UBB.Developers Forums Community Development Promoting Your Community Forum Showcase Affiliations.

I have recently approached some sites about affiliations. These sites do not run UBB and I've been asked by some of my members why I'm associating with sites that run vB or phpBB etc.

The fact of the matter is that these other sites have content that compliments what I do at Netwerkin. I'm curious about how some of you feel about this.

If a site has good content, does it matter what forum software they use? Generally affiliation is a good thing...

I don't understand why your memeber would care if these other sites were running a ubb or not, You don't work for UBB do you ?

As a site administrator, your goal is to attract users to your little spot on the web.

As such, you should seek ways to reach population base that is likely to be interested in your site. There are many different ways to try to do this, but affiliating with other "like sites" is one way.

The question for you is whether the sites complement one another, or whether they serve the same purpose.

If your site and someone elses site serve the same need, then whether you recognize it or not, you are in competition with them for the attention span of the users that you both bring to the table.

You don't want to align your site with another to have "your members" spending more time on the affilate site than your own.

It really doesn't matter what forum software one site runs versus another. What matters is what you are able to offer the users versus someone else.

Here is an example: You run a website centered around perl programming. You offer tutorials, examples, a script library, and a forum, where users get advice from one another.

You could affiliate with another perl web site, which will likely expand the number of potential users who visit your site. However, your users will visit the affiliate site as well. Eventually the users will migrate to the site that best meets their needs. If this is the case, make sure your site is better, and you'll win over their users.

On the other hand, you could affiliate with a PHP website. Each of you would have your core users interested in a particular language, but both would attract people interested in programming. Neither is likely to cannibalize the other.

What software you are running versus someone else is running shouldn't enter into the equation. If so, either you or your members are too emotionally attached to a program.

Ahhh, but a lot of members are UBB people, and mostly post at UBB's. I totally agree that content is king and that's the point I'm trying to make. I get a lot of e-mail from people that have seen my board because of links from here and some of them would never think of posting at another board that wasn't UBB.

I'll tell you a secret, I run other sites that have PHP and MySQL boards but I still love my UBB....

Since I haven't got a site with my forum currently If I was to use affliation I'd affilate with UBB forums. If it'a site I don't care what forum software they run.

We tend to be a bit bias when it comes to using UBB. Then again what do you expect when dealing with a group of 'enthusiasts' seeking to further enhance what the program can do.

By the same token, we sometimes can be biased against other programs. Your users may also be a bit emotional when it comes to their message board preferences. We're all used to using UBB, we like it, and in many cases we are unfamiliar with competing products.

The bottom line is that you should do what is best for your site. Since you have a site that caters to a lot of 'techie' types, I would be surprised that they would be opposed to exploring different technologies and tools.

Affiliating with another site that happens to use another brand forum isn't necessarily a bad thing. Bottom line, affiliating with other sites should be about the potential new visitors, services and content, not the platform they are presented on.