here is what i do if i want to make a successful website/forum

1: first thing is what it is about and and start creating it by either dreamweaver or a html editor. or if a forum start making threads that would make it look good.
2: the design is one of the most important things to think about. so think what kind of design you are going do.
3: and lastly the hits you get on your site. If you want more people to come to your site/forum you must advertise it some how. e.g. topsite, affiliation or advertise sections on other forums

Well i had an idea of putting my own-made ads on the bottom of each page adverstising a different page on my website. They're thin and small and they aren't distracting but is it still a good idea? btw, that was a good how-to topic. i'm definatly following this when i'm ready for my site.

I was thinking that when i was reading it, FOrums don't bring in people, you have to bring people in first & encourage them to participate & interact before you can have an active forum.
I'm not sure if i want to add a forum or not, but the guestbook is starting to turn into one, but i think i would not have a lot of topics, so i will not add one for fear of it being boring&uniteresting...

This tutorial is very good. One problem though, why is it in the Networking subforum? Is this related to Networking?

I will be sure to follow your tutorial for making my website so I can maximize efficiency and visitors to project my plans and information.

Yep and you can put your site in a google search engine like submitting it and skins are important so its not just plain,bland regular 2 minute site.

What I would do Is if you have Mozzilla Firefox download it's add-on like web designer and find a CSS you like a lot and hit the view CSS button. Edit everything you don't like.That's what I did with these forums(I just started them). If you can't then go to some generators or webs for skins.

thanks RunerNMage for sharing the tips, I'm currently in the process of customising the forum in my site to match with the site layout. I'll keep these tips as a reference.

I agree!!!
Starting a guest book is better for a new webiste or not a very popular site.

To have a Successful Forum/website need more efforts on it, like a main topic within many different samll topics(ie main topic is baseball, but there are still some other different topics like tennis, TV baseball game, sport shops and so on), and you may need two or more friends to work/maintain with this Forum/website.
WHY more pepole ? Because you need to keep putting lateset info/news on the Forum/website to attract new visiter and keep old visiters willing to come back often.

This post has been edited by LeafH: Apr 2 2007, 02:12 PM

This website is still looking rather old fashioned seeing although this post was made in 2004 and it is now 2004 come on Opaque get desigining we want some new designs in here.

great! Nice points... you have great ideas !