Are forums less active during spring and summer months?
- Thread starter Baw$e
- Start date
They were when we were 16.
Forums have definitely declined the last few weeks. And that's really no big surprise. Weather's been great, so everyone is spending more time doing chores, work outside, or just be outside more often than in the winter. I know I haven't been much active lately, and both FP and Administrata dropped in activity. But not only those forums, many forums I usually visit often have seen a rather large decline.
At some point, it will pick up again.
I had one of my members reach out to me, and told me they'd be less active during the summer. They usually take the summers off from poker, he said. I'm hoping it picks up soon, because I have some cool promotions planned for the summer.
It's good to know that it's sort of expected to have a decline during the summer because of the weather. I didn't think larger communities such as this one would slow down as much as it did though.
To put that in perspective, FP has around 50 posts a day averagely. FP's average would be around 150 normally. Administrata only has around 30 averagely. Where that would be around 110 normally.
So yes, it's noticeably more quiet nowadays. But it'll pick up again after September. That's my experience in this over the last few years. It's important to keep motivated and not think your community is done.
BeautifulAngel
Resident
More people are outside enjoying the nice weather during the spring and summer so they are less likely going to be online or they will be less active. It's a normal off-season for forums and happens to the best of us =)
As other have mentioned people like to be outdoors during the warmer seasons. Since it's starting to get warm again in the northern hemisphere you'll see less activity. There might be an influx of people from the Southern Hemisphere logging into your forum though since it's getting colder for them! I personally prefer to stay indoors during the hot weather because I'm not a fan of warm weather lol.
It depends on your niche and your audience, really.
I have a local cycling forum. I know for a fact that local cyclists in my area get out and ride more when it's warm. They are not using forums. They're on their bikes. I'm also not on the forum that much because I'm on my bike.
During the colder months when we can't get many outdoor rides in, we participate on the forum to keep our cycling interests alive.
So, it really depends on your niche and your people.
It may depend on the niche. I a few members that told me they play less poker during the summer, but will be all in for the winter.
This. The key thing is to always keep posting on your forum even if it's a slow period. I see plenty of forums that are doing well in the summer and some that aren't.
It's also a good idea to try to branch out and finds way to drive in new members. Whether that's by launching an ad campaign somewhere, promoting in certain places that allow it, or yet, launch a press release if you have the funds to do so.
Every forum goes through slow periods, but it's up to the staff members to determine how to keep the activity flowing. There are facebook groups that owners can use to promote, there's also Reddit or quora, even Tumblr where people can step out of the box and promote.
If you're just sitting back and keep the slow times running, then that's a decision on the owner's part. It's not a forum wide issue, it's a staff team issue on that particular forum. Every audience is different, every niche is different.
Post exchanges also help in slow times as help keep activity flowing as well.
Krissycakes09
Madly Diligent
Hmm I think people like me who HATES the heat would rather be indoors and online then outside and dying.
Lmao exactly. There are many users who stay in states that are relatively hot like in the high 90's-100s. These users aren't exactly playing outside or cooking with their BBQ pits.
They're more than likely hanging out on forums or social media. For example, the social media sites Threads, Twitter and Bluesky are based upon a forum's format, but I haven't seen their activity die down. Reddit is also doing quite well. Some subbreddits may be dying down a bit, but others are quite active.
The gaming industry also seems like it's doing well with many games having a lot of players playing on Steam, even though they're not forums, their stats can be compared to forum's activity as well, especially since it's summer time.
Another thing for forums is to check "Google trends" and see if your forum's topic is slowing down in searches or activity, or SEMRush, then you'll see if it's a global issue that's causing the decline.
HoleInTheGround.forum
Reputable
There will be slow times, there will be active times, just gotta be consistent and never give up.
I've run forums for nearly 20 years. I'd say, yes, forums do suffer a lack of participation during the more pleasant months. Most people have various other activities they want/need to do. Writing on a forum is kinda like a solitary thing people do when it's nasty outside. Of course, your mileage may vary. I've had a forum that sponsored mostly high school kids, so it was mostly active during the school year-- can you blame the poor kids? Maths be boring y'all! LOL I'm sure we've all had that teacher like from Ferris Bueller's Day Off, right? What was his name??
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