When I first started my forum, I made a lot of threads & replied to all new replies. I was actually happy the first time I didn’t have to do that as a thread had activity from several members.
I still create new discussions. May find something to post in an older thread so it can be brought back to life.
I don’t send out newsletters. I only mass email twice a year at the milestone marks, 6 months & year. I haven’t had non-active members come back however with that “reminder” lol
So my question is, how do you encourage activity, interaction between your members?
I honestly make new topics as often as I can. Sometimes they don't get any responses, though. I post as much as possible and try to encourage a discussion in the topic. I ask open ended questions and stuff like that.
I just got many people to join and make content other then one single staff or owner doing it, I do not know why but I feel it's bed to have you as a single owner doing all the content and does put of normal people joining if they see staff posting more then members do
I am one of the top content creators on Christianity Haven. It's difficult getting members to start new threads unless it's something they really want to ask. They feel they shouldn't be creating new threads for the sake of having a new thread, but that's the problem, they don't understand that we need threads to keep activity going. That's why FP comes into play in posting packages and exchanges, to get new conversations going from people who aren't a part of the community so it's no longer stale feeling.
Some people will create some kind of contest where members have a chance of winning some kind of prize in the end. Depending on what the prizes are, this can create more activity on the forum. However, the activity may die down once the contest is over. If you have an active member base already then you are still going to have some activity on your forum anyway. But if you don't already have an active member base then your activity is going to die down the minute the contest is over....not unless you win some people over with the contest.
My experience tells me if the members are not interested in your community, no matter what you do, you cannot bring them back to your community. However, you can of course encourage activity by offering posting rewards, contests, etc.
Encouraging activity on your forum is something that isn't always easy but it's possible. I find that to be able to encourage activity you have to as the forum owner be active yourself, creating new threads, replying to threads, and such. The more content there is the more you reply and keep content going, and the more inclined people will be to want to participate.
Content and engagement are key, I think. You can always run contests and whatnot, but I think you always need to keep building up the content and engaging with your user base. Without content and engagement, your forum has no life in it.
