How can we make this a better forum?

Hey Everyone,

This place used to be hopping and popular not that long ago. A place to go for advice, to share info and to connect with other poultry enthusiasts.

How can WCPS regain its popularity?
What are some ways that could improve things to once again make this a beneficial place for people to come and contribute.

Just think FB has taken over. Seems that's where many have gone.

I agree that it is most likely fb. That is happening more all the time to good forums.Yet there are still a few (like me) who have no use for it. It does get frustrating.

I haven't been on facebook for a while now. I took a Facebook sabbatical.

With the way my studies have been going, and the courses I have yet ahead of me there is an emphasis to have a presence on social media. I might have to kick start things back up.

Maybe I will sneak into the FB world and bring attention to the forum.

I will have to talk to Hidden, but there are some small changes that I would like to make to help continue this site on.


If anyone has any suggestions please feel free to mention them. Send me a PM or an email or share them on the forum.

Cheers!

My feeling is that you can't have too many pictures.......and it's fun to read about project birds and builds....just my thoughts.

I agree, I love pictures and projects of all kinds.

Pictures and threads about project birds or coops or gardening are always enjoyable to read.

I myself am working on what I call "Project Silver Sussex" I have been working on improving a line of silver sussex I acquired.

Once I get a chance I will post some pictures.


Keep the suggestions and ideas coming.

Cheers,

Jonathan

Easier way to post pictures.

I post pictures on the FB site over any others.
Why?
Because it is easier.

Loving my talks on the Buckeye thread. Why? New passion and really want to connect with others. Not interested in selling but learning from others across the country.

I want to see the breed expand and grow. And help people breed to the best they can. And support people!

Yes, making it easier to post pictures would be a good thing.

I still check in every day and have posted often as well. I had to use the new url to get on here, my old one did not. I used the one on ACE about this forum. I don't know. It still is a wonderful place to be, just lost interest because no one ever posted. Well, there was a couple of people, now and then, but really, seemed like it was dead in the water. I don't know what you can do Jonny. When some very key people left, I think alot of people left too , and the posts deleted, that left blank holes in so many threads, I am sure that bothered people too. Oh well. I still will come on here each day, now that I can (firefox kept saying it could not find the server, so I gave up). This has always been a wonderful place to hang out each morning, with some new friends here, and old friends. I think just putting it out there that there is this forum, with tons and tons and tons of posts with wonderful stuff in the archives. I will hang out more for sure, if there is new stuff to read. I do know though, as the hours in the morning get warmer and lighter, my day outside begins so much more early. So my morning time will be shortened on the internet and too busy outside to go on during the day usually and evenings, well, dinner, watch a little TV and I am pooped and off to my cozy place to lay my head for the night rest. But ya, make this the place it used to be to hang out, I would love that, as I am sure many others would too. Have a beautiful day, CynthiaM.

CynthiaM wrote:....I had to use the new url to get on here, my old one did not.  I used the one on ACE about this forum.  I don't know.

There are many reasons for this forum's decline in popularity over the past year but most recently, as in the past few weeks, the change mentioned above is probably most devastating. I imagine many people have bookmarked this site and those bookmarks are no longer valid.

True. I stopped using a bookmark for this forum- just google it every time.

I found it frustrating when members stormed off because of some tiff and took all their posts with them. It put a big hole in the forum and made me less likely to use the forum for information.

I very much like projects. Maybe there should be a dedicated title to projects? Silver Sussex, Buckeye, etc.

I liked this forum, but yes for it to survive, there has to be more posts. I don't have a lot to contribute unfortunately, as I consider myself still fairly new to the poultry scene, having a few breeds, not showing and all that. I am still learning and have always appreciated the advice from both forums. There can be valuable varied information from both.

I can't help but think of this like a church split. There are so many similarities, but in this case it was a chicken church split.

I really have no idea what happened, but I can imagine a chicken church...Too many hens gossiping in the pews, roosters putting up a tough front, using their weapons to unleash war on the other side. It never ends well and heavy damage is always done.

I think cleaning up the place so that no holes are left in conversations should be first priority. I think in the process getting rid of this conversation would be good too to start fresh.

I like the name...not everyone is from AB (as ACE is centered on), and Western Canada still has the potential to still draw more people from a greater area.

Just some thoughts on the whole situation. It can be hard to recover from such a thing. People do not forgive and forget very easily.

BTW, this is not the only forum out there struggling. I've seen struggles to keep going in other various forums too.

niglefritz wrote:
I think cleaning up the place so that no holes are left in conversations should be first priority.

This may be a tricky task as around 2000 individual posts have been removed.

Hey Everyone,

Great input and points made.

With my absence and time away from this forum I was unaware of what was transpiring, although if memory serves me correctly I do recall it was beginning before I had left. I don't know I kinda checked out end of June and my last post and visit, until recently was back on July 5th 2014.

Hidden asked me to come on as an admin a while ago now to help with the forum, it was to be temporary.
I don't mind being an admin, although I have not executed that many duties since being one.

The most recent change I made was I added a new thread for Coops.

When I first joined on as an admin, during that time I recall the forum was more lively and things were running a bit smoother. There was not much for myself to do back then. And it kind of continued on that way, I never really did much administration, I was more or less available for backup as I have prior experience with this platform.

Technically this is not my forum to administer and make changes. The way I see it is this is an open community and I personally like to get the opinion of fellow users before making any significant changes. I had in the past and it caused confusion and eventually was reverted to the original platform.
As this is Hidden's forum, and she asked myself to join as an admin I have always felt out of respect that I run any changes or suggestions past her before implementation.

I have been making a list of changes and such that could have a positive impact.

Over the past few days I have been going through the forum and noticed that it has a resemblance like that of swiss cheese, as a few peeps have mentioned on this thread there are numerous posts that have been removed and there are a lot of holes, missing threads etc.

I was unaware of the change with the forum's url address, these things happen, as this forum is provided by a "hosted company" WCPS technically uses their platform for free, when I deactivated my email notifications when I was going through personal matters, I wasn't getting updates.

One way to combat the forum's url address change is to send an email notification to registered users informing them of the changed url.
That is something I plan to do today.

With the numerous posts that have deleted content and such, I don't think deleting the threads will fix anything. In my logic it does not make sense to further delete these threads completely from the forum, much like the suggestion of this thread being deleted, I would much rather just archive it.

It will require myself to systematically go through each and every thread that has deleted posts and move those threads to an "Archive". This archive forum for "dead threads" can be hidden or available for public viewing, most commonly they are cached.

With response to making uploading pics more user friendly, that would require an instructional thread all on it's own. With numerous online image hosting sites available, such as Imgur, flickr, etc. it has become increasingly easier to upload multiple pictures to these online file storage sites for images and videos and then copy and paste the appropriate link.

On my list of things to do is to create a Tutorial on how to upload pics, and the easiest hassle free method.




I was questioned by a good friend of mine who is a member of this site and ACE, as to why even bother... why put the time, stress, effort into trying to revive this online community.
Of course I questioned it myself...

Well the answer is... Its a project. I like projects.

I just finished wrapping up Project Management and really enjoyed the many aspects I had learned through the content knowledge of the course.

My schooling has taught me something about myself, that is I really enjoy a good challenge. And I see this as a really good challenge. Will it be successful, how will I profit or gain from this, who knows.
Success can be defined so many ways, and with regards to this forum can be determined by setting and achieving milestones I guess. The way in which I will profit and gain from this, and I am not referring to the monetary gains that most associate with the word profit, I am referring to profiting from the gained "experience". The chance to apply some of what I have learned and continue to grow myself as not only an entrepreneur but also as a respected member of the poultry community.

First and foremost I need to be proactive and contact Hidden and get her approval.


Cheers,

Jonny

I joined because of the word "heritage" in the title and was hoping that there would be tons of information on heritage chicken breeds. So far so good!

Derbyshire wrote:I joined because of the word "heritage" in the title and was hoping that there would be tons of information on heritage chicken breeds. So far so good!

That is a good point!
Also that is good that you have been finding information on heritage breeds.

If you don't mind me asking, and this is the marketing side of me coming out.
How did you learn about WCPS?
Was it from google searching Heritage breed poultry?

The reason I ask is one of the suggestions I want to implement is "Search Engine Optimization". So when someone types heritage breed, or chicken, or poultry etc into a search engine, this site displays within the first 2 pages of results.

Johnny A I found it when I typed in "poultry swap" into google. This forum comes up on the first page. I am on another forum with that name.
I just did a quick search for "buckeye chickens". Even though there are lengthy discussions on the buckeye, including recent ones, this forum did not come up in the first 15 pages of search. Definitely some SEO is in order!!!!

Derbyshire wrote:Johnny A I found it when  I typed in "poultry swap" into google. This forum comes up on the first page.  I am on another forum with that name.
I just did a quick search for "buckeye chickens". Even though there are lengthy discussions on the buckeye, including recent ones, this forum did not come up in the first 15 pages of search.  Definitely some SEO is in order!!!!

Thanks for your feedback Derbyshire, it is much appreciated.

Glad to see that there is still interest in the old girl! There are so many wonderful, knowledgeable people here it would be a shame to lose it all. I second making it easier to post pictures. I have to ask my tec savy daughter to do it for me every time. I don't know if there is a better way or not but that would be my number one request. Welcome back Jonny, so glad things are looking up for you.

Thanks, it's nice to be back.

As for the posting of pics, I plan to work on a video or at least a tutorial on how to post pics on WCPS, exploring a few avenues.

For example, there is a quick way to upload photos from Facebook and post them here, it just involves copying the image's url and pasting it in the correct place. That will be included in my tutorial.

I do think that there should be something different about WCPS than other forums. Otherwise why come here?

heda gobbler wrote:I do think that there should be something different about WCPS than other forums.  Otherwise why come here?

Excellent point!

The "why come here" really is a good factor that needs to be understood. Chances are high that for each guest or member the reason is different. However, there likely is a common theme that can be extrapolated through an analysis of sorts. Once there is a clearer understanding of why people come to the forum, attention can be focused on using that as a means to help not only increase traffic on the forum, but to overall increase user interaction.

The idea behind this forum, as the title says..."dedicated to the buying and selling of quality heritage poultry in Western Canada" is to help connect breeders of heritage breed poultry with each other.

Just throwing this out there, if I were asked to write a mission statement as class assignment for the forum as viewed as a company, off the top of my head something like...

The Western Canadian Poultry Swap, is an online community connecting poultry enthusiasts of all expertise across Canada with each other, for the purpose of sharing in the experiences of raising heritage poultry. A place to educate and become educated, meet and connect with others, purchase, sell and trade quality heritage poultry."

What the differentiating factor is or will be, is yet to be identified. It may take some time to establish what exactly makes WCPS different than other forums and what its niche is. What ever it is it should be something unique that positively adds to the Canadian online poultry community as a whole.

As I said, I did love to come here and hang out, as well as ACE. But when my some of my personal and close friends left, it left a hole for me. I don't think they will return. So the hole has been filled, smiling. I take my hat off to you Jonny to have the desire to take the time to get our little forum the place it once was. Yippee!! Have an awesome day, CynthiaM.

I like the idea of archiving swiss cheese threads/topics. I hadn't thought of that. It makes much more sense than what I suggested. My thoughts had been that if something is hard to read through, most people do not have the patience to keep reading and/stay. It feels like too much work.

I like the idea of asking how & why a person come to this forum and what made them stay.

As for me, I was told about this forum from a member in my province. I only wish more were on here from MB...I don't understand why there are not many here...could that be something to work on...to try to attract more folks from out here somehow? I tell those I know, but that doesn't add up to many.

I came on here to learn more about heritage breeds, find breeders and to learn more about poultry in general from those with more experience. I have been very happy with what I have learned here.

I am looking forward to seeing what changes will be made and the niche this forum will find. I find those types of challenges fascinating too, so I will be watching and learning from what goes on in this area as well. I just wish I could help with constructive suggestions. I guess just being here is something.