How To Add A Forum To WordPress
For those interested in learning how to add a forum to your WordPress site or blog, bbPress is a nice program from the creators of WordPress to help you do just that.
Like WordPress, bbPress’ focus is on web standards and due to the fact that WordPress is becoming the defacto platform for blogs and websites in general, having a forum software created by the same people is a real plus.
If you’ve ever done any extensive research online for adding a forum to your blog, you’ll quickly realize there are not many highly customizable and professional solutions for those using WordPress (it’s not as easy as searching for the Best WordPress Themes for instance). Since bbPress has been created by the same people behind WordPress, if you like WP, chances are you will like bbPress.
One point to remember: bbPress is still in a sort of “working beta” stage, and it is definitely not as easy to integrate as your typical plugin (it’s not a plugin). It is a standalone program that can be integrated with WordPress, where for example, a person can register for your site through WordPress or bbPress and not have to register twice – once for the site and once for the forum – so that is nice.
When it comes time to install bbPress, they provide great documentation and a pretty good forum (using bbPress if you want to check it out) to answer questions you may have.
Personally, I found a person through the forum that I hired to install/customize it a bit for me, and if you’d like to know his name, contact me and I’ll pass on his information. For the most part, however the installation should be pretty straight forward, and if you’re looking for a good forum software for WordPress, I think you’ll really appreciate the simplicity and elegance of bbPress.
Comments
Play Games Win Prizes March 27th, 2009
A lot of bloggers are starting to add forums to their blogs, but it isn’t that popular because it’s usually your blog is more popular or the other way around.
-Mike
kompanzasyon March 28th, 2009
Thank you my friend
Webmaster Juice March 30th, 2009
If you are going to add a forum to a blog, it may be an idea to turn off comments and direct people to the forum to discuss the posts?
- Ned
Kyle March 31st, 2009
Good point Ned. Forums seem to be better for your active readers and really need to be there for a reason (product support, membership training) in my opinion. It’s also nice to have another feature coded similarly to WordPress and run by the same people. You really can develop just about anything with WP, and it’s mostly free to boot.
Tyrone – Internet Business Path March 31st, 2009
Yeah .. some build forums along with their site. That depends on what you really want. But this business also has a nice future. You just need the right path…right???
Bratwurst Recipes April 1st, 2009
With the way wordpress handles its current blogging platform, and its constantly improving it, I cant wait to see what the forum software looks a few months down the road! I have used myBB in the past for forums, which works pretty good, but I am ready for wordpress to take over! Especially if they add alot of seo properties to it
Till then,
Jean
Odzyskiwanie Danych April 1st, 2009
Great post !
Kyle April 1st, 2009
@Jean – I’m right there with you. It will be a good day when the bbPress code gets more attention from the WordPress higher ups. Although perhaps the “forum” as we know if is not as popular as it used to be…Maybe they know a thing or two we don’t
It’s interesting to watch these technologies develop because we all know that things typically don’t turn out anything like we originally planned – real world or online. Maybe the forum will soon become a thing of the past thanks to improved commenting tools, services like Twitter, etc. Who knows really…
Wayne April 2nd, 2009
I like the idea of adding a blogging forum to my site. I have also been thinking about adding something like a ask the expert chat or video conference where I can chat with or meet my visitors or subscribers and they can ask direct questions. Does anyone have any ideas what could be done on a wordpress site to facilitate that?
Oh yes… I looked around to find the forum for blogging experiment and never found it. Am I being blind and it is here right in front of me or was it installed to a different site?
Kyle April 7th, 2009
Wayne, we do not currently have a forum for Blogging Experiment…hence why you couldn’t find one
Best Underwater Digital Camera April 9th, 2009
The software looks great – first I just need to build up my readership a little bit and then I might implement BBPress into my blog and see how it turns out
door handles May 5th, 2009
I think that is very true about adding forum to a blog can exit the way of making comments.
Jon August 19th, 2009
I am now going to check out bbPress, I did try a few others but I did not have much luck! I was just wondering, does bbPress allow image uploads?
Also what is the forum like regarding SEO ? Will try the forum out, I will see if I can intergrate it with my site that I am running wordpress on!
Kyle August 19th, 2009
Jon, I had someone install/tweak the design for me on the site I wanted to test bbPress with, and it seemed like there were several customization features you could control related to title tags, etc. Is that mainly what you were concerned with or whether or not the forum posts themselves were search engine friendly?
jon August 31st, 2009
Hi Kyle, I would like the post themselves to be seo friendly, that way my site topics can be found. I did have another forum on phpbb, but this did not seem to get anywhere on Google.
Kyle August 31st, 2009
The post seem to be fairly SEO friendly. I’ve noticed that the title tag is the title of the post, and you do have some customization control from within the admin’s control panel.
Helen September 5th, 2009
thanks a lot! great site! I’m so glad I came across it:) so many wonderful pieces of advice! exactly what I very often need:) just adore reading interesting articles with useful information.
Wayne Key September 6th, 2009
I have been thinking for a while that adding a forum to my wp site would be a good idea and could add a lot of value in helping my readers support each other and in helping me help them… nice to see wp on top of it!
Gravity September 29th, 2009
There are a lot of caveats.
For example, some wordpress themes do not easily map across to being the header for a bbpress site. I had picked two which my developer said were just too hard to work with for ‘deep integration’.
Tom Mariner October 17th, 2009
Aha, but here’s the point — what if you want an easy way to create a forum rather than add a forum to a successful, ongoing blog? – that’s also one of the reasons for the original post.
The ease of use of WordPress makes its original purpose not all you can do.
Make money October 19th, 2009
A forum on a blog is always better online visibility plus a place for new ideas, comments and discussions. So a very good idea for marketing.
Paul C December 29th, 2009
I think forums for your blog iis a great idea to provide backlinks and promote other products pertaining to you sites overall subject. not only does it provide content but would allow customers to provide feedback
Sush February 4th, 2010
what great post – Im actualy working on a forums page for my website – which I am almost completely redesigning. Ive always liked Blogging, guestbooks and forums and think they do offer a fun, informative and interactive quality to an otherwise non-user-enhanced website.
This post has given me some really good ideas and information that I needed.
Lauren-Glenn Davitian February 4th, 2010
We want to use this to “ask the expert”. Do you think people will get confused with Comment section of the actual blog posts?
Unlimited Forum February 14th, 2010
what any forum software can do the tricks, can vbulletin use it?
jeswinaugustine July 16th, 2010
i am using the egamer theme in my site. can i have forum that looks like exactly like the theme ? if so whom to contact for a cheaper price.