Running a vBulletin Powered Forum
Are you a forum owner, or would you like to be? Forums require a scipt and hosting to run. I’ll quickly go over some of the basics that you’ll need to setup your own forum. First off the script, I prefer vBulletin, but you can use IPB as well as free scripts like SMF, phpBB and MyBB.
I choose vBulletin for a number of reasons, one being the upgrades. As I previously mentioned, I had used phpBB before switching to vBulletin. I hated updating all the php files when you needed to do an upgrade on a modded phpBb forum. I’m not sure if the current version of phpBB has easier upgrades, but I’d had enough of phpBB. Time for vBulletin the professional forum script; I had looked at IPB (the other paid alternative) but was not impressed with the actual look of the forum from a users point of view. I used vBulletin for the first 9 months and it was great, then they released the plugin and product system which allowed mods to be with one upload and a click of a button. The product/plugin addition also made the upgrades much easier. You could update a fully modded forum in a matter of seconds, you still need to update each of the templates but you’re still saving time of updating php files.
One of the great addons for vBulletin is a product called vBSEO. vBulletin Search Engine Optimization in one single product. You can do a number of the tweaks that vBSEO does with other addons, but you can’t do everything and who really wants to install 20 hacks to take the place of one? Not to mention the strain 20 hacks will have on your forum and that’s just 20 more chances for a security exploit. vBSeo is the #1 SEO script for vBulletin, I will not start a forum without it. Even if it’s a very small forum, and low on funds, you have to take every advantage that you can in optimizing your forum for search engines.
So if you want the best forum possible, you’ll want vBulletin and vBSEO. Now we can talk a little about hosting. You should be able to get a good host for less than $10 a month to start off. Then as your site goes, you’ll need to extend your hosting package to cover the traffic and bandwidth that your site will be consuming. If you want to host several sites, you may want to look into a VPS or virtual private server. That’s what I use on my websites it allows me total control that your shared hosting plans aren’t going to give you.
I hope I’ve explained a few things here, feel free to ask any questions. I’ll be posting some articles on building back links and advertising for your forums in the near future. If you do need any help setting up your vBulletin forum or would like to talk on the phone and brainstorm topics for your forum, you can contact me at my Professional vBulletin Services pages on one of my other blogs.
Last 5 posts in forums
- Strengthen your Community w/ Social Media - January 8th, 2010
- Do you use vBulletin or IP.Board? - December 4th, 2009
- What does it take to be a successful forum owner? - November 24th, 2009
- I sold vBulletinSetup to Crowdgather - November 13th, 2009
Popularity: 15% [?]
Hi,
I’m new to the forum and just saying hello.
I do believe that phpbb 3 has been vastly improved on, I hve yet to try it though, I have one set of forums (a very small usergroup) which uses phpbb 2
Otherwise I use vB and I actually use it as a platform for most of the portals I develop
Wow! You all know so much. This blog is really helpful. Thanks so much!
Hi
Does anybody have an openion about where Economic situation is ending?
Hello webmaster
I would like to share with you a link to your site
write me here preonrelt[at]mail.ru
This is so amazing I think I
Hi Everyone,
I have a carpet cleaning business in Houston,TX that was doing pretty good until the economy went bad, and with it my clientele. I have a website for the business but I dont
know what I have to do the get it to show up in a search. Right now it’s somewhere in the yahoo/google netherworld (LOL).
Is there someone on here that can give me some insight or know of anyone that coud give me insight on how I can get my local website on the front
page of a Yahoo or Google search to increase my business without it costing me 5 or 10k $$$? If so please share with me.
I thank you and my hungry over-eating children thank you.
thanks,
A fantastic read….very literate and informative. Many thanks….what theme is this you are using and also, where is your RSS button ?
Useful info here, thank you. If possible can you visit my site and let me know what you think, its got free internet secrets and hacks, tricks and loopholes, free money tricks, free phone tricks etc etc, you get the idea lol… hope to see you there soon.
I have set up 2 forums, one free that uses phpbb wich is preset with widgets and I love it but they put an ad on it and I didn’t like that. So I set up my own forum using SMF which has a lot of options but it also has some downsides, I crashed it twice in the past week, both times it was my fault. After getting familiar with how forums are set up I will tell you that be next one will be big and I will use vBulletin because of its stability and options even though it is not free.
Brandon, whats your expertise with integration of vBulletin into a WP set-up ?
Would like to talk wit you about what I have in mind of for a New Site I am developing and see if you may be of service for what we need.
Thanks
Tom Townsend´s last blog ..Year End in Review