New Membership Drive

We need to sort this out guys.

I randomly logged into XBR a moment ago and was highly amused at the shanty town it has become, but then the prospect did slightly worry me that this forum may end up going much the same way. Because afterall we all can admit this place pwns!

This forum is great but since the collapse of PS3N and XBR we've done nothing but lose members with the exception of the occasional new member joining. I don't mind if it stays exactly the way it is but i've got a feeling more people are going to leave than join in the grand scheme of things.

Let's pool some ideas to get our name out there and crack the fuck on with it.

Even though I hate the idea of people plugging something but my idea would be to drum up some attention on relevant channels and videos on youtube seen as i'm quite sure most of us started getting into gaming forums after using that site. (Fuck No! to MLD's channel though)

Suggestions?

Get someone big in the Youtube gaming community. People include Treezy504, Drewsdays, TruthMVP and if we can Swoozie06. Also we can try and spam IGN, Gamespot and other big gaming channels.

A lot of the latest members to join are people I grabbed in from reddit, but pretty much none of them post! I think the problem is the place feels quite static and amateur. Don't get me wrong, I love the place but it can be improved.

Design-wise improvements:

Spruce up the place. I love dark colours but the place needs to be eye-catching. Mix up the colour scheme and change the icons to something more eyecatching. As I mentioned before, add thumbnails for topics (maybe give the privelage to only those with higher post counts) and make the section icons themselves be the relevant console.

ALSO I think we need an animated GIF as a banner. Each slide can focus on the latest or upcoming games or news for each console. And if you want to (and can) make it more advanced, clicking on it will link you to the relevant forum post.
It would keep the design team on their toes, get them more productive and make the place more aesthetically pleasing.


Member increases

Try to make friends on different forums and sites then eventually tell them to join the forum.

The big problem is that the forum is generic and isn't attached to anything. Most forums have to be the forums of some larger site, and to be honest, G7 doesn't offer anything that other forums with better forum software do.

TheCinemaJack wrote:

The big problem is that the forum is generic and isn't attached to anything. Most forums have to be the forums of some larger site, and to be honest, G7 doesn't offer anything that other forums with better forum software do.

True, but look at PSUni, I posted over there about a week ago, and it seems to be almost dead. Not that many members anymore. It happens with all forums I suppose.

Sheogorath wrote:

A few suggested non-partners with a huge amount of subs: Archimedes & Hassanalhajry.

However, getting the word around is not enough.
If we want people to join and be active at the same time, they Have to take us seriously, we have to give them a reason to come here and join us, so it's best for all of us to show the good example and stop acting like immature babies(I won't mention names).

"We are a forum free of System Wars, you are allowed to discuss things about gaming here without having the trolls and the fanboys ruin the discussion for you"

^ Think of that quote as your drive to get people to join us.[/color]

Yeah I'm down for that. Archimedes is cool and one of those few guys who doesn't have raging flame wars in the comment section of his videos. Haven't seen any from Hassanalhajry though. We'd also have to take it easy with religion because our group will easily offend and drive away anyone with religious beliefs.

If you want this forum to survive, you're going to have to appeal to a certain demographic of gamers. Now what is the one game that most people play? Call of Duty. Not only does Call of Duty make the most money, but it also gets the most views on YouTube. As much as we may dislike Call of Duty, this forum needs to be a bit more casual friendly in order to attract new members. Just look at most of the Call of Duty forums. I'm not saying we should turn this into a Call of Duty forum, but we need to find ways to make gamers feel welcomed. It doesn't just have to be Call of Duty, it can also be Battlefield or whatever.

Oh and no offense to those who are in charge of the YouTube channel, but you guys try too hard. You don't need to make an entire video of you guys playing while chatting with your buddy. It's boring. As a matter of fact, you guys barley even chat, which is even more boring. All you really need to do is make videos that are simple, creative, and that are less than a minute or two. Also make the title for the video simple and short if that's not too much to ask. If you guys can't handle that then we need to hire new members to make videos for us instead.

We don't need people who like Cod. It's not like we need a shit load more people. Even just 3 or 4 new members a month would be great.

But yeah I admit the youtube channel is boring I unsubbed long ago.

I notice a lot of the current users like movies. Maybe we could expand the movie section and make this a forum about games and movies?

As long as all of us guys keep coming back then this place will never die. It could just do with a bit of a kick up the arse really.

An easy soloution we can all do right away is to spread the word about this place when you happen to comment in any other gaming circles.

Keep the ideas coming lads and remember to drop the name Generation7 out there whenever it may relevant.

@Stigma

That's not the point. Point is, you must make every new gamer feel welcomed. This forum doesn't really have that. The only reason we feel differently is because most of us knew each other since back when PS3N and Xbox Republic were still active.

Mecha wrote:

@Stigma

That's not the point. Point is, you must make every new gamer feel welcomed. This forum doesn't really have that. The only reason we feel differently is because most of us knew each other since back when PS3N and Xbox Republic were still active.

We do make people feel welcome though. Granted we sometimes have the odd heated debate and have our own opinions on certain subjects but that's common on many forums anyway.

I don't want us to forsake what makes this forum what it is for the sake of a few more new memebers but i'm sure plenty of other people would happily enjoy the dynamic of this place and become active posters if they knew about it.

The problem with PSUni was that the admin stopped coming around. Our old admin there sold the forum to someone else because his job at BioWare didn't allow him to keep it. Then the new owner just never showed up or anything.

Sorry I haven't been on much. End of the year and teachers are loading on final exams and my regents are coming up. I've been in study mode for most of this and last month.

There really isn't a golden way to get new members that are active. That's why in the past I've resorted to bringing back old members such as Mecha, BlackStigma, and Zeratul. Which for the most part has been successful. I think it's a good idea to bring back old active members, and than after we have established ourselves, start outreaching for new ones.

@Dam_Noir

I don't mean just that. I mean like, God dammit how do I put this? Okay, It's like how people respond to colors, you'll see more people react to the color blue than purple. Well, right now, we're purple, We get a lot of new members every month, but most of them don't even come back after their first or second visit.

Mecha wrote:

@Dam_Noir

I don't mean just that. I mean like, God dammit how do I put this? Okay, It's like how people respond to colors, you'll see more people react to the color blue than purple. Well, right now, we're purple, We get a lot of new members every month, but most of them don't even come back after their first or second visit.

I think that's kinda down to lack of activity more than anything else. On many other forums you can simply refresh the page and plenty of responses have been posted. We need more members to cure that problem but it's a bit of a Catch-22 situation.

Lets offer free microsoft points to people so they join!!!!!!!

I'm might go back to the IMDb video game board, since its pretty active over there. That way, I will be able to get at least 3 or 4 people to come. I must have gotten a few people to sign up here since the last time I was there.

Sexton_Hardcastle wrote:

Perhaps our current user base should post more, create more topics, stir the shitstorm so to speak. It means we can get some activity going and people will want to join. And we are still working on a new theme. If anyone has specific ideas for videos for the channel then feel free.

E3 should increase the activity a ton with new threads and discussions. Maybe even a shitstorm on teh chatbox just like last year.

But yeah, we need a new theme badly.

Fix the fucking domain