New forum project

[Rancid]

So, this a webmaster community, right?
I know most of you for a while now so this is why I'm making this thread here on this forum, I feel at home and among decent quality members.

I need your help on a new project, a forum project that is.

I want to start an aquarium related forum for ages, but I never had the willpower to actually do it. I love everything aquarium related, I have tons of real life experience as well as written lots of fish tank related articles and forum posts. So this is something I'm interested in and passionate about.

I never owned a forum before so this will be something totally new for me so all of you forum owners out there please share some tips! I have a Hostgator baby plan, this means I can have multiple domains on that host, do I need a separate hosting package for a forum, dose it need a VPS? Any advice will help!


First, I need to choose a good domain name. I will also need your help on this one.
Please make some suggestion regarding the following:
-it needs to be as short as possible
-it needs to be a .com (available)
-it needs to contain one of the follwing keywords (just one): fishtank, aquarium, aquaria, fishkeeper, fish
-it needs to be catchy

Please share anything on the subject, both forum related advice and domain suggestions.

Cheers,
Rancid.

[Smoke]

can I spam it with Xrumer?

are you going for fresh and salt waters?

fishkeeperforum.com


fishkeeperboard.com


FishTankBoard.com


what type of forum phpbb,smf,vb, etc?

[Rancid]

can I spam it with Xrumer?

are you going for fresh and salt waters?

fishkeeperforum.com


fishkeeperboard.com


FishTankBoard.com


what type of forum phpbb,smf,vb, etc?

Maybe just a little Also, Great suggestions, thanks! Never thought about throwing the "board" around.

Well, what do you guys recommend? Paid right from the start or free software?
When it comes to paid software my only to options are XenForo and vbulletin, but is there any way I can buy the licence at a cheaper price or should I go for the free software till the forum build popularity and I can switch?

[Smoke]

I would use SMF or phpbb. oh and take the money saved and use it on SEO!

[Rancid]

I would use SMF or phpbb. oh and take the money saved and use it on SEO!

Ok. I'll go for Simple Machine Forum, seems to be the best.
How should I start the forum, do I need to have some decent content before opening? Also, I need some basic forum promotion methods but also what kind of SEO should I do?

PS: almost picked a domain but if you guys still have suggestions, share them!

[Smoke]

SMF is a great choice!

2 ways get a few posters to start topics ( look at seo clerks ) or use a bot to scape other simialar type forums and post

on the seo here is my list-no particular order

Social Bookmarking
niche related directories
do a few inter linked(3d) linked wheels they kick azz !
relevant blog comments
for a start !
oh and dont forget .edu and .gov sites say when and I will do a few 1,000 of them for you !

[Rancid]

SMF is a great choice!

2 ways get a few posters to start topics ( look at seo clerks ) or use a bot to scape other simialar type forums and post

on the seo here is my list-no particular order

Social Bookmarking
niche related directories
do a few inter linked(3d) linked wheels they kick azz !
relevant blog comments
for a start !
oh and dont forget .edu and .gov sites say when and I will do a few 1,000 of them for you !

Thank you for such quality advice Smoke! I keep everything in mind. Let you know with the progress I made here in this thread.

[Smoke]

don't forget to get a tweeter acct for it also

[Rancid]

don't forget to get a tweeter acct for it also

But I hate twitter, lol!
I'll have a twitter account and facebook page, don't know if I can get any members on twitter but I'll try.

[Smoke]

there many ways to use tweeter when you are ready let me know !