"Register" or "Join"

For those of you who have forums, have you ever considered changing the "Register" link to read as, "Join"?

I am considering doing such, as it may appeal to a wider audience. "Join" seems more frank; "Register" seems to mean more like "sign up to receive e-mails" or something like that.

What do you think?

 

I use "sign up" in my websites. Why? no idea. didn't give it some thought

 

I like that, too. I've gone ahead and changed mine from "Register" to "Join Us".

 

link? what kind of board software do u use. just curious

 

vBulletin.

 

Oooh "Sign Up" sounds the best to me. Something about it makes it seem like it encourages a person to sign up. Like it's more attractive. I may try that. Would be awesome to see a larger number of registrations

 

Please let us know what works best, and what doesn't. If "join us" or "sign up" attracts more members to sign up, then please share the details with us.

 

I tend to agree, join probably sounds a little less official. One thing I have found is no matter what if you have some forums that can't be accessed by the non-members you will always drive membership

 

Join good but Sign Up is better.

 

Did you guys notice any change in the number of users that signed up on your forum since you've changed the registration title? Just being curious...

 

Register more formal.....Join is more verbal
That's all

 

I would also like to go with JOIN. Its looks much good than Register

 

I've gone with Join Us, and it seems to be helping a bit.

I don't see much of a difference in registration rates, but It certainly hasn't hurt. So I'll leave it as "Join Us".

 

Wait, what template do I change to do this?

I did a language & phrase search and ended up with about 500 results....

 

"Join" is the best imo because it makes them feel like they are 'joining' the community.

 

G0dfather to do this you would have to edit the common.php file in forum/language/en/common.php

This is where you can change the index page name for your forum as well.

Please note change with Notepad++ Or any HTML editor not just notepad bacause it generates an error for some reason.


Back to the forum in hand.....I like Sign Up. I think i will be changing my forum to Sign Up,

 

I'm using join us in my site.

 

G0dfather, I don't think tentwenty has a clue as to what he is talking about

Just do a "search in phrases" for "register" in "Phrase Variable Name Only".

Exactly my thoughts

 

there is no need to bother in such small issues sign up or register or join us all that matters is how much active is your forum.

Remember Content is the King, I share articles on my forums and I get much uniques/day bounce rate is too good. so on my forum its register 6 out of 10 of my uniques get registered with forum.

 

I would prefer JOIN, like doing collective work.