Remove statistic information to increase registrations

Introduction:

I came up with this idea when I thought about "what discourages me from registering with a forum I don't know when the topic interests me?"

Ask yourself what you do when you are searching for a topic and find a forum.
Where do you look first? What is it that turns you away?

Right! You/I first check to see how many threads and posts are in this forum and then I check the stats for how many registered members there are.
If these numbers are to low for me, then I most likely don't even start to read in the forum.
Does this sound familiar to you? If it does this hack is for you!

What this hack does:

It removes the columns "threads" and "posts" (count) for guests but leaves them for members on FORUMHOME and FORUMDISPLAY.
Optional it removes the whole "what is going on" box.
This way you get rid of unimportant information for guests and let them focus on your content.
These information are only helpful anyway if you are the top dog in your niche and want to show of what you got. If you have a smaller forum these information will most likely discourage guests more then it would encourage them.

And as nice SEO side effect you get rid of some code for guests which will increase your code to content ratio and if you also remove the what is going on box, then a lot of useless links are gone as well

Installation:

Templates to edit: 6

For all who have installed the Template Modification System
skip the manual edit and use the attached xml file to import all template edits.



In Template FORUMHOME find:

Code:

<td class="thead">$vbphrase[threads]</td>
      <td class="thead">$vbphrase[posts]</td>

and replace it with:

Code:

       <if condition="$show['member']">
       <td class="thead">$vbphrase[threads]</td>
       <td class="thead">$vbphrase[posts]</td>
      </if>

find:

Code:

<td class="tfoot" align="center" colspan="<if condition="$vboptions['showmoderatorcolumn']">6<else />5</if>"><div class="smallfont"><strong>

and replace it with:

Code:

<if condition="$show['member']">
         <td class="tfoot" align="center" colspan="<if condition="$vboptions['showmoderatorcolumn']">6<else />5</if>"><div class="smallfont"><strong>
        <else />
         <td class="tfoot" align="center" colspan="<if condition="$vboptions['showmoderatorcolumn']">4<else />3</if>"><div class="smallfont"><strong>
        </if>

In Template forumhome_forumbit_level1_nopost



find:

Code:

<td class="tcat" colspan="<if condition="$vboptions[showmoderatorcolumn]">6<else />5</if>">

and replace it with:

Code:

<if condition="$show['member']">
        <td class="tcat" colspan="<if condition="$vboptions[showmoderatorcolumn]">6<else />5</if>">
    <else />
        <td class="tcat" colspan="<if condition="$vboptions[showmoderatorcolumn]">4<else />3</if>">
    </if>

In Template forumhome_forumbit_level1_post



find:

Code:

<td class="alt1">$forum[threadcount]</td>
        <td class="alt2">$forum[replycount]</td>

and replace it with:

Code:

<if condition="$show['member']">
         <td class="alt1">$forum[threadcount]</td>
             <td class="alt2">$forum[replycount]</td>
            </if>

In Template forumhome_forumbit_level2_nopost



find:

Code:

<td class="tcat" colspan="<if condition="$vboptions['showmoderatorcolumn']">5<else />4</if>">

and replace it with:

Code:

<if condition="$show['member']">
     <td class="tcat" colspan="<if condition="$vboptions['showmoderatorcolumn']">5<else />4</if>">
    <else />
     <td class="tcat" colspan="<if condition="$vboptions['showmoderatorcolumn']">3<else />2</if>">
    </if>

In Template forumhome_forumbit_level2_post



find:

Code:

<td class="alt1">$forum[threadcount]</td>
    <td class="alt2">$forum[replycount]</td>

and replace it with:

Code:

<if condition="$show['member']">
      <td class="alt1">$forum[threadcount]</td>
      <td class="alt2">$forum[replycount]</td>
  </if>

In Template FORUMDISPLAY



find:

Code:

<td class="thead">$vbphrase[threads]</td>
       <td class="thead">$vbphrase[posts]</td>

and replace it with:

Code:

<if condition="$show['member']">
       <td class="thead">$vbphrase[threads]</td>
       <td class="thead">$vbphrase[posts]</td>
      </if>

OPTIONAL:



If you want the "What is going on" box to be removed as well:



In Template FORUMHOME find:

Code:

<!-- what's going on box -->

and replace it with:

Code:

<if condition="$show['member']">
<!-- what's going on box -->

find:

Code:

<!-- end what's going on box -->

and replace it with:

Code:

<!-- end what's going on box -->
</if>

If you install this hack, please mark it as installed. Thank you.

DEMO: Patientenfragen.net - Für Patienten mit medizinischen Fragen


Feedback is welcome

StarBuG

Honestly i never check how many threads or members a forum has. My main concern about a forum is the content and the subject of the forum.

So you register in forums with 20 members and 120 threads?

Are you sure?

I have seen the effect on my forum, it had no dramatic impact
because I already had a very active forum but it was measurable.

StarBuG

I think this is a good idea. I believe many forums already do so. If you're looking for information and happen upon a forum that does not look active, you can sometimes discriminate and move on. Not all end users will do this, but a significant portion may very well do so.

I think there was a similar plugin for this over at .org ([Board Optimization] Do not show who's online for guests - vBulletin.org Forum), I combined it with Reduce Bandwidth, Enhance Pagerank [Remove Last Post for Guests] .

Removing who's online is only a fraction of my mod.

I personally don't like the "last post removal".

Users often lurk in a forum for quite some time before they register,
why take away the functionality of getting directly to a new post in a thread they are interested in? Why not let them see which thread was the last that was replied to?

I thought about removing just the image to the last post for reducing duplicate content but that would also take away this functionality for guest.

I personally use it sometimes on other forums or when I use my forum from a different computer and don't want to log in.

But that is my personal opinion

StarBuG

Interesting template modification, thank-you for sharing.

** Made sticky. **

Any thought about turning this into a plugin.

I have edited my first post

For all who have installed the Template Modification System
skip the manual edit and use the attached xml file to import all template edits.

If you don't have installed the TMS, read this:
For all vBulletin Admins. READ THIS ;)

StarBuG

I think webmasters are more inclined to do what you do. Not regular people..

Thanks for this and the TMS file! I'll probably keep the what's going on only b/c I've made a mod for affiliates that adds your affiliates to your what's going on box. And I dont think my affiliates would be happy if they found out they were removed from guests/SE bots view.

Again, thanks for the TMS file...makes life so much easier

You'r welcome

You can simply deactivate the "what is going on" box modification to keep it.

Our traffic has picked up alot here lately but registrations haven't.

We're just installed this template edit today, and we'll report our findings after a couple weeks.

FightRice... did you see any difference after you installed my mod?

I would be interested in your report

ps: Black font on a dark brown background is not a good idea. It is so hard to read

I've just installed part of this on my new forum, I can't wait to see how much it helps!