by James on September 9, 2011
Should I add chat box to my forum?
I’m a big believer in letting the forum be your “chat box”. There isn’t any reason to add another place that members should chat; all chat should be on the forum itself.
One thing you can to to make sure that your members stay and “chat” is to have a general chat on your forum, in many cases this maybe your largest section on your forum.
Also I would not allow members posts to be counted in this section either. Most members may (do) use this section just to pad their post counts.
So no, I would not add a chat box to any forum under any circumstance.
Should I pay my Administrators or Moderators?
Well I think that all depends on you and your ability to pay and if you even want to.
There are lots of forums out that a strictly on a volunteer basis and to some it’s an honor to be an admin or a mod, although it can go to their head a little sometimes.
If you are going to pay, think about what you are going to have them do. Are they going to go out and actively search for new members, advertise? Are they just going to manage the board (ie delete post, banned members, etc.) and look at what your role will be in all of this.
Maybe look at doing giftcards at the Xmas or look at revenue sharing with Google Adsense. There are many ways to “pay” someone without it coming out of your pocket.
So do you pay your staff? Let me know I would love to hear from you.
Sorry for not posting last week, I was out of town for the holiday weekend.