Getting this site used more?

[m4same]

Any ideas how we can get more people participating in discussions here?  I feel like new people who could be good active participants are not finding this site.  I could be wrong.  And maybe you all are happy with the level of activity? Thoughts?

[+ Lucky]

5 hours ago, Fcfs said:

 

Of course Daddy is no longer with us. I didn't know that banning posters was very common. I am looking forward to more posts by @jjkrkwoodas he has a lot to contribute here. But surely an outright ban is rare?

[+ WilliamM]

1 hour ago, Lucky said:

Of course Daddy is no longer with us. I didn't know that banning posters was very common. I am looking forward to more posts by @jjkrkwoodas he has a lot to contribute here. But surely an outright ban is rare?

Not always when Daddy was still alive. And I was a big fan of Daddy

[sjmuktop]

I'm relatively new to this site (I joined in July this year), so I don't know who 'Daddy' was. I feel like I've missed out on a lot. 

[+ JEC]

I think there are multiple factirs at play here

1. I feel like the site was much more active before Daddy did the (previous) redesign of the site.   
2. The redesign also roughly coincided with SESTA/FOSTA
3. I think the combo platter of these forces + his failing health made Daddy cranky and banned/alienated some members.   
4. SESTA/FOSTA also really cracked down on the some of the freedom of discussion on here, and probably made some nervous about their activity being tracked here. 
5. Lastly, I think hiring activity is also becoming more diffuse - moving to other platforms (GRINDR) and ergo more into the mainstream? 

Open to other opinions here, these are mine.

I also miss the higher level of banter and would welcome more participation.

Jack

Edited September 9, 2021 by JEC

[+ JEC]

2 hours ago, sjmuktop said:

I'm relatively new to this site (I joined in July this year), so I don't know who 'Daddy' was. I feel like I've missed out on a lot. 

Daddy was the former sole owner/operator and webmaster of this site for many years (search on hooboy for history before Daddy).   While he was already in failing health, sadly he succumbed to COVID in March of this year.   He passed away alone in his apartment and was discovered by the Las Vegas Police.  An period followed where the future of the site was uncertain - there were issues of legal ownership, probate, funding the site, who will operate and maintain the site etc. even getting access to the content of the site was unclear.  This site and this community were at real risk of simply disappearing off the web.  Daddy had no will or close family to serve as executors, complicating matters.  Many members of the community (and some of daddy's friends) stepped up in various ways to secure the future of this site.  The fact that daddy technically had no assets, and the site had no real value, meant that probate basically "left it alone" and allowed it to pass to new owners.  Now there is a new generation of people running the site, and infusing new ideas.   Honestly, this story could be case study (one that will never be published) in the survival of a community, Lord of the Flies for the escorting community if you will. 

By the time you joined in July,  we were coming out on the other side of this.

There's lots of content on here about this period, and the yin and yang of daddy's style of governing which was not universally appreciated. 

Welcome to the community, (fellow top) ....Jack

Edited September 9, 2021 by JEC

[+ WilliamM]

2 hours ago, JEC said:

Daddy was the former sole owner/operator and webmaster of this site for many years (search on hooboy for history before Daddy).   While he was already in failing health, sadly he succumbed to COVID in March of this year.   He passed away alone in his apartment and was discovered by the Las Vegas Police.  An period followed where the future of the site was uncertain - there were issues of legal ownership, probate, funding the site, who will operate and maintain the site etc. even getting access to the content of the site was unclear.  Daddy had no will or close family to serve as executors, complicating matters.  Many members of the community (and some of daddy's friends) stepped up in various ways to secure the future of this site.  The fact that daddy technically had not assets, and the site had no real value, meant that probate basically "left it alone" and allowed it to pass to new owners.  Now there is a new generation of people running the site, and infusing new ideas.   Honestly, this story could be case study (one that will never be published) in the survival of a community, Lord of the Flies for the escorting community if you will. 

By the time you joined in July,  we were coming out on the other side of this.

There's lots of content on here about this period, and the yin and yang of daddy's style of governing which was not universally appreciated. 

Welcome to the community, (fellow top) ....Jack

I appreciated Daddy's round-up of daily news and his personal responses to members. The latter is also a great feature of the new regime here, including the Super Moderators

Edited September 10, 2021 by WilliamM

[BluDay]

I believe a lot of people found this forum looking for reviews of escorts, so a good deal comes from there. When Daddy's Reviews was up, there was either links or enough references to notify interested parties of a forum of discussion. Lacking the main feeder in, there is less new blood. To look for new members, posts on Reddit in escort sections, and some comments on reviews when they are available again (I don't think there is a review site active right now). 

[Luv2play]

1 hour ago, JEC said:

Daddy was the former sole owner/operator and webmaster of this site for many years (search on hooboy for history before Daddy).   While he was already in failing health, sadly he succumbed to COVID in March of this year.   He passed away alone in his apartment and was discovered by the Las Vegas Police.  An period followed where the future of the site was uncertain - there were issues of legal ownership, probate, funding the site, who will operate and maintain the site etc. even getting access to the content of the site was unclear.  This site and this community were at real risk of simply disappearing off the web.  Daddy had no will or close family to serve as executors, complicating matters.  Many members of the community (and some of daddy's friends) stepped up in various ways to secure the future of this site.  The fact that daddy technically had no assets, and the site had no real value, meant that probate basically "left it alone" and allowed it to pass to new owners.  Now there is a new generation of people running the site, and infusing new ideas.   Honestly, this story could be case study (one that will never be published) in the survival of a community, Lord of the Flies for the escorting community if you will. 

By the time you joined in July,  we were coming out on the other side of this.

There's lots of content on here about this period, and the yin and yang of daddy's style of governing which was not universally appreciated. 

Welcome to the community, (fellow top) ....Jack

That's a very fair summary of our recent experience on this forum, at least from my perspective, which admittedly is not all encompassing. Certainly what I feel was going on at the time.

[Luv2play]

I was a member of the forum back in the early 2000s when Hooboy ran it and at that time his idea was that what forum members engage in by hiring providers is a hobby. By exchanging ideas and experiences we all stand to gain something that will enrich our participating in this hobby.

Our conversations here are not intended to be reviews of particular providers but rather the overall experience of our interactions with them. No matter our level of experience, we all have something to learn. I know I have gained some wonderful insights into things I would never otherwise have had.

[+ WilliamM]

Yes, but HooBoy encouraged other types of discussion as well - sort of a lively gentleman debating society.

[Cooper]

Gentlemen, Please stay on topic and not use this thread to discuss moderators. If you would like to reach us, the contact information is at the bottom of every page. 

Thanks. 

[Cooper]

18 hours ago, m4same said:

Any ideas how we can get more people participating in discussions here?   Thoughts?

One way that’s been tried to attract new members and encourage more participation was to create new Forums and Sub-Forums. 

HooBoy introduced the “Strip Club” Forum. It was an instant success and attracted many new members...  Most recently, the “Sports Desk” was added, a Forum that several members had requested... Daddy created the “Gallery” which is now one of our most popular Forums... And, a few years back, the “Comedy/Tragedy” Forum was added and now has several Sub-Forums. With Broadway reopening I’m sure we will be seeing more members contributing.

HooBoy and daddy realized that to attract new members and increase the participation of others, it was necessary to open the site to new areas/interests for discussions.  

 

[Phlmuscle]

I spend very little time here because the white background hurts my eyes. I think it needs to be toned down a bit. I get a headache every time I open the forums. I have tried adjusting my computer but it doesn't seems to help.

[sjmuktop]

4 minutes ago, Phlmuscle said:

I spend very little time here because the white background hurts my eyes. I think it needs to be toned down a bit. I get a headache every time I open the forums. I have tried adjusting my computer but it doesn't seems to help.

Maybe if we ask the Mods politely, they may add a 'night mode' option to the site?

[+ Charlie]

15 hours ago, BluDay said:

I believe a lot of people found this forum looking for reviews of escorts, so a good deal comes from there. When Daddy's Reviews was up, there was either links or enough references to notify interested parties of a forum of discussion. Lacking the main feeder in, there is less new blood. To look for new members, posts on Reddit in escort sections, and some comments on reviews when they are available again (I don't think there is a review site active right now). 

I think that this is an important point. Many people found this site through the reviews site, of which it was originally a part back in Hooboy's time. After the two sites were separated, "Daddy's Reviews" was still a feeder for this site, and many new participants learned of its existence because of the connection. Most discussion in the early days was about escorts, but over the years that has diminished considerably, and it has become a conversation medium for (mostly) gay men about all sorts of interests, from politics to sports to opera, and escorts are only one subject. Some of the most prolific posters don't even seem to have much interest in escorts at all any longer. I think the question is really about how to attract new members without sex with escorts as the lure.

[+ BenjaminNicholas]

When the review side goes live, it should- in theory- boost traffic here: There's always been a great deal of sideways handshaking between the two sites (that is, when the two sites were linked).

There's also the option of SEO and tinkering with some paid targeted advertising.  Twitter would be the easiest.  Facebook has a more firm TOS.  Not sure about IG.

More than anything, both sites (reviews/forum) need social accounts.  Insta and Twitter at the least.  It's how you gain and churn an audience.  It would also invite in a younger contingent of posters/reviewers.  There are many of us here who have solid socials already who could help with that.

[RadioRob]

There are a number of things I've done to improve SEO already...  including removing the restrictions placed on search engines entirely.  Daddy originally specifically prohibited Google, Bing, etc.  I've also started embedding keywords and meta tags, I've setup site maps, and made structural changes to the site code to make it easier for the search engines to read content.    

This has drawn significantly more page views since I first took over the site.  In fact, we've gone from an average of 800 clicks from Google per day to around 2000 per day and 2K impressions (meaning turning up in the results) to 38K impressions per day.  

This coincides with how much coverage of the site is actually done by the search engine as well.  The chart below represents the number of pages that have not only been crawled by Google but also added to the index and overlying that with the daily click through rate.  

I've made literally dozens of changes to improve the ability to find and drive traffic to the site.  Many of the things are items that are done under the hood transparently.  I'll continue doing this, but at the end of the day...  CONTENT IS KING.  One of my long term goals for the site is to have more than just the forums.  My goal is to have news feeds, articles, reviews, and other content of interest to the affluent gay male.  

One thing that I'll point out here as a reminder... only about *15 PERCENT* of our site's traffic comes from people that are logged into the site.  

The green line represents a session tied to someone who is logged in with an actual username/password.  So there is a LOT more people that view the site than actually participate.  

Regarding advertising...  I would love to be able to do this.  However I honestly don't have the budget to do this.  I'm also not sure it would make sense (at least right now based on how much content we have along with our limited ability to monetize content currently) to try and push for a donation campaign to do it.

https://follows.com/blog/2017/01/much-spend-twitter-ads
https://www.webfx.com/social-media/how-much-does-it-cost-to-advertise-on-twitter.html

Even setting a SUPER SMALL budget of $25 per day would cost $750 per month.  You would want to run any real campaign at least 3 months to measure the impact and be able to make changes along the way with a series of A/B tests to figure out what message resonates the most.

The average return per click is typically 0.86% (meaning the percent of people that view an ad that actually click through).  Of those that click through, only 3-5% actually convert (meaning take an action such as buying something or signing up, etc).  It would mean even if we did get a bunch of people to click the ad, the percentage that would actually signup and join here would be limited.  We would then have to measure that gained membership versus the spend to figure out the ROI.  

I have more thoughts on this topic, but I'm in the middle of the "day job".  So I'll save that for later.  But yes...  this is a topic near and dear to my heart and is something I've actively worked on literally since I've taken control of the site.  It's something I don't really talk about on a regular basis because most of the things that need to be done are not really all that interesting.  Ya'll know I'm a tech nerd at heart... you don't need me shoving it in your face on a daily basis.  

 

[sjmuktop]

Hi there @RadioRob. Do you think it would be at all possible to add a 'night mode'/'dark mode' option to the forums? 

There are those of us whose eyes don't take kindly to the very bright white background.

Cheers  

[RadioRob]

6 minutes ago, sjmuktop said:

Hi there @RadioRob. Do you think it would be at all possible to add a 'night mode'/'dark mode' option to the forums? 

There are those of us whose eyes don't take kindly to the very bright white background.

Cheers  

I can add a dark theme and allow members to pick.  I've avoided doing it because most people here tend to not like change too much.  Given this site has had a light background for 20+ years, it did not seem to be something that was important to people.  The comment earlier was literally the first time I've seen anyone bring it up since I've taken over running the site.  

It's not overly difficult to do.  In fact, I would most likely just purchase a pre-created dark theme and customize it a bit to save time/effort.  My suggestion if something like this would be helpful is to post the ask in the Features and Feedback forum.  (That also keeps the discussion on topic for the original post in the thread.) The more people that say "hey yeah that would be helpful to me", the higher on the priority list it goes.  

[sjmuktop]

7 minutes ago, RadioRob said:

I can add a dark theme and allow members to pick.  I've avoided doing it because most people here tend to not like change too much.  Given this site has had a light background for 20+ years, it did not seem to be something that was important to people.  The comment earlier was literally the first time I've seen anyone bring it up since I've taken over running the site.  

It's not overly difficult to do.  In fact, I would most likely just purchase a pre-created dark theme and customize it a bit to save time/effort.  My suggestion if something like this would be helpful is to post the ask in the Features and Feedback forum.  (That also keeps the discussion on topic for the original post in the thread.) The more people that say "hey yeah that would be helpful to me", the higher on the priority list it goes.  

Thank you. Yes, that is exactly what I meant - a dark theme that members could pick to 'switch on' if they prefer that.

I think that would be great for those of us with sensitive eyes!

Thank you very much for at least entertaining the idea, it would be good to get other forum members' thoughts.

[marylander1940]

On 9/9/2021 at 1:05 PM, m4same said:

Any ideas how we can get more people participating in discussions here?  I feel like new people who could be good active participants are not finding this site.  I could be wrong.  And maybe you all are happy with the level of activity? Thoughts?

Asking about providers was the main reason most of us got to this site. Now RM allows direct contact between clients and I'm sure that has made life more simple to some potential members of this site who simply reach out by IM about a guy they find attractive. 

[jtwalker]

I scan the site and post occasionally.  Much of the content is repetitive, so I find myself losing interest.  I also preferred the previous forum layout.  This one has grown on me, but its not my favorite.

I think the site would be more interesting with reviews.  I'm not excited about the new review layout and doubt I'll use it much.  I've never quite understood why reviews are not just allowed in the forum.  People leave reviews or hints of reviews anyway, and I doubt that will stop.  Forcing its isolation doesn't seem to have much of a benefit other than it allows someone to vet the reviews before they are posted.  If we just allowed respectful reviews, I would about guarantee that the site would grow in popularity.

Only sharing this feedback because you asked.

[jtwalker]

One more thought...

Quite a few people have stopped posting lately.  Has anyone reached out to find out why?

[lonely_john]

Hiring is also seasonal. I hire more during the Summer as many other clients do. After August I slow down and am more thoughtful about who I hire because it's more of an ordeal going out to visit a provider, plus I already sampled some of the new talent in town to see if I add new guys to my regulars. Winter will be even lower. I think some things have been already done to improve site traffic, and with the reviews that should improve. That's good. When I googled "male+escort+city" this forum used to come up on top positions, but not anymore, hopefully, things will improve. I would also appreciate a grey or dark mode. Full pitch black background, however, is not desirable, at least not for me as the contrast of white letters over black tends to also hurt my eyes and difficult my reading. Anyways, Black or dark grey will be better than white background. Not sure if an automatic Dark mode that turns on around 5pm is possible along with a switch option. Some users find it difficult to find website features despite the announcements.

Edited September 10, 2021 by lonely_john