- Original Poster
- #1
Hi All,
Following on from a few comments from members on here relating to the ads that are running on the site, I wanted to make a little post.
First of all though, the current structure, design and indeed what these forums purpose and reason for existing is will change over the coming year. Back in the day when I originally owned the forums they served a purpose to help people who were like me, working alone at home and not sure if I was doing the right thing, or indeed whether starting my business was the biggest mistake I'd ever made. I didn't know what I didn't know, and questioned myself on every decision, and financially I was in such a bad place. I was in so much debt I'd racked up trying to start a business with a bank loan and 3x credit cards. These forums became my lifeline, my support network, and they were for so many others too.
I sold these forums in 2007, an offer I couldn't refuse, but bought them back again last month. I saw they were not being invested into ay more and crazy as it may sound, these forums mean something to me. I realise they aren't quite what they used to be but I believe what they stood for all those years ago is still relevant today, and that is what I'm trying to achieve. I'm not completely green though, I have a mortgage and salaries to pay, so they can burn money for a while but at some point they need to be sustainable.
You all know Ads is a way for website's like this to earn revenue and these forums cost money to maintain, both in the infrastructure and the staff I employ to work on them.
Right now these forums have two ways to pay for their upkeep, through Ads and through membership subscriptions. Even with those together currently they are in a cash burn position. So that isn't and cannot be my long term plan, long term I've already mentioned previously I do intend to add some services to these forums which can be revenue generating, which is much more transparent and more what I'm about, but that is going to take several months to implement. For now the forum structure is as it is, although I will be making small improvements here and there based on feedback and analytics we come across. Nothing major will come until after we've done a major software version update.
On to the small change I've made for now...
I've removed the top and bottom ads from being displayed for Full Members. Ideally I'm happy to remove the ones on the left too but when I try to do this I end up breaking the forum layout, so they'll still be hanging around for a bit until one of my more qualified colleagues can take a look.
Putting myself out there now, as things stand today and for the next few months I felt this was a fair change to make.
Following on from a few comments from members on here relating to the ads that are running on the site, I wanted to make a little post.
First of all though, the current structure, design and indeed what these forums purpose and reason for existing is will change over the coming year. Back in the day when I originally owned the forums they served a purpose to help people who were like me, working alone at home and not sure if I was doing the right thing, or indeed whether starting my business was the biggest mistake I'd ever made. I didn't know what I didn't know, and questioned myself on every decision, and financially I was in such a bad place. I was in so much debt I'd racked up trying to start a business with a bank loan and 3x credit cards. These forums became my lifeline, my support network, and they were for so many others too.
I sold these forums in 2007, an offer I couldn't refuse, but bought them back again last month. I saw they were not being invested into ay more and crazy as it may sound, these forums mean something to me. I realise they aren't quite what they used to be but I believe what they stood for all those years ago is still relevant today, and that is what I'm trying to achieve. I'm not completely green though, I have a mortgage and salaries to pay, so they can burn money for a while but at some point they need to be sustainable.
You all know Ads is a way for website's like this to earn revenue and these forums cost money to maintain, both in the infrastructure and the staff I employ to work on them.
Right now these forums have two ways to pay for their upkeep, through Ads and through membership subscriptions. Even with those together currently they are in a cash burn position. So that isn't and cannot be my long term plan, long term I've already mentioned previously I do intend to add some services to these forums which can be revenue generating, which is much more transparent and more what I'm about, but that is going to take several months to implement. For now the forum structure is as it is, although I will be making small improvements here and there based on feedback and analytics we come across. Nothing major will come until after we've done a major software version update.
On to the small change I've made for now...
I've removed the top and bottom ads from being displayed for Full Members. Ideally I'm happy to remove the ones on the left too but when I try to do this I end up breaking the forum layout, so they'll still be hanging around for a bit until one of my more qualified colleagues can take a look.
Putting myself out there now, as things stand today and for the next few months I felt this was a fair change to make.
