developing forums and online communities

Anyone who is good at building forums and communities, I need some tips

I have a few forums, but none has any real users posting frequently, even though there're thousands of posts and users in there..


I usually fail to get any members who would be the soul of the forum and start posting frequently. How do you guys do it?

 

Offer something to talk about, like a debate section always works. If it was something they are interested in they will keep coming back to check on it and see what is happening.

Or offer like a contest to the most post or referrals and that alone will keep them busy.

 

You could always register an account, and begin posting under this account. Start an arguement with yourself. You could come in and be controversial under this alias; advocate unacceptable or unsocialable behaviors.

Forum users are a strange sort. Usually, posts are made out of self interest, self promotion, or the perception that a post will gain some future reward. DP requires 50 post before beginning revenue sharing. Is such a modification and requirement available on your forum? If not revenue sharing, are there any special boards accessible to members with a certain post count?

Is your forum a reflection of your local community? If so, you could plan some forum get-togethers at the local pizza hut. If your forum makes money through adsense, use this adsense money to pay for people to attend the buffet or something. Communal incentive = communial participation.

What is the subject matter of the forum -- and are you well versed and well known within this subject matter? Most forum posts tend to be of the "I need help," "How much do you earn," "Do you know when the next PR update is," "What do I need to do to earn traffic," type things -- at least on this forum. If you run a stock market site, posts tend to be around those stocks that people are pumping and dumping.

Basically, all forum posts are self serving. Take what I'm writing for instance. I'm posting this message in response to your question, to be sure, but I have an incentive -- someone will actually visit the links in my signature and will perhaps do some shopping at my Amazon store(s). People make posts to sell a service which the buyer feels will ultimately them. The seller makes their buck, and they feel it benefits them.

Basically, when attempting to gain some posts, ask yourself one thing (among many) : What will I, as a poster, gain by contributing? Is it reputation? Is it some link advertising? Is it access to some special features? Or is it due to the benevolence found because I have a good heart (rarely the case)?

It's all about incentive. There's an incentive to running a forum.. you want members to post in order to generate an internet buzz. This buzz is generated so that members will shop at your store, click on your links, and basically, make you some money. However, without factoring in "What's in it for the poster," it's kind of hard to grow a forum site.

 

thanks Nite and Scheme, great posts

What you describe though assumes that you already have some good users who are interested in the subject.
So first how do you find them.
Suppose you've decided to start a forum, set a few subforums, posted a couple threads with different accounts.. what would you do next to get the things going and to get some people join?

 

Post your forum link in your signature, and post on competitor's sites. Like your running a web mastering forum, post with that sig link at earnersforums, dp, talkfreelance and anywhere that people would benefit or share a common interest in your forum.

Try joining chat rooms and have a good discussion and ask them to join your forum to help you out and have similar discussion's. Ask your friends to join up, get your site dug with an intresting article.

There are ton's of way's you just have to experiment and get people talking.

Best advice create multiple user's and increase activity yourself so when someone comes to the forum it inst just empty. When it seems like there are alot of post and members people want to join in on the discussion.

 

Michael, I would be happy to share some of my thoughts with you over IM sometime. I do a bit with forums.

 

Nice Offer lee!

Yea. you do more than a bit with your forums ....Nice Job

 

Nite: well post! . thanks so much. I have tried to offer some High PR5 main page of my site to forum posters but it doesn't help at all. I wonder what i did wrong for my webmaster forum.

 

You might be interested in my little write up. There are tips on how to get new members and how to make them post

http://www.efishtalk.com/category/forum-management/

 

Scheme, you might want to check the URL in your sig, I get a 404. Besides that, starting and continuing a forum is one of the hardest things you can do. You need to post in similar forums, but don't spam. My forum has a pretty active group of people, yet every once on a while, it gets slow (like now). SO you have to constantly come up with things to talk about.

Forums are very demanding but rewarding.

 

Hi Michael,

I've been pretty successful with a few forums myself.

Over the last three years I've grown pbvids.com to over 30,000 members, pbspace.com to 7,000+ members, and am working on another at the moment (see signature).

Let your visitors know you're there to help. Make an update on your front saying that you'll take any questions or requests for help on whatever topic your website is about, and guarantee a response within 24 hours. That will interest some people.

Also, the benefit of this is that when Google comes and indexes your forum's posts, it turns into a nice Q&A for people search the same questions or suggestions; and ultimatley bringing you more visitors.

 

Excellent tips and ideas, thanks everyone..

 

It's fixed, something wrong with my domain.

 

i hope this helps dnt wana self promote but you will like it for sure
http://forumrating.com/blog/category/forum-promotions/

 

the most important i think is the content of the forum.. if it something people want to talk about or ask about the forum will have members

 

I don't agree with the reward idea... there are some people who just enjoy socializing!

 

so what do you guys think about using contests to quickly populate a forum, like the one earnersforum has done?

 

There are many services that you can pay people to post and up your activity with.

 

I've learned a few tricks at AdminFusion.