as I am!

They are good people and have been helping me with my 'exposure' out in the world of online Disney fanatics.

But, there is a thread here on the boards with everyone's hacks. So, if you do a little searching, you can find what a lot of us have on our boards and ask questions about certain hacks, etc.

Good luck with things!

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Walt Disney Boards
Walt Disney Buddies

Thanks ArnyVee.

I got VBSEO and VBAdvanced installed and am busy working on building up some membership. I'm looking into a few hacks to see what might be valuable but at this point nothing really stands out. Will keep plugging away though.

Thanks for your reply!

No problem Andrew.

Keep us posted on how vBSEO works for you. I've been toying with the idea of purchasing it, but I've been making some nice strides with the simple instructions and tweaking that I've done based on recommendations here on the site. With the advice here and some 'working' on my part (couple of banner exchanges, link in sig field & going onto other sites, etc) I've gone from approximately 50 'guests' per 24 hours (including spiders) to over 150 per 24 hour period (and currently on my high of 162 for the last 24 hours).

So, I'm not sure how much better or what vBSEO can do for me at this point. Although, I'm sure that we'll have someone with vBSEO already or with the knowledge step up and tell me how I'm still missing the boat on not having it!

Keep us posted and good luck!

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Walt Disney Boards
Walt Disney Buddies

Here's my hacks, bolded what i think are important ones for a new board....

Advertise Page
Advertising Links
AJAX REG
Cyb - Advanced Forum Statistics
Cyb - Advanced Permissions Based on Post Count Cyb - Forumhome Sub-Forums Manager
Display only one signature per member per thread per page
Display Unread Posts and Reputation Comments
e-steki Referrer Statistics
Enhanced Captcha Image Verification
Favorite Smilies
FlashChat Admin Menu
Flashchat Integration
Global announcement
ibProArcade CMPS
ibProArcade for vBulletin
Inactive User Reminder Emails
Left Side Column
Link To Us
Members who are using Flashchat
Members who have visited the forum
Multiple Login Detector
nCode Image Resizer
passiveVid
Pay to Register
PhotoPlog Pro
Post Thank You Hack
Separate Sticky and Normal Threads
Smilies in Quickreply
TFW Sponsors
Title Replace
Top Posters
vB Ad Management
vBadvanced CMPS
vbBannerRotator by Frapegliko
vBGuides: Seasonal Effects
vBSEO :: Sitemap Generator
vbTrends
WAP
Welcome Headers
Zoints SEO or VBSEO
Zoints Thread Tags
[Sniper] - Mood Manager

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