Need advice on building a community / networking

Social Media
1

I have been working on a submission-based networking site for quite some time now.
The problem is… I don’t really know how to get people to start “networking” on it, so I need a little advice.

Most visitors just come from another site and look at one or two submissions, and then leave. How can I get them to stay and browse?
More importantly, how can I get them to sign up, submit their own content and comment on other submissions?

The site is: http://shroomtown.com
(If you have any other feedback about the site, feel free to tell me.)

2

Well Im a looks kinda person and the website looks well not “nice” or clean ya know? I would leave at first site.

Increasing pagerank would help, allowing do follow content so people can advertise their own stuff will help the most.

3

dude, did you code that entire website? I mean with skills like that you can make alot of money…

4

What do you mean by nice? I was going for more of an artistic-type look, rather than a clean, white facebook-look. Any specific details on that would definitely be helpful.

And yes, I did design and code the entire site by myself alone. And I’d love to make a lot of money (of course), but I wish to do it primarily with my own websites.

5

I think you should be able to get a lot of useful response if you posted this thread to the review section.

To be honest the site needs to be professional looking to be able to get the attention of the visitors.

6

That section seems to be for sharing full reviews of websites, and it requires that I write at least three lengthy full website reviews before I can even post there. I am not at all asking for a full website review, but rather just some tips or advice.

This thread’s topic is regarding help in building a community. I am, however, interested in any detailed advice you might have about the professionalism of the design.

Any honest and constructive criticism would be appreciated very much.

7

I guess your site is not bad…just need some seo to get higher ranking in search engine.
also try adwords and facebook ads to get some traffic.
you concept is good and I guess it should work after some hard work.

8

Thanks for the encouragement.

Most people come to my site through a submission link such as this:
http://shroomtown.com/index.php?page=exhibition&id=3008

I think if people actually saw some comments on the submissions, they might be more encouraged to leave some themselves… Which would eventually encourage them to submit some of their own stuff and see what people have to say about it.

I don’t really know how much some comments would help, but maybe I could allow non-member “guests” to leave comments (using a captcha). Also, perhaps I could offer some sort of reward for commenting. =/