Starting my first forum! any advice? please!

So I've decided to start my first forum and really have very little idea on what i am doing at the moment! I don't mind as everyone has to start somewhere, but i am just looking for a bit of advice. Does any one know of a good page on starting up a forum from scratch, where to find moderators and where are the best places to find forum posters.

Hope someone can help! Cheers!

 

I purchased Managing Online Forums: Everything You Need to Know to Create and Run Successful Community Discussion Boards by Patrick O'Keefe, and found it to be a terrific read. It's available on the Kindle if that suits your reading preferences.

 

if you need moderators i suggest you post in the buy sell trade section of these forums under partnerships. You can recruit people there.
Its best not to pay for posters you will get them naturally as you build up your content

 

Cheers i will look into it on amazon!

Drunkglitch... how much do you think moderators are roughly? is it not a good idea to get a some posts on there first, before more people will even think about posting?

 

Forums take time and money to build so don't go into that field if you are just hunting for money. It should be about the topic and that you want to talk about the topic. I recommend the same book and there are a few more that are on the subject. They aren't cheap but are worth the cost.

Take the time to do a proper launch for your forum with a coming soon page. Market the page and the features and offer a bonus for those that request membership before the forum starts. This can help build word of mouth and create a nice buzz.

Best of luck..

 

Hi Bowles,



I'm agree with sweetcrabhoney18, forums take a lot of time. You must be passionate about the main topic of your forum, since it may take time to grow a good userbase. Once you have reached that, you can't relax, you need a good team of moderators to keep everything clean from spammers, flamming and porn bots.



I hope It's helpful for you.

 

Take another forum helps for search of moderators.

 

If you're just starting up, you need to think of a lot of things - niche, content, design, hosting, forum software, moderation & administration.

 

Search for good moderators,
Best of luck.

 

You can recruit me to be a moderator of course with all the perks ... I have successfully built a couple of forums using Vanilla Forums platform. Even if you don't want me,,, it is important you get a good moderator to check on spammers.

 

Hello,

Which types of give you advice. Forum posting is best way of your website.

Thanks.