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Beginning of a trend, or a dead cat bounce?
Grumpy Jac made a post on Thursday discussing the recent downward trend in the forum post count.
That, in turn, led to a variety of views, debates & threads.
On Friday, posts were made on 31 different threads in Poker Chat alone, & on 40+ threads overall.
I don't have any stats or historical data to confirm this, but anecdotally, this seems to me like a record, & by some way, in use of the Forum.
It's absolutely true that a contributor to post count is the software quality. Guilty as charged. However, it is on the radar of The Business, & they are now fully aware of the situation.
It's also the responsibility of the players though. If they want a vibrant community, they have to make the effort. They certainly did yesterday.
Comments
One oddity with the Forum is that many of the things you mention CAN be implemented immediately. Not new or better software, no, but as to moving threads to different boards, Community Competitions, that sort of thing, it's one area where I do have the ability & responsibility to do stuff.
I also have a small budget to spend as I see fit, without further reference or requests to Upstairs. So if prizes are needed for Forum Comps, or Leagues or whatever, I can do so (or decline to do so) immediately, no waiting, no "it's on the list". They can be run by anyone, too.
Mention was made of the old "Post of the Week" thing. That's easy, if we wanted, we could just do it. Not sure we should, though, as judging "Best Post" is so subjective.
Have to say, if there were one this week, Grumpy Jac would get it, as it was his post that set the ball rolling. But there's not.
How would we judge whether a Forum Comp merits some prizes?
It's a combination, really.
1) Fun.
Anything which helps remind us that for the vast majority of us, poker is a recreational pursuit, & it should be fun. More fun would equate to more forum posters.
2) Drives people to post more.
I could run a "free to Enter Fun Comp" every day, or 2 or 3 times per week. The lure of free Tourney entries ALWAYS attracts new or non regular posters. And if a significant % of them then hung around, & posted regularly, that would be a success. But they don't - they post their answer, in the hope of a freebie, & then we never see them again until the next Forum Fun Comp. That's no good, they are just freerolling us all.
3) Has a commercial benefit.
If it is related to, say, a particular Sky Poker MTT or Promo, & as a result, there is heightened awareness, or more entries, that works. Ditto if it relates to a sporting event - a football match, a horse race, a F1 race, & in some way helps to drive extra uniques & bets for Sky Bet, that works, too.
So there are some ideas.
Have a great weekend.
"£110 main even starting in half an hour dont forget to buy in for your chance to win big"
"Head over to the forum, for your chance to enter exclussive FREE competitions with tons of prizes"
now admittedly both are going to be just an annoyance to most people but i feel like more people will come to the forum influenced by the oppurtunity to win free prizes, than people will respond to a post trying to gain main event runners
In my opinion, Table Messaging should be "dynamic", & change daily as appropriate. Repeating the same messages every day, day after day, nullifies their impact. We just ignore them. Whereas if they changed daily, & were not just driving players to register for a MTT, but were driving people to the Community from time to time, they may have more impact.
I ought to add I have no access to the data, & so I have no idea if those confounded "register now for the £100 Guaranteed!" things actually work - if they do drive extra registrations, then fair enough, they have to stay. It's also very easy for me to sit in my comfy Team Moan armchair & say "change them daily", but I don't have to do that work, & have no idea how much time & effort would be needed.
Good post though.
I should also add that the Table Messaging has improved immensely in the last few weeks. We were getting Messages over Messages, both IN the Chatbox & OVER the Chatbox (same messages, & all clickable meaning they were a right PITA to get rid of), as well as over the Lobby & in the ticker, but the improvement in these is huge, they have been reduced & improved out of all recognition in the last few weeks.
It's very odd you should say that. Although they are high maintenance to run, as they require work & updating every day for a week or two, (though I often get help from forum regulars) I thought these were really engaging & great fun.
But the weird thing is that one of the Suits sort of mocked me for running these, said they were a complete heap of poo. And of course he may be right. He's certainly due, he was right once before, in 2009 as I recall.
But I just don't know what the process is, how resource heavy it is, how difficult it is to make them dynamic, as in, say, "Overlay Alert". I suspect that it is not really practical or cost-effective.
Let's not forget, though, the Table Messaging has improved immensely in the last few weeks, so well done Sky. They had got to the point of being intensely annoying & intrusive, to the point when even I, with my high tolerance to minor irritations was getting a little tired of them. But fair play, they have improved that immensely of late.
hi tikay,
an overlay alert must be one of the big win additions for sky poker. if, for example, there is a total overlay of £500 a day in the 20 biggest tournaments each day and half of this can be saved, that is £250 a day. Or £90,000 a year.
that would be very good for sky poker and ithe players.
ppppppft Suits eh what do they know :P
Great post from RLT too