It has been an interesting few months working to update awdp.org and to keep its content refreshed and updated with all the latest technology news and trends. The idea behind awdp.org was to build a community of web design companies, developers and anyone else who was interested in learning about web development and design.

I personally build alot of functionality in to the website for users to add comments to articles, share news via social networking sites and even allowing users to upload their own content. A reason to get users involved and discuss context with in an article and get your work published to a larger audience than usual.

We have a high passing traffic rate and a fair few members, some top level and others just starting out, but the current website just does not seem to be bringing a community feel to the current user base. I get it, I understand web design companies are looking for the simple high page rank link that points back to their up and coming homepage. But web design and development is about much more than seeing how many high PR links you can get incoming to your website, sure it will help, but guess what else helps? Writing articles on awdp.org. Google indexed page on 1, blog posts about latest tech trends and articles submitted by users with in a 24 hour window. Why? the articles got a high traffic rating and it was relevant, another thing, we allow our users to add back links to their own websites. We set no restriction on that, thats the way we say thank you for sharing. So that traffic can be re-directed to your homepage or campaign page.

We do often get the same few users adding content to the website and they keep coming back as it seems to be working pretty well for them. We also had premium members, who go extra benefits for a small fee, which up until we decided to remove this feature for future developments of awdp.org, we found a large portion of our premium members still wanted to keep paying for the benefits, which was astounding non the less. I would personally like to thank each premium member for their contribution to our community.

However all these great features and benefits did not create the kind of response I wanted from the people using the website, a sense of community and place users can share ideas, thoughts and coding issues or asking for help. Comments on the site seemed to hit a big fat 0 on all aritcles, what I did find out is that people commented on tutorials that helped solve coding issues. At one point we even had a user ask why users of the website would not comment on articles, I honestly could not explain the reason. Well, I could. Being a free resource for users to add website links to our database, a high PR website, meant users would register and leave. This was becoming a big issue for us and to the people wanting to be part of the community. Part of this was our fault for not offering an incetive to keep users coming back to upload new content and data to keep profiles fresh and updated. I can honestly say our database is hugely out-dated, I imagine some of the first registered members are still not trading and if they are it would be great to hear from them.

May be I have over-estimated the community behind web design and development? May be people dont want to have a sense of community and get to help each other with web problems? But then I visit sites such as Hacker News and Mashable. Both having great communities behind them. People share, comment and argue. Something I wish would replicate in this website.

So enough about past failings, I am re-developing awdp.org in to a professional networking site. A place users can find designers and developers and make contact with ease, follow users, share comments, videos, articles and photos.

What path may lay ahead is unknown right now, but hopefully this version will build a bigger and better community to awdp.org.