How many threads before you make a new forum?

Discussion in 'Managing Your Online Community' started by Soliloquy, Jun 22, 2009.

  1. Soliloquy

    Soliloquy Regular Member

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    When adding new subforums, how many threads do you wait for on the topic before you create the new forum and move the threads?
     
  2. kev

    kev Regular Member

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    At the very least enough threads to fill up 2 whole pages - so that is no an exact number. Lets say that you display 20 threads per page, so I would want at least 40 - 50 threads on a certain topic.

    If you display 15 threads per page, then at least 30 - 45 threads. Which would be enough for 2 - 3 pages.
     
  3. Nick

    Nick Regular Member

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    I don't go by numbers. A new sub-forum is warranted when I feel a certain section is becoming too cluttered and is getting way too much attention.
    The "General Community Discussion" forum here is a perfect example: the first twenty threads in that forum (page 1) are all less than 24 hours old, so topics get buried rather quickly... which is bad in my opinion. So we're currently trying to think of sub-forums that can be added to that section.

    But when I do create a new sub-forum, I make sure it has a good page or two filled up so that it doesn't appear empty or inactive.
     
  4. Wayne Luke

    Wayne Luke Regular Member

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    It would entirely depend on the site, the topic at hand and current trends. If the current surge in posts is due to trends online, than its probably not worthy of its own forum. It will simply be replaced next week or next month.

    On vBCodex, I added sub-forums for different kinds of addon releases when the main forum got to about 15 releases over 3 different types. Even added a subforum for vBulletin 4 layouts and content types though its not visible yet. I fgured it would be easier to handle it now rather than later.
     
  5. Chris

    Chris Regular Member

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    I'll add a new sub-forum when I feel that a specific forum is either a) becoming too cluttered or b) going somewhat "off-topic" - like others, I don't usually go by the number of threads.
     
  6. Tyler

    Tyler The Badministrator

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    Same.

    I'm actually a fan of sub-forums. I need to make sure I don't overdo it before I have enough thread activity.
     
  7. tryfuhl

    tryfuhl Champion

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    I try to avoid creating new subforums unless they're in great demand or serve a particular niche than can't be achieved otherwise.
     

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