5 ideas for User Guidelines in Your Forum or Community
Posted by Hoyt Mann on Thu, Sep 18, 2008 @ 09:33 PM
Don't Let Funny Things Happen on the Way to Your Forum! Protect your community by creating and posting guidelines for use.I do not actually mean you can have no sense of humor in your forums. But...when a forum or community is created, it is necessary to create and publish guidelines to be followed by the users.
I recommend a new book by Patrick O'Keefe entitled "Managing Online Forums: Everything You Need to Know to Create and Run Successful Community Discussion Boards" (AMACOM copyright 2008). This has everything you could possibly need to create and run a forum. With so many Customer Service and Support solutions (like PhaseWare's Self Service Center) and CRM solutions containing the option to create forums for your users to discuss products, ask questions, and otherwise hobnob with their fellow users, there could be any number of you who are now wondering what is entailed. This book will tell you.
Here are five topics he mentions that, in my opinion, must be addressed in any forum guidelines. I will give them to you now but I highly recommend finding this book and reading all of the other tips and guidelines from someone who has been managing forums for quite a while.
1. Respect: This is at the top of my list and is emphasized by Mr. O'Keefe. Respect for the community members, respect for you and your staff, and respect for your forum.
2. Privacy Policy: You see it on every site, and there are reasons for that. One of which is that it makes your clients feel safer.
3. Vulgar Language or Offensive Material: Presumably you are going to ban such things; just make certain you have it stated and to enforce it at all times.
4. Illegal Activities: See #3.
5. Personal Information: There should be zero, nada, zip, zilch posted with anyone's personal information made public.
These should get you started. As I said, Mr. O'Keefe has an entire book full of great advice for those who would now like to create a forum but don't know where to start. See also the book's website or reach Mr. O'Keefe at patrick@ifroggy.com.