Suggestions for updating the forum

Axwell

As per the title if you have suggestions for updating the forum please list them below. I will leave this open for a week or two and then we will have a look at it.

Bear in mind some things are controlled by the powers that be in boards not by the mods of the forum itself.

Keep it to bullet points, long essays will just be ignored.

Cheers

Axwell

Copy of Pedronomix post from other thread minus the irrelevant bits to the topic at hand..


A few simple items could go a long way to improve the Business section for all. I will start the ball rolling with a few, others will no doubt add substance to this little list

Lots of well run BBS's have moving stickies that are put up for hot/current topics and then when they cool are moved to an Archive Sticky. It would not take more than 10 minutes a year to maintain.

We are in the age of eCommerce and all that goes with it, yet we have boards/forums about web design, development, SEO, Adwords, Apps, Techy stuff etc etc scattered throughout boards.ie etc etc... yet nary a nary a one dedicated to the main event, eCommerce itself.

Over recent years and probably allied to the main-streaming of eCommerce opportities, sourcing, shipping, drop-shipping from Asia and China in particular crop up on nearly a daily basis and the same questions get posed over and over and over... ad nauseam...

Trade Marks, Brands, Patents and Idea Protection. We pride ourselves on being at the forefront of the knowledge economy. A topic well worthy of it's own sticky at least.

Graham

Here's my suggestions for the stickies, that's probably as good a place as any to start.

1) The Business Partner Sticky
Prune the 4 year old posts, enforce the no communication on the thread rule.

2) Trying to register a .ie domain
Unsticky and see 6)

3) Information, Essential Links & Books
Contains very little of any of the above and only 7(almost completely irrelevant) posts since 2011. Unsticky and give it the dignified send off it deserves.

4) Anyone care to share their story? Part 2.
Contains almost no recent stories, a few website reviews and a liberal sprinkling of I'm about to (insert page 1 of a story that never gets written). Enforce the Story part of the title or even make the thread pre-moderated/by invitation.

5) E & B M Charter
Doesn't need much more than a quick spring clean and a drop of WD40 on the hinges.

6) Looking for a Website / Website Advice (including e-commerce) FOR YOUR BUSINESS
morph into a Looking for a Website /Domain Name or Website Advice FOR YOUR BUSINESS resources thread with an early post being about registering a .ie domain.
For Your Business to emphasise it's specifically for that purpose. Review requests and general web dev should be directed to their appropriate forums.

7) Potential New Sticky - I'm about to start a business/I Have An Idea for......

8) Potential New Sticky - Where can I find ......... (including importing goods)

MRTULES

I would love a few sections or sub forums like the following:

Idea generation/innovation = a place specifically to throw out your ideas and look for feed back.

Lean start up/bootstrapping/minimal viable product = the cheapest quickest route to test your idea/product/service. Business model canvas in stead of a full blown business plan

I'd agree with the Ecommerce Section and import from Asia also.

Sorry about the bit part post but I'll put together a better more readable list later in the week.

pedronomix

The forum search facility is not obvious, especially to new members, and leads to many of the same questions being posed over and over. A READ THIS FIRST sticky could include a simple tutorial.

Graham

pedronomix wrote: »

The forum search facility is not obvious, especially to new members, and leads to many of the same questions being posed over and over. A READ THIS FIRST sticky could include a simple tutorial.

+1

The "Read this First" sticky could also include some hardcoded URLs with the more popular search terms:

Popular Questions / Searches

Importing products from China: Importing China

Starting a Business: Starting Business

Producing food products in a domestic kitchen: Home Kitchen

Starting an Employment Agency: Employment Agency

Tips for new posters:
When searching through previous posts for more information, please do not add posts to very old threads. If you can't find what you're looking for, start a new thread for your chosen topic and include as much relevant information as possible.

Example Posts - Bad
Where can I find a manufacturer of 'Left handed flugel widgets?

Example Posts - Good
I have been searching for a manufacturer of 'Left handed flugel widgets but from a Google search all I can find is a previous manufacturer that went bankrupt 2 years ago. Does anyone know of any manufacturers still trading?

Fionn101

As mentioned above some subforums would be good. e-commerce & payment solutions are 2 areas that I'd like to be able to jump to and talk with other owners. having a sub forum would allow them to see my question amongst all the faq's that occupy our main page.

Some other forums where people can go to for advice from those with relevant experience :
Tax and accounting , maybe how to gain start-up funding and grants would be a good sub forum.
Making a pitch or marketing your product areas.
and lastly a forum for all those opening their own coffee shop ;-)

Whatever can be achieved to see the Excellent advice on offer from the forum members(you know who you are), above the drone of ill researched questions.

Hope this helps & Good idea Axwell.

pedronomix

I would add to my original list as in post #2 above

e-Commerce: Some highlighted links to the other specialist topic forums for Web Design, SEO and Internet Marketing, App Development etc etc. They are great specialist resources with different posters who may not frequent E&BM.

The Accountancy sub-forum has become a trainee/student accountants zone with little relevance to business. A couple of the other sub-forums are locked or effectively dead.

Im wondering how effective the stickies are in general. For example things posted in the business partners sticky could open up decent discussion in the forum.

True there will be posts from people looking for a web guy to build their idea for free, but at the same time there may be people who want to do it.

Or maybe the step is to create a sub forum something like Business Ideas, Funding and Partners. This could be a pretty interesting place to bounce around ideas, figure out how to finance it and help to get people involved. I feel like putting this kind of stuff into stickies is going to slow down everything. Whereas maybe this is the area that could be perhaps the most interesting, and generate lots of great debates.

Buttercake

CRO stuff, sole trader, ltd, partnership etc

always the same questions/confusion

pedronomix

Deleted User wrote: »

Im wondering how effective the stickies are in general. For example things posted in the business partners sticky could open up decent discussion in the forum.

True there will be posts from people looking for a web guy to build their idea for free, but at the same time there may be people who want to do it.

Or maybe the step is to create a sub forum something like Business Ideas, Funding and Partners. This could be a pretty interesting place to bounce around ideas, figure out how to finance it and help to get people involved. I feel like putting this kind of stuff into stickies is going to slow down everything. Whereas maybe this is the area that could be perhaps the most interesting, and generate lots of great debates.

As Mod pointed out, the current boards.ie format is not something that we can hope to change here. I know that some of the best other platforms can facilitate a home page with the sub-forums listed on the "homepage" and featuring trending/recent threads in short order under each sub-forum. Very easy to use, very user friendly but will only ever happen with a total boards.ie upgrade.
There is no question that the present sub-forum designations could benefit from real housekeeping and modernisation.

pedroeibar1

I believe the biggest improvement would come from more active modding on s#ite being posted by people who have no idea, done no homework, revert with asinine remarks and get in a huff when given practical advice.
‘Read This First’ sticky – preferably in red should be at the top and contain basic ‘Do’s & don’ts’
That should contain
Encouragement / guidance on using the SEARCH function
Encouragement on providing fuller information in a post.
A ban on homework-type basic questions
There should be an information précis on topics such as
Raising cash/equity
Difference between sole trader - Ltd. Co. - partnerships
Basics on Revenue matters for a new entity including VAT, thresholds, etc.
A sticky for ‘Corporate Law and Governance questions’ (whole new Companies Act / rules arriving next year)
A sticky for ‘HR Issues’
A sticky for ‘home industry and coffee shops’
A sticky for ‘Importing and exporting’ (if only to encourage those who want to import 20 pairs of jeans from China to look there first!)
The dead sub-forums should be archived and replaced by ones for eCommerce including web design/SEO/critiques
‘Anyone care to share their story? Part 2.’ Total waffle. Should be put out of its misery.

dbran

Hi

I would not be in favour of putting a blanket ban on "so called" homework questions as this is the whole point of the forum. One persons homework is another persons advise. If you come across a post asking a question that you believe is beneath you then the simple answer is that you do not answer it. They will soon move on and quickly find the advise they are looking for elsewhere. I also think this would lead to excessive moderating of the forum which I am not prepared to do.

I would not be in favour of the stickies you are suggesting as I believe they would constitute professional advise that is subject to change over time and is nearly always based on the individuals circumstances. A link to http://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/ would be more appropriate for most of them.

dbran

Axwell

We are limited to the amount of stickies we are supposed to have on a forum anyways so we cant go putting stickies to loads of topics - we will look at the suggestions and try cover them in those but there wont be a stickie for all of these individual items.

pedroeibar1

Thanks, points taken; my post consists of a wish-list, I did not expect Christmas!

However, we disagree on ‘Homework’. It should be discouraged/banned. ‘Research’ and ‘Advice’ are quite different. Taking as an example the current thread on ‘Glamping’ – (there are countless older thread topics to choose from) I’d have no issues in commenting on a business plan or advising on a model, or indicating where some research could be done, but I’m not going to post/paste links to the dozens of Irish Glamping websites and hundreds elesewhere. Why bother? If an OP is not prepared to do some basic research (even Google) and see what other businesses are doing in the same field (sorry!) s/he is doomed to fail anyway.
Another ‘homework’ type post is here
Maybe I’ve got it wrong, but IMO providing responses at that level of basic ‘homework’ is demeaning to an Entrepreneurial & Business Management Board.

dbran

Hi pedroeibar1

I hear what you are saying and certainly there have been some posts by newbies recently on here where I believe we all raised our eyebrows when we read them.

That having been said, that is just the nature of the forum. Sometimes you get threads that are very enlightening, and other times you get the mundane bog standard question. I don't think that we should be going down the road of banning them. Otherwise we will just have a stagnent and empty forum where people are afraid to post anything in case it is viewed as too basic in a very over moderated forum. That result would be a lot worse in my opinion.

If someone on here wants to help them with their homework I am not going to stop them. Its their time, they can do what they want with it. If you dont want to help then you dont have to post.

dbran

Axwell

pedroeibar1 wrote: »

Maybe I’ve got it wrong, but IMO providing responses at that level of basic ‘homework’ is demeaning to an Entrepreneurial & Business Management Board.

I know where you are coming from but this is the key part - no one is forcing anyone to respond. Rather than waste time posting and engaging those type of posts simply report it if it seems someone is just looking for their homework to be done and move on and let the mods deal with it.

Putting stickies up and a charter of rules is all well and good but its not going to stop people from still posting threads without reading them and some of this stuff is still going to find its way on to the forum each week. People come on here that never use boards, others never use the business forum and dont know some of the questions they want answered are available in the stickies as the forums they post on might not have a similar structure.

As regular users who are familiar with the forum you point people in the right direction if there is a specific sticky or thread that answers what they want, if the post is against a rule in the charter or out of place then just report it. No need to go on a rant in the thread and tell the user this isn't a homework thread or anything else, that just starts bickering and nonsense which in itself is just as demeaning to the forum. As a side note that's something that's seriously going to be clamped down on from now on, its been far to common place lately and there's simply no need for it, just report and move on.

Bandara

Axwell wrote: »

No need to go on a rant in the thread and tell the user this isn't a homework thread or anything else, that just starts bickering and nonsense which in itself is just as demeaning to the forum. As a side note that's something that's seriously going to be clamped down on from now on, its been far to common place lately and there's simply no need for it, just report and move on.

Excellent news. Well done

daviecronin

For updating the forum hmmmm.....................

Well as stated before a lot of the questions asked are ones that have come up before and are kind of similar so maybe a sticky for certain things. Like Importing from China, Health certs etc! Stuff like that.

Also maybe think of adding stickys to bring up the mood or something. The My story sticky was a great idea and maybe encourage more people to write there. Have a sticky for young entrepreneurs to talk about the student enterprise, JDD, getting off the ground etc etc! Sher ye know best I suppose

pedronomix

De facto, the E&BM sub-forum has become the main head forum. Too many stickies are not going to address the fundamental issue that it has become the catch-all for the vast variety of topics that make up investigating/starting/running an SME enterprise.

It would seem therefore logical that E&BM should become the head forum and the key topics and their subsets be divided between a number of sub-forums, each with their own search facility. This would enhance the value of the overall forum as a more useable archive of information and be much more user friendly.

It would also remain within the existing boards.ie structure and minimise the use of stickies.

Axwell

Closing this up tomorrow folks - any last suggestions get them in today.

Cheers

Axwell

Thanks for the feedback folks.

Myself and DBran will look over it and see what can be done to implement whats possible in due course.