How popular are Profile posts on your Forum?

[Mr Lucky]

A LOT of our users think it's private conversation

So what exactly are profile posts and what are they for?Cna someone give me an example of how (and why) they might be used?

 

[Mr. Jinx]

I think the idea behind profile post was to offer some functionality like facebook. But as we all know, forums are not the same as social media.

 

[siONtI]

Is that 1 post and 1 comment per day? If so, doesn't seem very popular.

26 Profile posts 38 Profile post comments per day

 

[sbj]

So what exactly are profile posts and what are they for?Cna someone give me an example of how (and why) they might be used?

I can try to explain.

The profile post idea is actually the idea, which Facebook (later Twitter, Instagram) has stolen from.

In a time where people didn't have their own websites (or Facebook profiles, etc.) people used that to create their own little corners, specially on "Myspace". The literally meaning of "my space" explains it very well. People (or members of a forum) wanted to have their own space/corner so they could share their interests, like what music they listen to, what they like, like today's Facebook. You could declare the world in that specific forum, whatever the niche is, what type of person they were.

Of course with social media becoming so big, profile (posts) on forums became obsolete. Imagine you being registered to multiple forums, do you want to create for all of them a space? Or do you go to one place where everyone else is and do it there?

So people moved to social media to create their personas. Now people have their Instagram personas, or Twitter personas, or are on Facebook to share their love for dogs or whatever.

That is what profile posts were meant to be. A little space/corner for the user to create his persona. But people seek attention and a profile on a random x forum these days will get 0 attention. So they are dead, nobody uses them. People get more attention on the big social media platforms.

So, the only way making profile posts work for forums are 2 cases.

Either you have a very big forum with a lot of users, then a tiny group of that will use profile posts to create their persona. At the end it is still worth it for some users because there is a big audience (because the forum is big).

Or you create this incredibly complex structure by integrating Facebook, Twitter, Instagram feeds to forum profiles, so a tight integration with those platforms. People won't bother to share their stuff extra on a forum if they can do it on the big sites. But if their content would be shared automatically on their forum profiles, I would say people would make a use of that because it is free advertisement (as said, people LOVE attention).

 

[Mendalla]

I turned it off when it became obvious that a large percentage of the posts were actually intended to be private conversations.

I've seen this as well as members thinking they were posting in a forum. However, it hasn't happened in a while AFAIK and one of the members most prone to it had advancing dementia which ultimately led to other problems and eventually him leaving the board. With our small group and few newcomers, I think everyone currently active gets the difference between forum posts, profiles posts, and conversations at this point so any errors on that front tend to be "brain farts".

 

[ichpen]

Reminds me to go disable them. Pretty useless and more headaches than anything.

 

[creativeforge]

I would like to remove this feature entirely, as if it doesn't even exist. So, would disabling the widget entirely remove the feature from the forum? If not, where can I find instructions to surgically remove the profile posts feature from our forum?

Thanks!

 

[Max Taxable]

I would like to remove this feature entirely, as if it doesn't even exist.

It's in the core. Disabling it disappears it nicely for all intents and purposes.

 

[creativeforge]

It's in the core. Disabling it disappears it nicely for all intents and purposes.

Thanks, so there is no disabling, only DELETE. Is this what you mean?

 

[Max Taxable]

Thanks, so there is no disabling, only DELETE. Is this what you mean?

No, Man. Pardon. I mean globally disabling the profile post feature. Any widgets or anything else that uses it, won't load it. It will be like it doesn't exist at all.

 

[sbj]

You can disable profile posts in usergroups, that was what he meant. Also for the widget, just untick the boxes and the widget is disabled. Alternatively you can delete that widget, but you don't have to. Unticking the display in positions is sufficient.

 

[creativeforge]

You can disable profile posts in usergroups, that was what he meant. Also for the widget, just untick the boxes and the widget is disabled. Alternatively you can delete that widget, but you don't have to. Unticking the display in positions is sufficient.

OK, so when you say usergroups, do you mean user permissions? Sorry, it's a been a few years since I dived in the belly of the beast, and with this new version, things seem a bit different although in some regards clearer.

 

[Max Taxable]

OK, so when you say usergroups, do you mean user permissions?

I went in Groups and Permissions>Usergroup permissions and selected NEVER for profile post usage. For every usergroup.

 

[sbj]

No, usergroup permissions.

ACP -> Groups & permissions -> user groups (alternavely click on user group permissions, both will direct you to the same page normally)



Click on that and you see your usergroups, such as the default registered and unregistered usergroups.


Click on that and you will find all user group permissions. Scrolling a bit down, voila, you are here:



Do this both for unregistered and registered usergroup.

 

[creativeforge]

I went in Groups and Permissions>Usergroup permissions and selected NEVER for profile post usage. For every usergroup.

No, usergroup permissions.
ACP -> Groups & permissions -> user groups
Do this both for unregistered and registered usergroup.

THANK YOU!! That's very helpful.

 

[Max Taxable]

with this new version, things seem a bit different although in some regards clearer.

The more you explore around, you'll see it's mostly quite intuitive and robust.

 

[tomdav]

This doesn't completely eradicate the cancer. For example, to do any sort of advanced search (view results as threads, search specific forums, etc.) you have to click on search > advanced search which defaults to "search everything" > then click "search threads" tab. Very user unfriendly and confusing. There should only be one tab if you disable profile posts and don't use media gallery or other claptrap.

 

[shimspedy]

Converting from another forum software that didn't have this feature. Debating whether to enable or disable it after converting to XF. Do your users find Profile posts useful? Do they use it very much. I'm guessing most of my users wouldn't use this feature and content would be less visible / harder to find, so rather than encouraging social engagement it may be a net negative in that regard, so maybe less is more? Thoughts?

well my thoughts I think though they play no role in SEO they are useful to members especial if your forum is huge... And depending on the future of xenforo API this can be used in a mobile app where you would decide to show profile posts of users that you follow like twitter does...

 

[Max Taxable]

they play no role in SEO

Everything published on a site plays a role in SEO.

 

[shimspedy]

Everything published on a site plays a role in SEO.

i meant to say that xenforo doesn't include them in the sitemap therefore they dont generate any traffic