Suggestions for this site

[elbereth]

I thought we might have a thread where the members can offer suggestions of things to draw more people to the boards.
I notice on many of the other discussion board they have a gallery, home page polls, caption contests, encyclopedia, quizzes, download sections etc. I don't know anything about setting up or running a website so I don't know if any of this is possible on this board, just thought I would throw it out there though. ;D Is there anyway to get this board into search engines? I did a bunch of searches on LotR discussion boards and fan sites and we don't come up on them. Again, I don't know anything about this stuff, so this may be useless.

[princessleagwen]

good ideas.... yeah sadly to come up in a search engine close to the top you have to be a site that's hit often... so we need some ideas to get the word out there.

[Rumil]

About running a website.. I have good knowledge of HTML, XHTML, CSS and some other few languages. However I don't have my own server.

I can design simple but practical webpages and even entire sites. If you are interested please let me know what you want to upload. Bear in mind also that all pages will be hosted by free servers unless you have some free space on the forum.

For some who don't know, HTML is a special programming language for simple webpages building and design. Those who master it, have opened the gates for advanced programming and cool websites (however still a huge step to be made).

Think about it and let me know what you've decided.

[Rumil]

Suggestion:

Let's run The LotrHeavens Newsletter, a place where all art works from the forum to be uploaded, ranked, admired and forever improved and increased.

What do I mean by art work? Easy: banners, pictures, stories, poems, videos etc (all made by our forum's users and even more from its very first days to the days of its fame and glory).

What do I mean by place: on the same chain with the 7 links on the top of the page, beneath the forum banner (Home, Help, Search, Members, Calendar, Profile, Logout + Newsletter).

[elbereth]

That sounds like a good idea Rumil, however I'm not sure if it is possible to add a page to the area you are talking about since this is just a basic discussion forum site. I don't know much about that stuff though. Would probably just have to add a new section to the forum areas though. Merry's girl is the admin here, so have to wait and see what she thinks. It is a good idea though.

Also, wondering if you might have any ideas for drawing people to the boards and getting them to become members. We seem to get a lot of visitors to the site but they aren't becoming members or when they do they don't stick around past a few initial posts. I have promoted every where I can think of, so I don't think that is the problem. I'm thinking we need some fun and unique ideas to get people to want to stay. If you have any fresh ideas they would be appreciated.

[luxlucis]

I think what this site rally needs is an RPG area.

[elbereth]

I for one don't know anything about rpg but the owner of the board merry's girl might. If you would like you could maybe post some suggestions or "how to" here for her.

[Samwise Gamgee]

i think we need to get more topics on here about LOTR... there are so many topics that have nothing to do with it, even though the whole point of this message board is to talk about LOTR...

[elbereth]

Good suggestion Is there anything in particular you would like to see? And please feel free to open topics if you would like.

[Samwise Gamgee]

hmm... idk... just more stuff having to do with lord of the rings.
maybe i will start a topic...

[elbereth]

We could all brainstorm some ideas here. I will think on it and see what I can come up with.