Comparison of Access World Forums (AWF) VS Utter Access.

[Uncle Gizmo]

Just added the next month comparison of Access World Forums (AWF) VS Utter Access. Access World Forums showing a healthy and steady increase. Unfortunately Utter Access is still declining and is now getting around 10% of visits as compared to Access World Forums.

Checking AWF hit Count...

THE HIT COUNT is HERE: AWF Thread Link I’ve been checking website traffic stats again—something I do from time to time. Since I haven’t seen this kind of data published on AWF before, I thought I’d start a thread. The numbers make for interesting reading! According to SimilarWeb: Forums...

www.access-programmers.co.uk

 

[arnelgp]

that is why Most of their contributor are switching to this channel (ouch! thriller...)(did you sing it?)

 

[neuroman9999]

Just added the next month comparison of Access World Forums (AWF) VS Utter Access. Access World Forums showing a healthy and steady increase. Unfortunately Utter Access is still declining and is now getting around 10% of visits as compared to Access World Forums.

seriously!? I've gotten MANY good answers over there. @cheekybuddha specifically is of wonderful help. to me it's always seemed like the 2 sites have been equal in terms of content that is useful.

 

[Jon]

I think the new owner has good intent but poor execution, hampered by a programmer who I believe (from memory) obfuscated the code, making it harder to sort out. Consequently, the traffic has plummeted. But yes, the history of answers there is good.

@arnelgp Is this true, or is that a guestimate? I am interested to know the goings on.

 

[neuroman9999]

hampered by a programmer who I believe (from memory) obfuscated the code, making it harder to sort out.

I have NO CLUE why their pages are all white. it looks like heaven, but it hardly is.

 

[arnelgp]

i am an inactive member there.
whenever i pass by for a visit, i see same old thread when i query the "new post" section.
it's hard to tell if i am alone or another person is viewing coz there is no facility, unlike here
you can see "who is online and how many visitors".
my guess is visitors and contributors feel they are crawling in the dark, trying to touch
if anybody is around.
it feels like, "leave your message and comeback to see if anybody has answered".
unlike here, you can see (always there is at least a member online).
so they can be assured that when they drop a question, it will get answered
instantly.

mr.jon, just a scientific guestimate.

 

[Jon]

@arnelgp Thanks for your feedback. I have to say I like the facility here where it tells you who is looking at a thread, how many etc. Someone here requested this add-on for this site, since it was on the old vBulletin software. Was a good call.

Do you ever look at the bottom of threads to see who is viewing the thread at that time? Did you know that feature was there?

 

[Minty]

I think they have some serious issues with the site.
I was searching for something earlier, and UA came up as a search hit. I clicked the link and it simply took me to the home page, no sign of the thread the search engine had found.

What's worse I couldn't use their search to find it either, it didn't seem to work.

Shame as there is(was) a lot of useful stuff on there.

 

[Jon]

There have been complaints on their forum about the broken search function so you are not alone. There comes a point where the traffic is so low and the opportunity cost to fix something broken so high, that it gets left. It all depends on why you have the site.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

So the next question is, we know our traffic is rising. BUT has our "search rank" risen concurrently? I know in a separate thread there was some talk of how other forums popped up first in web searches on Access topics.

 

[Jon]

The traffic is only slightly rising. I don't think much happens regarding our search rank for long periods. It is when Google decides to do an algo change that things can shift around signficantly. We get about half the traffic we got 2 years ago, sadly.

 

[CJ_London]

in the old days when I googled something for research, I had hits on plenty of different sites. Now it seems all the hits are to perhaps half a dozen sites - all of them appearing the in the advertising section at the top as well as below. So if you don't have the means to pay google, you just won't be seen.

 

[pbaldy]

Is this true, or is that a guestimate?

Our most prolific poster came from UA, among others. All probably still post there.

 

[Jon]

Our most prolific poster came from UA, among others. All probably still post there.

Yes indeed, although I think that might have been before the rapid decline in traffic?

 

[Isaac]

Since my past comments on UA have been less positive, I'll balance it out with this one.
I strongly agree with whoever stated that the quality of stuff on there has traditionally been very good. It seems less functional now, but I esteem it highly in terms of quality.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

A very fair statement, @Isaac.