Last Friday I used a screen shot of the Cre8tive Flow blog for round 4 of Guess the Internet Marketing Site game. Cre8tive Flow along with the Cre8asite Forums is owned by Kim Krause Berg. I consider Kim an authority on usability and holistic SEO. You can read her views and news on the subject at her Cre8pc blog or find out more about her usability services at Usability Effect.

Kim was gracious to give her time to answer a few questions about her and the Cre8tive Community so read on!

Q: Congratulations, it was recently announced that you will be working with Matt Bailey and SiteLogic. What is the most exciting part of this move for you?

A: This was one of those, “Hey, why didn’t we think of this before?” situations. We have similar skills and share the same passion for SEO, usability and accessibility. But, I admire his ability to analyze and work with data and he can use my software functional and UI testing background. The blending of what we know and can do, plus what we want to learn from each other, makes for a nice business partnership.

And, really. The true exciting part is that we get along so well. Working with someone you have fun with makes it not feel like work. And, Matt understood my need for independence. I can keep several of my own sites and client work intact and grow with SiteLogic. This is an awesome opportunity.

Q: You are so well respected in website usability and SEO, you have a top-notch group of authors on the Creative Flow blog and first-rate moderators in the forums. This great collection of folks really make Cre8asite special. How have you kept everybody together for so long?

A: Thank you! The core group of moderators have known me since 1998 or so. Others that came in later and at various points seemed to “marry” us. We don’t keep everybody. There are a few moderators who got too busy to remain or were simply frustrated with me because in the beginning I was overwhelmed with how fast and big the forums became. I’ve learned a lot. But overall, we have little turnover rate for staff and always look for recruits. We choose from what I call the “Cre8tive Community”. You can tell the members who have pulled up a chair, or maybe built a porch and just moved right in. These members patrol and contribute as if they’re staff, and we encourage that because it’s their community.

I don’t analyze it very much, to be honest. It seems that we attract talent, devotion, loyalty and definitely fun people. We share the load of work, and trust me, running a forums is time consuming. Everyone communicates if they can’t be around due to work or family issues and the others pick up the slack. We’ve grown quite close as a team. I don’t give orders. In fact, I have a Project Manager, Garrick, who keeps me and everything organized. We have several Technical Administrators who handle the back end and server. What exists is created continually by everyone - staff and members. It’s a living community and everyone is encouraged to participate. In fact, we have two staff members, Donna and Paul, who are hosts, rather than moderators as you would think of the term. They make sure new people are welcome and needs are met.

The Cre8tive Flow blog is what’s left of the old Cre8asite Directory, which was the brainchild of one of the old moderators, Stock (aka “Grumpus”), who has since moved on to pursue his career and dreams. He and several moderating staff built this huge directory of resources and the foundation for what is now the forums blog. We chose a member of the Community, Elizabeth, who impressed us, to be our Blog Editor and she has since rounded up her own blog team culled from the staff and membership to write for it.

Q: Its great to see the Cre8asite Forums continue to be strong. Do you think all the blogs out there now days make it harder for a forum to survive?

A: No. Blogs largely remain one way conversations, with certain exceptions like SEOMoz and others that purposely worked on building their own communities. Forums are where you can come and get answers and opinions with faster turnaround. And, every forum has its own vibe. If you don’t fit in one forum, there’s likely another one elsewhere that feels just right. Some are tough to break into. Some can be intimidating because of how smart the members are. If you’re afraid to ask a question, that bothers us at Cre8. We work very hard with everybody, and even more so for those willing to learn.

Q: Describe the mix of offerings the Cre8asite Network offers. What’s next for the Cre8asite Networks, how do you see it evolving?

A: With the directory now pulled, with was part of the original plan for a network of sites, we have slowed down the pace and plans for Cre8asite.net. It’s not for lack of interest or enthusiasm. The entire community has lots of ideas, including sponsoring workshops and doing more formal networking. Because everyone is a volunteer, progress can be frustrating. Nearly everyone who becomes a moderator is either already well known, or is about to become so due to their exposure at the forums.

Presently, we have devoted ourselves to education by sponsoring internships and schools who teach search marketing. We give away our ad revenue in scholarships money.

On June 12, a new forum was added, called “Monetizing Your Website“. The idea came from one of the members, and two of our present moderators, Ammon (aka “Black Knight”) and EGOL, instantly saw the logic of this focus. We had so many existing threads on the topic spread all over the place, so they were pulled together and now there is a new forum at Cre8 for learning how to earn money with websites.

Before that, we were the first to launch a forum dedicated to social media with two new moderators who are active in that industry.

I’m extremely proud of all the people at Cre8asiteforums and especially fond of the Cre8tive Community.

They become “family”.

Thank you for letting me share a bit about the forums.

Kim

Thanks for sharing Kim!