I.T Studio Hosting takes the strain off creating your own forum and allows its users to install phpBB 2 & 3 easily from its extensive library of scripts.

phpBB is a high-powered, fully scalable and customisable open-source bulletin board package. phpBB has a user-friendly interface, simple and straightforward administration panel and helpful FAQ.

Below are some Top Tips in helping you run your own forum and get your community off to a good start.

Start off Small
Many forums make the mistake of creating too many categories too soon. If you’re just starting out with your forum, you’re going to create a negative atmosphere if you have plenty of categories but with zero or very few posts. Plan out the minimum amount of categories your forum needs and use those for now. Once the community becomes more active with regular posts and contributing members, you can start to introduce more categories that will suit your target audience.

Make the Forum Appear Active
When you first start building your forum, it’s important to create a sense of activity, as it will be less likely that users will register to a forum which appears to lack enthusiasm and where there are no new topics being created. If you’re determined to make your forum a success then you should either get friends to sign up and post topics or create multiple accounts that you can login and post as, so inevitably you’re answering your own questions to begin with, but it makes the forum appear more active.

Creating & Running a Successful Forum
Every member that is newly registered to the forum should be sent a “Welcome to the Forum” message via the private message system. This is a really nice touch that new members will appreciate, it doesn’t have to be unique to every user, you could have a standard template that you can simply copy from and paste into a message. It’s a good idea to include links in your welcome message to the most popular categories on the forum , encouraging new members to participate. Give them the opportunity to introduce themselves to the community, add a link within the message to the “Introductions” forum on your board and make sure you greet them with a reply.

Reply to Posts as Soon as Possible
Make the right impression by subscribing to all forums so you will be alerted of new threads and posts. Login and reply as soon as you can, if you are unsure how to answer the question, it may be worth searching the internet to see if it has been answered before and use that information to help, be sure to credit the original source.

Hire Moderators
Over time you will find it harder to monitor your forum as post rates and the amount of new registrations increase. It’s almost impossible for yourself to monitor the forum 24/7 for inappropriate content, such as spam and advertising. It would be highly advisable to hire a moderator to help run your forum, approach the active members on your forum and ask if they would like to help improve and grow the community. Due to their commitments to the forum, it’s likely they will accept your request and be happy to help. It’s advisable to create a set of rules and instructions for moderators to follow so the forum is still run in exactly the way you want. Also, try to hire a moderator who is in a different time-zone so when you’re asleep, the forum is still being moderated.

Remove Spam
Nothing can turn visitors away more quickly from a forum than spam, so make sure you keep a watchful eye on members trying to sell unrelated products and remove posts that do not serve any purpose or that are offensive. It’s advised to create a forum for “General/Off Topic” posts so members can chat about other things which are not forum specific.

Send a Regular Newsletter
Send a regular newsletter to your forum members which includes the latest popular topics and encourages them to participate. It’s a great way of reminded members about your forum and also a way of generating traffic back to your boards.

Useful Links:

Support:
http://www.phpbb.com/support/

Modifications and Styles
http://www.phpbb.com/customise/

I.T Studio Hosting provides our hosting customers with an extensive library of CGI scripts to help build, maintain and improve their websites. The following article will focus on our installable blogging software, WordPress and Geeklog and why maintaining a blog can be beneficial for your website.

What is a Blog?
A blog is an online journal that displays posts in chronological order. It’s an ideal solution for people who want the ability to publish and share regular content online with as little effort as possible.

Search Engine Marketing
Google will rank a website that publishes unique, quality content regularly much higher than a website that is static and rarely updated. Thanks to blogs it has never been easier to keep your website fresh and increase your chances of appearing high within search results. If your blog is tailored towards your industry, your posts will be full of targeted keywords and related content and by having this will increase the likelihood of your website ranking higher with related search terms.

Attracting New & Repeat Visitors
If you’re publishing regular content, chances are you will be getting repeat visitors looking to read your news, this is especially effective if your content is unique, industry related and interesting. Attracting new and repeat visitors by running exclusive promotions, e.g. a sale or discount on some of your products, not only will this attract people to your website but also increase the likelihood of you making a sale though these promotions. Allow people to subscribe to your Blog via RSS, so they can be alerted when your blog is updated, this will send them directly back to your website.

Easy to Update
Once your blog is installed you can manage everything from an intuitive admin control panel. From here you can easily and quickly add, edit and remove your posts, plus many other features such as changing the look and feel. Many blogs offer the ability to set a publish date for your content, this is especially useful if you are going on holiday and are unable to update your blog. Simply create your posts before you go and set the publish date for the period you are away, this way you’re able to maintain a regular supply of content.

Keeping the Costs Low
Wordpress has become much more than a standard blogging tool due to its thriving community of developers. WordPress is very extendable, you can easily add modules such as image galleries, videos and widgets yourself with minimum effort and no cost. WordPress even offers free themes, so changing the look of your website can be done quite easily yourself, eliminating the need to hire a potentially expensive web designer. WordPress and Geeklog run excellent communities who can assist you with your blog should you need any guidance. A list of helpful links can be found below:

WordPress Modules:
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/

WordPress Forum:
http://wordpress.org/support/

Geeklog Forum:
http://www.geeklog.net/forum/

We have updated some more of the CGI scripts you can install from Hosting Control Panel, these include:

Drupal to 6.1
AgoraCart to 5.2
WordPress Blog to 2.5
Nucleus Content Management System to 3.32
Geeklog Blog to 1.4.1

If you would like to install any of these onto your website please login to your Hosting Control Panel.

I.T Studio Hosting offers our customers access to an extensive library of free cgi scripts allowing them to install professional applications very quickly and with minimal effort. This article will cover the benefits of using our Content Management Systems (Joomla, Drupal, Typo3 and Nucleus) and why using them will help streamline the publishing of content online.

Quick and Easy to Update
Content Management Systems allow users to add new pages to a website with minimal effort. Your entire website is managed via your administration control panel where you can add new articles, images, polls and many other features via an intuitive interface.

Web Experience not Essential
Traditionally you would need to hire a web designer/developer to manage your website. Using a CMS eliminates the need to do this. Everything from the look and feel of your website to article management can be handled via your control panel. It is also a very cost effective way of running your own website as everything can be updated and managed by yourself. If you are ever in need of help or guidance, you can check the CMS provider’s FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) section of their website or try posting your problem over at their official support forums. A list of useful links can be found at the bottom of this article.

Automatic Navigation Generation
Menu’s will be created automatically when you add new pages/categories which will form the basis of your websites navigation, e.g. Homepage, Contact, Articles, etc. This eliminates the need to manually update your navigation each time you add a new section, saving you time, effort and preventing the risk of creating dead links.

Searchable
Using a CMS will allow your entire website to be searchable enabling people to find content fast. The advantages of having a search system in place on your website will save users the time of having to trawl through static pages trying to find what they need. It makes for a much better user experience and is certainly less frustrating.

Scheduled Content
With most Content Management Systems you can post date articles allowing you to publish them on a certain time or day of the week. This is especially handy if you need to publish content at certain times but you’re not available to do so – the CMS will update it for you.

Protected Content
A CMS can make certain pages viewable only to people you choose. For example, you can allow visitors to your website to view all of your basic articles but require registration for them to view premium content.

Consistent Design
Don’t worry about creating new pages for every article as a Content Management System will automatically produce them for you. The article page will be created from a single template and, no matter how much content you add, you can rest assured the look of your website will stay the same.

Extendable
Content Management Systems, such as Joomla, have an excellent resource of extensions allowing you to develop your website further and offer more functionality. There are hundreds of extensions available, including Ecommerce, Forums, Galleries, Classified Advertisements and so much more. A link to the entire database of extensions can be found below.

Remember you can easily install your own CMS from our database of scripts that come with any hosting account.

Helpful Links

Joomla Extensions
http://extensions.joomla.org/

Joomla Community Forum
http://forum.joomla.org/

Drupal Forum
http://drupal.org/forum

Typo3 Documentation
http://typo3.com/Support.1228.0.html

Nucleus Support Forum
http://forum.nucleuscms.org/

Yep that’s right for a limited time only we are offering 10% off any off our hosting packages, use the code below -

CODE: ITS01

All new customers get a chance to win a Nintendo DS, If you sign up before 21/06/2008 you will be entered into our prize draw !

Don’t delay sign up today !

You may of noticed we have re developed our control panels and added some new features, check your out now !

We have just released our lastest addition to our product range which is rent a cart.

Ideal for starter businesses who would like an affordable e commerce solution to start selling online, for only £6.99 a month with our unlimited user account.

Pick your colour and we will install and give support until you are happy, We will be releasing many more templates to choose from over the next few week.

We are making our new ordering system and account area live today !

Your password is the same and your username is your email address you assigned to your account.

So whats new -

We now are accepting the following payment methods -

Nochex, Google checkout, Paypal, Cheque and bank transfer on request.

You can login to your hosting account and domain account just by clicking on the manage hosting / domain link within the new account area.

Our support database is now on there, so if you need to know how to do something all you have to do is enter it into the search box !

You can update your account information, buy new hosting products and renew old hosting products, download invoices and submit a support ticket.

If you are thinking of joining I.T Studio Hosting its never been easier to set an account with us now.

If you do have any problems as we may experience bugs in the system please contact and let us know so we can get them fixed right away.

We have given I.T Studio Hosting a lick of paint,

With the cold weather around we throught it might make us all feel a little happier.

Let us know what you think of our newer look.

info@itstudiohosting.co.uk