How to promote?

Dave Lianelli · 01-10-2004, 10:26 AM

Dear members,

today I've launched a custom style at my forums, though now we need some members to register and post... make the forums active. I would like to know how you would attract more visitors to a 'general' forum, and how to get them to register. Can you please help me?! The forums' portal is located at www.static-net.com , the forums can be reached at www.static-net.com/forum/

Thanks in advance.

~Dave

nickc · 01-10-2004, 12:29 PM

Forums are one of the most difficult things to promote. It is usually done by having a website with unique content that attracts visitors who will hopefully use the forums. Good luck with it.

Nick

I, Brian · 01-10-2004, 12:32 PM

Darn hard starting a forum from scratch.

I highly recommend you visit www.forum-forum.com and enter the forum - especially read up in the "tops" and "admin" boards for some good suggestions on starting up forum traffic and increasing membership.

Dave Lianelli · 01-10-2004, 01:42 PM

Thank you very much for your fast and good replies. I will check forum-forum.com

If anyone can give more help, please post it. Thanks in advance!

John Scott · 01-10-2004, 01:45 PM

When I first started this forum, I was on it pretty much every waking hour. I think that helps. Also, I used pay per click (Adwords) to promote it. It helps to kick start a forum.

compar · 01-10-2004, 02:48 PM

I went here The forums' portal is located at www.static-net.com, and I have no idea whatsoever what your forum is about????

Why should I join? What subjects are being discussed? Nobodies is going to bother registering for a forum when they don't know what the subject matter is.

I would say the first thing you need to do it tell somebody what the subject matter is and what the benefits of membership are.

altyfc · 01-11-2004, 08:11 AM

The other thing that I have found works well is making informal agreements with other forum owners - I post on their forums if they post on mine... that kind of arrangement.

Seems to work quite well, depending on the relationships you develop.

Aaron

I, Brian · 01-11-2004, 10:23 AM

Ah, yes - post exchange. Did some of that on my own before now.

Had some good posts that way - but also met a few dark sheep I was happy to see leave.

rtroxel · 01-19-2004, 02:56 PM

Quote:

Had some good posts that way - but also met a few dark sheep I was happy to see leave.

Some spammers love to hang out in forums. I posted something on one of the Yahoo boards, and my spam volume doubled overnight.

webwriter · 01-19-2004, 05:02 PM

That's a shame --- I had no idea! But then, I am new to websites and forums. Great point!

altyfc · 01-21-2004, 04:27 PM

Another tip... get a good host. I've been trying to access your forums for much of the evening... and it's not working.

Aaron

jonsimons · 01-21-2004, 11:45 PM

same ere... 'page cannot be displayed'

webwriter · 01-27-2004, 11:03 AM

My apologies.

Anyway, go to the site's homepage and click on the link to the forums. Let me know if there are any problems and I will try to solve them. Thanks in advance.

mediatech · 01-27-2004, 11:32 PM

Depending on what your forum is about it can be very easy to have an active forum if you're willing to keep up with it. The tricky part is when your forum involves more of your time than its worth.

The general tactic I use to create an active forum is to give away something of value for free (graphics/templates in my case) in exchange for email addresses.

Once enough emails have been acquired (500-1000) you launch the forum and email your subscriber base about its location. It never fails. I started this subscriber list a little over a month ago. I owe much of my results to Google for the keywords "typo3 template".

http://mediatech.net/Member_List.48.0.html

You'll typically notice a portion of your subscriber base emailing you with questions and advice... once you start receiving more than 5 emails a day launch the forum.

Note: If you don't have time to moderate your forum find several moderators before starting one first

cray · 01-29-2004, 02:35 AM

Hi,

Like john I used adwords to kick start my forum using 0.05p bids. I started promoting it from 0 members at the beginning of November 2003 and without spending a great deal but working very hard we have racked up over 1300 members. Now we can let off the adwords a bit more that the forum is established. It does help to give something away, ours is free pc support but I also place a link in my signature on the forum which generates a lot of new visitors. See this post http://www.d-a-l.com/viewtopic.php?t=371 that signature then allows people to tell others about the free help, its nothing new but it works very well to promote the board as the link is always in the siganture of the post offering a solution.

talkingspot · 02-03-2004, 04:51 AM

Thanks all for the info on this thread. All good advise.

I just setup a forum at http://66.45.232.108/~talkspot/ (domain is now resolving).

Intent is to offer people a place to talk about life, concerns, share ideas and exchange advise.

I would be open to more suggestions on how to get people to participate in forums. Currently, I am looking at :

- adwords
- seo
- banner exchanges

Also, if you wish to use talkingspot to setup a small forum for your own interests, feel free to email me.

It's non-profit for now.

Thanks & Warmest Regards!
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