Need feedback (please)

Hi guys,

I am badly looking for some feedback on a sub-forum that I've setup. I've made some template mods, and placed ads in sneaky places

1. I am looking for some answers on the following questions:

What do you think about the ads placement on the forum:

• Currently, there are 2 leaderboard ads on forumdisplay -- one above forums and one below
• There are up to 3 ads on showthread -- one leaderboard above threads and 1 250x250 within each post

Please look at the forum display and at one of the posts to see ad placements and let me know what you think.

2. What did you think about forum description right above threads?

• Did you like the the way it looked?
• Did you like the way I setup RSS availability within the forum description?

3. Did you like the way I setup a redirect shortcut for a sub-forum?

4. Overall, what did you think? Any suggestions?

I would greatly appreciate any honest feedback -- be it bad or good.

Search Enginge Marketing - RubySquad or
Search Enginge Marketing - RubySquad

I'll comment on aethetics and layout. But, overall, if your set-up boosts your ad revenue and does not scare your members away, then it is probably something you want to maintain.

Part I

• The two leaderboards look ok. Well placed and not too intrusive.
• I don't like the 250x250 ads in the posts (personal preference). If you're going to keep them, I'd try aligning it to the right. I'd only do it once. Try putting a small ad type in additional posts if you really want to have ads there.

Part II

• Forum description is fine. I'd lose the bold. And you have some typos.
• I don't like the border around the "sponsored by" part.
• The RSS is good. I'd lose the Outlook one. It takes attention away from the RSS standard icon.

Part III

• I like the re-direct if that is your most important sub-forum. It's reasonable to direct traffic directly there.

Part IV

• I'd recommend working on your site template.
• Also - test your ads. See how they play out. Since the forum is new, you don't have many members. I'd leave out the 250x250 ads until you build up your member base a bit more. You're probably not going to earn much in the beginning, unless the content you've harvested really delivers rapidly in the serps. In that case, I'd keep the ads to a minimum until you have enough traffic to start doing some testing.

Thanks Joe, I'll keep these tips in mind. I appreciate your feedback.

Remove all the ads but 1.

Especially on a webmaster/computer guy board, an overload of ads is not what you want.

Your homepage of subforums only simply looks like crap. I beleive there is a setting to set the level for what shows and what doesn't in the vB control panel. I'd push it up one more notch so that the child forums show on the home page.

blend your ads. the dark blue stands out too much. use the same BG color as the container element.

Kill the RSS feeds and actually get some real home made content in there.

Overall, I think it looks very amatuer-ish, and if i were a ruby developer, i probably wouldn't be coming back after my intial visit.

Spend some time cleaning it up and making it easier on the eyes.

Income comes with content.
Content comes with members.
members come with content
content comes with a lot of hard work.

Thanks for the tip.