Footfall to Hx.com

[GommeInc]

If anything this just proves how incredibly irritating Habbo is as a company, they've managed to single handedly destroy what made fansites unique and interesting, and ultimately useful. It's hard to say what could make Habbox useful again, because it's main source of users are Habbo users, and you've got to find what they want and put it on the site, and seeing as Habbox is limited to what it can provides thanks to Habbo it does make you wonder what to do with it. It's all well and good suggesting articles, but are they (Habbo users) coming on Habbox to look at articles? They may not have a use if it's not directly linked to the place they've found Habbox from (Habbo). The only thing that does seem of use is beefing up the event/competition departments, to draw in crowds of Habbo users who, let's face it, are just looking for furniture or credits, it's what many Habbo users wanted when they joined and/or used it frequently.

The other main selling point of Habbo fansites are their unique communities which Habbo users may want to be apart of, this is probably assisted with events and competitions to draw them in and keep them interested.

After thinking about it, it does make you think that maybe Habbox is now redundant and it's no wonder the forum gets all the attention.

[Casanova]

i agree with you gommeinc. good post actually.

Oli you really annoy me. you continually throw things in peoples faces, as a person I have no understanding of people liking you sometimes. I was merely passionate about what I believed and obviously wanted. Everyone does the same, maybe I do it a bit more hostile than most but that's just me.

Thanks for your views anyway, as always Oli they're an absolute delight to read. Maybe you could have your own section of articles, called Oli's hot air?

In all seriousness I think articles could be a success. RUN WITH IT MARTIN. and yes, I may be wrong (about martin not being right).

[Hecktix]

If anything this just proves how incredibly irritating Habbo is as a company, they've managed to single handedly destroy what made fansites unique and interesting, and ultimately useful. It's hard to say what could make Habbox useful again, because it's main source of users are Habbo users, and you've got to find what they want and put it on the site, and seeing as Habbox is limited to what it can provides thanks to Habbo it does make you wonder what to do with it. It's all well and good suggesting articles, but are they (Habbo users) coming on Habbox to look at articles? They may not have a use if it's not directly linked to the place they've found Habbox from (Habbo). The only thing that does seem of use is beefing up the event/competition departments, to draw in crowds of Habbo users who, let's face it, are just looking for furniture or credits, it's what many Habbo users wanted when they joined and/or used it frequently.

The other main selling point of Habbo fansites are their unique communities which Habbo users may want to be apart of, this is probably assisted with events and competitions to draw them in and keep them interested.

After thinking about it, it does make you think that maybe Habbox is now redundant and it's no wonder the forum gets all the attention.

Quite true, Habbo have in simple words ****** us over, marketplace, their own news etc etc etc. However that's not to say Habbox should give up, we can easily fight against it. What Sulake don't realise is that fansites are such a huge advertisement base for them and if you think about it how many people would use Habbo if they didn't use sites like Habbox - I know I wouldn't and I think it's pretty safe to say that for a lot of the people on this forum.

We need to work on establishing a larger userbase on the new Hotel - we haven't yet done this in my opinion, once we have done this we can generate large scale events (like we plan at christmas) which could topple events organised by official sulake staff, as since the merge their community efforts have dropped tremendously, there's no Lost_Witness and Bucho6 anymore organising fantastic Habbo quests and stuff, Habbo is very robotic etc and I think fansites can offer a great alternative if they get out there properly - yet no fansite has managed to do this yet.

I know the plans for our new website, and yes I know people are sick of hearing about it because it seems to have taken so long but it will be released in January 2011 and in my opinions our plan for this site are very good for combatting the challenges Habbo has thrown at us (especially the marketplace). Our new site will also be an exciting experience for our non-habbo users too. The three Habbox sites will become more united and I'd like to think after the release of our new site that if you use one Habbox site you will use another too as they will be closely linked, ehh you might even go all out to three too. These plans will help.

I think it was Lost_Witness who referred to Habbox as a "Super" fansite as we had a large control over the population of Habbo UK - this was clearly shown when we took one of the most awful fansites i've seen to Official Status via voting. The population of Habbo has now got immensely bigger and we don't have the majority support anymore, but the benefit is no other fansite does either.

Nobody has yet found what it needs to conquor all timezones and get the biggest userbase, there are big UK fansites such as us, ClubHabbo, HFFM, there are big US fansites such as HabCrazy and there are big AU fansites such as arghhh I can't remember the name of it - yet none are successful in other timezones and in this climate you need to be.

The race is on, and we need to win it.

[Casanova]

i'm not sure habbox can win this one being honest, i think it's too difficult with sulake's efforts to push fansites out.

[Hecktix]

i'm not sure habbox can win this one being honest, i think it's too difficult with sulake's efforts to push fansites out.

They'd be screwed without us, not that they entirely know this. Unfortunately, it turns to the fact that small, volunteer-run sites like Habbox have to challenge big corporations like Sulake. It's an impossible feat but we have the upper hand of knowing what the Habbo community want as we are the Habbo community, if you could find me a Habbo who's happy with the way Sulake are running things at the moment I'd be crazily shocked and then reccommend that Habbo to a mental institution.

I've spoken to a former UK Moderator who is absolutely astounded at how sulake are running things. If we capitalise on these weaknesses we can improve a little, although we need to change from being a UK fansite which we've been for 7 years to become an international fansite and that is extremely hard because 99% of us are all from Habbo UK.

I'd quite like to see Habbox buy out an Australian and US fansite, but that's probably beyond our funds so we have to look at the community to get users to us. We have 2 weeks worth of giveaways planned at christmas each at staggered times so it will work out with each time zone getting 4 giveaways (and yes I have volunteerd to do one at god knows what hour). We just have to work hard, the new site will help as we plan to combat sulake with some of the problems they put infront of us.

[Josh]

I'd quite like to see Habbox buy out an Australian and US fansite

Does Australia even have a good fansite?

[GommeInc]

Quite true, Habbo have in simple words ****** us over, marketplace, their own news etc etc etc. However that's not to say Habbox should give up, we can easily fight against it. What Sulake don't realise is that fansites are such a huge advertisement base for them and if you think about it how many people would use Habbo if they didn't use sites like Habbox - I know I wouldn't and I think it's pretty safe to say that for a lot of the people on this forum.

I'm amazed Habbo is even still going. They clearly picked the staff who most resembled apes to continue working after the merge. Heck, the merge was a huge hint that they do not particularly care about their userbase, more so with fansites seeing as none of the staff knew what Habbox was. What made Habbo successful back when I used it frequently was the HabboHood Happenings and knowing who the staff were and what they did, what the future events include and what were the results of events in the week, which I don't think you get with the current set-up of neanderthals who are just there to systematically check that the site is working and throw faeces at their customers when they say anything that used more than 3 brain cells. Habbox could probably focus on a "HabboHood Happenings" styled article system, which could work if you talk to Habbo Staff and get some interesting information. It's worth a shot seeing if they respond and will help out, afterall you're keeping their current customers informed and their new users interested (provided you get more than grunts and uggs out of them )

So in short: A weekly "digest" that lists who won what (Habbox events and Habbo events), and smaller articles filling the gaps with any interesting information if it exists and cannot wait for the end of the week (or you could make it bi-weekly). It seems better than trying to milk articles out of nowhere, seeing as there is clearly nothing in Habbo to leech out of.

We need to work on establishing a larger userbase on the new Hotel - we haven't yet done this in my opinion, once we have done this we can generate large scale events (like we plan at christmas) which could topple events organised by official sulake staff, as since the merge their community efforts have dropped tremendously, there's no Lost_Witness and Bucho6 anymore organising fantastic Habbo quests and stuff, Habbo is very robotic etc and I think fansites can offer a great alternative if they get out there properly - yet no fansite has managed to do this yet.

The only problem is you've got to advertise, which might be tricky. Do the "Official Groups" still have discussions boards and do Habbox Staff have access to the boards to advertise events? As Official Fansites you must be entitled to some perks (I wouldn't be surprised if you lacked them, however). You could probably get HxHD involved, HxL involved and other frontline departments, like adverts on HxL saying "And don't miss out our fantastic event on Habbo this week" and maybe random shout outs in HxHD by staff to users advertising upcoming events - not too frequently, but enough times to engage the users. Just make sure you do not do the annoying "flooding" thing which is going into other rooms shouting the odds about events happening. It's worth looking into how you can advertise certain events though, no matter how small.

I know the plans for our new website, and yes I know people are sick of hearing about it because it seems to have taken so long but it will be released in January 2011 and in my opinions our plan for this site are very good for combatting the challenges Habbo has thrown at us (especially the marketplace). Our new site will also be an exciting experience for our non-habbo users too. The three Habbox sites will become more united and I'd like to think after the release of our new site that if you use one Habbox site you will use another too as they will be closely linked, ehh you might even go all out to three too. These plans will help.

You need to get a whip out really, these plans were strongly suggested to be out by Summer which caused a few controversial posts by some members who were told other members were lying then finding the threads proving otherwise. You've got to make quick changes to go along with changes in your environment, it's never good to leave them for so long

Nobody has yet found what it needs to conquor all timezones and get the biggest userbase, there are big UK fansites such as us, ClubHabbo, HFFM, there are big US fansites such as HabCrazy and there are big AU fansites such as arghhh I can't remember the name of it - yet none are successful in other timezones and in this climate you need to be.

It is incredibly difficult and perhaps impossible for a fansite like Habbox without wasting tons of money and re-writing the structures of the 3 sites. At the moment you've got a strong British culture which contrasts with other cultures. You would have to re-write the forum structure to make events work for Austrailians and Americans, and hide the British ones which are of no interest, and the discussions would be hard to control because you'd get British people signing off at 11PM to 8AM which would be a daunting experience for Australians just coming home and Americans at the peak of their online activities. So finding it is one thing, but using it is another.

The race is on, and we need to win it.[/QUOTE]

[Josh]

You would have to re-write the forum structure to make events work for Austrailians and Americans, and hide the British ones which are of no interest

The race is on, and we need to win it.

Eh? What? I stay up late into the night and I am for sure interested in them.

Also, Hecktix.. what's the Habbo AU Fansite?

[GommeInc]

Eh? What? I stay up late into the night and I am for sure interested in them.

Also, Hecktix.. what's the Habbo AU Fansite?

I'm thinking of the ones which won't be accessible to a vast majority of AU/US visitors Perhaps I could re-phrase that to less accessible than hidden, as some could well be accessible to all nationalities if the time frame is right?

[Josh]

I'm thinking of the ones which won't be accessible to a vast majority of AU/US visitors Perhaps I could re-phrase that to less accessible than hidden, as some could well be accessible to all nationalities if the time frame is right?

12pm is usually a nice time, maybe a little later. (quiz any1)

Well it's currently 6am in Australia as I type this, so I am able to get to the prime time events (if I'm willing) by either staying up super late, or getting up early. I may be an exception though.

The actual issue I have with it is, if they hide main timezone (UK) events for international people, it's going to look really empty as I haven't seen many events in my timezone prime etc. (Felix-X does some, but that's about it.)