I am really nuts as a designer, so I might not be the right person to criticize here but it looks awful to me. Won't even have a second look with such simplified design. And concerning SEO (no idea about your rankings) but still PR 0 after a year does not indicate that you really took care of your "baby". Apart: Thread starters like this look like copied from an (very) old school book. Nobody is interested in such common information. Write particular vivid and passionate about specific places, habits, rules or whatever is not easy to find with a click on Google's search button.
I will be implementing vBuletin 4 soon so that will change the design, but what exactly do you think is wrong with it at the moment? The thing is, for every change that is made, some like it, and some dont. Our current users seem happy with it, and i regularly ask them to comment on what needs to be improved. Yeh i had PR2 for a while, but for some reason it disappeared. Personally i dont really care about PR i would much rather have traffic. The thread starters are just copied from Wiki, as i have not been to every country so, just needed something to start each thread.
i think you can work on the design a little make it more modern. plus get your forum to remind people of Australia. also try seo that will help create back links submit it to search engines and directories every 3 -4 weeks good luck
Design will appear more modern after vbulletin 4 comes out. Have recently just submitted to >1200 directories whcih would mean nearly 2k total since the site was launched
i think forums are not out of date and its a old concept. people this days dont have time to visit forums. hence you will see only support and seo forums get visitors. most people use forum only to boost traffic and alexa rankings. i liked your website. because of your .au domain search engines outside au will not give priority to your site. try getting a .com or .net .org domain name.
have the same name registered under a .com, and obviously you havn't done any research on forum growth
My guess is that the travel category is fiercely competitive. The category can be very lucrative in the form of advertising and commissions generated and booked travel and some there very serious and well-funded players are in the game. You may want to consider doing something highly targeted to a specific group, interest or travel lifestyle. Many of the very broad content sites do not have the depth on specific topics that interest various groups. maybe you should consider a topic that your particular interest to or search around to see if there is a topic that's not covered very well. If you pick the right target and promoted within those interests circles you're a good chance of doing very well. Best of luck and you get much respect for your hard work.
Thanks Seddu, Finally some practical advice, other than just the generic stuff that gets thrown up evey time! Bearing in mind this is my first ever website, im still kind of fumbling my way through it, as i said, i know the theory, but applying it is harder. Its funny you mention what you do, as i recently added a 'Cruise forum' section to my site, after finding out that there are no aussie cruise forums and that my site ranks in the top 4 both glpbally and within Aus for the search term 'cruise forum' so that is a bit of a focus now and then hopefully people will join for that, then stay for the rest
Looks like you need a bit more SEO. I did a quick check, your site has a page rank of 0, and Alexa says you only have 8 Back links. I would try and get with some of the Aussie Travel blogs, start posting comments on their blogs, and if you become well known you can ask for a link to your Forum. Also, ask if any of your members have websites and see if they can link to you. I would say your list of keywords on the front page is WAAAYYY to long: Try and cut it down to 5-10 valuable key words and use some of the less valuable ones deeper into the site on the topics they relate too. You don't necessarily want to drive all traffic to the main page, driving traffic deeper into the site can actually make a huge difference. Try and drive some specific niche traffic to some of the topics and subtopics. What directories are you listed in?
Thanks Pyro, Funny you mention it, i actually just (still have the tab open!) was adjusting my meta keywords Not 100% sure what directories i am listed in, but i have submitted to over 2000 throughout the last year, some take a while for approval, so as i said, i dont know which have been approved and which not. I just checked my backlinks and it says i have around 2k from about 80 different sites. I have never had much luck with Alexa, it doesn't recognise my site properly for some reason Will ask members to add my site to theirs. Thanks for the practical hints
Why not try and give the site a little bit more structure when it comes to reign and high tourism areas, and try and get some local businesses from the area to link to those sections. Or maybe invite the business owners of that area to come post and promote in those sections?
Well, you should rewrite the wiki copies and make them sound a bit more emotional. Not having been at all the places you write about is normal. Who has been everywhere? But the "clinical " style does suggest it (not having been there) direct with the article. I suggest to look a bit into press release style articles to have an example (not to copy that exactly, of course). You need to make your visitors whish to see the places you are writing about, not present them a school-examen-like description. And yeah, as said I may not be the most indicated person for a critic about design, I just want to say that the simplicity creates somehow an amateurish look (to me).