Order of Forums and Sub-forums

How do you determine the order of forums and sub-forums in your community? Are they sorted alphabetically, by popularity, or by some other metric?

Personally, I usually sort them based on [expected] popularity.

 

Grouped in a way that would be simplest for people unfamiliar to the site to find what they were looking for, and more importantly in a way to drive peoples posting. That was a little obscure, so here is an example.

If a forums topic is fruit, and there is a strong desire to create a true community then I would do this:

Fruit forum, with the following subforums, which would show up on the front page in a smaller font
-apples
-bananas
-pears
-strawberries

News forum, with subtitle "news about fruit"
General
off topic
Humor

That way the people would see the General/off topic/Humor in much larger sizes and the people that would normally only look at the Apple forum would be more tempted to post in the Humor forum. Then presumably the banana people would read the Humor forum, and they would get acquainted.

 

I go by importance, than I either go by alphabet, or importance for subforums.

 

no particular order but announcement and rules and stuff go at the top and off topic near the bottom

 

RONG!

Annoucements, rules etc go at the bottom. The last thing a potential new member wants is crap rammed down their throat when they first visit.

Put the good shit at the top and the bad shit at the bottom.

 

A little excited there AzH?



I think another important question is where to to put the private forums, top or bottom? Mod & admin type forums.

 

I disagree.

The 'News and Announcements' section should be one of the (if not the) first boards that members are presented with upon visiting the community. In my experience, members have a tendency to stick to the upper-half of the board index and work their way down slowly. If an important announcement is made, said members would not reach it until they are finished with the content above. This is not ideal, from my perspective, particularly if said announcement is of high importance.

Additionally, I have never received a single complaint in regards to the section's placement. Different strokes.

 

i always do it so that members can see when there is a new announcement as soon as they log on, because if its at the bottom they are less likely to find it, and then will complain that they havent been told about something cause they didnt look far enough down the forum to see it

 

Code:

Staff Forums
Staff Announcements 
Developer & Management Lounge 
Project Brainstorming  
Site Development [project]
Server Development [project]
Infractions & Reports
Trash
Ticket Center

Announcements & Links
News & Announcements 
Site & Service Rules 
Site & Service Suggestions 
GM Applications 
Bug Reports -> Link

Donor Forums
Donor Lounge
Donor Suggestions & Support
Donor Resources & Guides

Genesis - 
General Discussion
Genesis Bug Reports -> Link
Guilds & Recruitment
Trade Channel

Gehenna - 
General Discussion
Gehenna Bug Reports -> Link
Guilds & Recruitment
Trade Channel

Elysian - 
Server Lore & Rules
General Discussion
Character Introductions & Storylines
Elysian Bug Reports -> Link
Guilds & Recruitment
Trade Channel

General Forums 
Player Introductions
The Tavern
Entertainment Hall
Jokes & Rants

Warcraft Discussions
Class Discussions
Druid
Death Knight
Hunter
Mage
Paladin
Priest
Rogue
Shaman
Warlock
Warrior			
Lore Discussions
Profession Discussions
Quests & Raiding Discussions

Technical Forums
Programming Lounge
Design Lounge
Development Lounge
Tech & Gadget Lounge

My usual brainstorming for how I'm going to do my forum structure.

 

Most forum softwares have an annoucement feature to allow you to post important annoucements at the top of every forum. Having what is essentially an archive of out of date information right at the top of your forum is not a great pull.

People want to see interesting stuff relating to the niche, NOT that you've installed a new theme (or whatever).

 

I do weekly updates regarding changes to the game server the site is based around, so I want members to see the news as soon as they hit the front page. I also want them to see what contests are currently going on, so that it'll generate more activity.

Most of my sites have a very active Announcements forum, so I've always put it on top, along with important links and forums.

 

Different strokes.