Quacker Jack
Madly Diligent
I know there are some admins of some VERY successful forums. How did you get it so big? What is your secrets in advertising?
How do you advertise to make your forum big?
- Thread starter Quacker Jack
- Start date
That's true. It seemed like every time I wanted to run a forum, it was always at the worst time. And not only that, it always seemed like with the genera I wanted to do, there are thousands others just like it! I think it would take waiting until the time is right for you to decide whether or not you were ready to open a forum, because it's pretty darn obvious that I wasn't ready.
The World Wide Web is billions of pages. Of course there's gonna be a lot of sites like yours.
I think that one of the main ways to become big is SEO, but general discussion forums I believe are tough to do in that sense 🙁 I dunno, I try. I still consider my forum pretty small so far but I hope it grows soon!
I think that one of the main ways to become big is SEO, but general discussion forums I believe are tough to do in that sense 🙁 I dunno, I try. I still consider my forum pretty small so far but I hope it grows soon!
CyberFreak
Legendary Typer
For this forum the secret was near enough what Zane said. Right time, right topic and right place. We started off on a crappy free phpBB host. We were the first (active anyway) promotion forum on that host. Alot of members on the support forum when we started to promote it were impressed with the idea and hadn't seen anything like it in most cases so it made us unique to the community there. It gave us a very good group of active members at the start. When we start this forum, advertising forums not using Invisionfree were rare. They wasn't many around at all which weren't on invisionfree. We were something different again which did help us.
This all helped us get started and with constant promotion for years we got to this stage. We are now at a time where we don't need to actually go out and promote anymore. We have many links everywhere and there is a large amount of members promoting us. Google is also very good for us. We get a large number of our members from Google.
Basically what i am trying to say is that it is not just how you advertise but it is what you are advertising. If it is unique and different then it will be easier to get a foot on the ladder to having a big forum. We had 2 unique things about FP and that is what gave us a good start. Once you get started it will become easier.
This all helped us get started and with constant promotion for years we got to this stage. We are now at a time where we don't need to actually go out and promote anymore. We have many links everywhere and there is a large amount of members promoting us. Google is also very good for us. We get a large number of our members from Google.
Basically what i am trying to say is that it is not just how you advertise but it is what you are advertising. If it is unique and different then it will be easier to get a foot on the ladder to having a big forum. We had 2 unique things about FP and that is what gave us a good start. Once you get started it will become easier.
I third what Zane said. It's like success in any other media, I think: Right idea, right place, right time. Music, movies, books, products--you see it again and again. So it's like anything.
That is not to say that it's "too late" to begin and accomplish a successful forum even in an oversaturated genre. It can be done, and I have seen it happen. But it's rare, and again, results from that forum being able to fill a niche. Sometimes a niche can be very specialised and still result in a successful board as long as there is a market for it. If you're the only forum in that niche, or one of the only ones and you do it best, and you get your name out there you will gather members. For example, my forum is an RPG forum set in a fandom, we are the largest as far as I know, but many people do not want a big game with a somewhat loose take on its fandom, which we are. There are lots of smaller boards that fulfill the niche of a smaller game, in various ways. Some players want a game run with only longer posts, and stricter writing standards. Others want an anything-goes RPG with just about no writing standards at all. A more recently created forum in the genre that catered to this last niche was set up only about a year and a half ago, a lot more recently than most others, after the market was supposedly saturated. Fast forward to now, they have over 100,000 posts and lots of daily activity, because they filled a vacuum. The other boards were all focused on higher writing standards but they decided to cater to a looser approach. So people who want that kind of thing now know where to go.
So it comes down to competition. I have noticed in the past that when a large board goes down, there's a small surge of activity on certain other boards as many of those members disperse to find a new board to take the place of the old.
That is not to say that it's "too late" to begin and accomplish a successful forum even in an oversaturated genre. It can be done, and I have seen it happen. But it's rare, and again, results from that forum being able to fill a niche. Sometimes a niche can be very specialised and still result in a successful board as long as there is a market for it. If you're the only forum in that niche, or one of the only ones and you do it best, and you get your name out there you will gather members. For example, my forum is an RPG forum set in a fandom, we are the largest as far as I know, but many people do not want a big game with a somewhat loose take on its fandom, which we are. There are lots of smaller boards that fulfill the niche of a smaller game, in various ways. Some players want a game run with only longer posts, and stricter writing standards. Others want an anything-goes RPG with just about no writing standards at all. A more recently created forum in the genre that catered to this last niche was set up only about a year and a half ago, a lot more recently than most others, after the market was supposedly saturated. Fast forward to now, they have over 100,000 posts and lots of daily activity, because they filled a vacuum. The other boards were all focused on higher writing standards but they decided to cater to a looser approach. So people who want that kind of thing now know where to go.
So it comes down to competition. I have noticed in the past that when a large board goes down, there's a small surge of activity on certain other boards as many of those members disperse to find a new board to take the place of the old.
first and foremost thing is that the forum shud have good and informative related to the niche of the forums
and a check on spammers is also necessary
i agree with all that fowler acom said
advertising can be done successfully only when the object to be advertised has enough weight in it to attract views and users
and a check on spammers is also necessary
i agree with all that fowler acom said
advertising can be done successfully only when the object to be advertised has enough weight in it to attract views and users
Adding to what Fowler said,Quacker Jack said:
Mimiking success will indefinatly equal a failed forum. Too many members now a day use Forum Promotion as their only promoting forum. It isn't what forum you use, it is how you use it.
I think the first mistake many new admins make is to make their goal for their forum a whole lot of members and posts. Your first goal should be what you can offer members that can benefit them. Find something to offer, then work at it. Forget about just having tons of members and posts.
Personally, I'm not a fan of plain chat forums. I won't join them, unless they were made by someone very close to me. But otherwise, I look for communities than can help me with something or can offer me something.
I think one of the most damaging things a reviewer can say in promotion forum reviews "You just need more posts in your general/spam forums". No, you don't. You need to offer something worthwhile in all your other forums. The general forums are just for support to what you really offer. Honestly, maybe it's a guy thing, but I never did see why having a huge forum made you successful. There's a lot of huge forums full of idiots and trolls, who are admin'd by idiots and trolls. I always thought that having a forum where people enjoyed themselves and found you useful made you successful.
The truly successful forums are the ones who offer a service, and do it well.
Personally, I'm not a fan of plain chat forums. I won't join them, unless they were made by someone very close to me. But otherwise, I look for communities than can help me with something or can offer me something.
I think one of the most damaging things a reviewer can say in promotion forum reviews "You just need more posts in your general/spam forums". No, you don't. You need to offer something worthwhile in all your other forums. The general forums are just for support to what you really offer. Honestly, maybe it's a guy thing, but I never did see why having a huge forum made you successful. There's a lot of huge forums full of idiots and trolls, who are admin'd by idiots and trolls. I always thought that having a forum where people enjoyed themselves and found you useful made you successful.
The truly successful forums are the ones who offer a service, and do it well.
Honestly, Every website is different that being said some websites could do the easiest advertising and gain more members than those websites who pay thousands to advertise. The goal for advertising and bringing in users is the following.
- Find what your audience wants/needs
- Find sites that offer the same and different.
What I mean by different is lets say your website is Advertising, You might want to go to a clan website and tell them so they could advertise their clan website.
- Also finding appealing advertising.. Yes using banners / text advertising is nice. But finding unique and new ways to advertise that people will say "Wow.. That is amazing".
Basically all I'm saying is finding ways to stand out with even advertising, Yes ForumPromotion helps but finding other ways to gain more people is probably your best bet.
- Find what your audience wants/needs
- Find sites that offer the same and different.
What I mean by different is lets say your website is Advertising, You might want to go to a clan website and tell them so they could advertise their clan website.
- Also finding appealing advertising.. Yes using banners / text advertising is nice. But finding unique and new ways to advertise that people will say "Wow.. That is amazing".
Basically all I'm saying is finding ways to stand out with even advertising, Yes ForumPromotion helps but finding other ways to gain more people is probably your best bet.
Yup, a forum where people enjoy themselves is the most important thing because people won't join a forum that's huge yet not fun. However, if the forum IS huge, that's a strong indicator that it's also enjoyable...otherwise, hundreds of people wouldn't be devoting daily or almost daily time to it. That's why we use it in advertising, because numbers speak for themselves more concretely than just saying your forum is enjoyable and friendly {though I point that out, too}. It's hard to convey subjective matter really convincingly in an ad; they would have to click through and browse around and try out your board before discovering how pleasant/fun it is, but they could see its size immediately. Click through rates on ads are abysmal no matter what you do, so every tiny bit counts. It's true everywhere. How many billboards have you seen and then suddenly rushed out to buy or try whatever they were advertising?
Big forums also have stronger cushioning against sudden death because of the natural laws of population dynamics. A dead forum isn't fun for anybody, and all forums go through ups and downs in activity. We had a down in activity for a few months, I noticed this and advertised, etc. till it eased up. We were down by like half but that still meant we were reasonably active. When the same thing happens to a small board it can kill the board entirely. So, I feel you do need a "healthy" number of members and activity to make sure you continue to stay alive at all. But you don't need thousands. And bear in mind that as a forum grows larger it experiences "growing pains" that if you're not prepared for those issues they will kill your board.
Big forums also have stronger cushioning against sudden death because of the natural laws of population dynamics. A dead forum isn't fun for anybody, and all forums go through ups and downs in activity. We had a down in activity for a few months, I noticed this and advertised, etc. till it eased up. We were down by like half but that still meant we were reasonably active. When the same thing happens to a small board it can kill the board entirely. So, I feel you do need a "healthy" number of members and activity to make sure you continue to stay alive at all. But you don't need thousands. And bear in mind that as a forum grows larger it experiences "growing pains" that if you're not prepared for those issues they will kill your board.
Talk Horror
Up-and-Coming Sensation
Advertise, have people to sign up for ya.
Also another trick is to do multiple
sign ups and talk with different names.
Also another trick is to do multiple
sign ups and talk with different names.
Talk Horror said:
As much as I hate it when people do this, it usually is the only way to get off the ground and running. After that it's all about unique content. Why do you go back to a website? What makes you compelled to reply to something? Does your site have anything your rivals doesn't? Ask yourself some very basic questions that you'd expect visitors to subconsciously ask themselves, try to look at your site subjectively and you'll start seeing the best avenues of expansion. 🙂
Acorn said:
I know that recently happened about a month ago concerning a large comic book message board. Which was basically made for a magazine that is out on stands every month just about everywhere and outside the USA as far as I am aware of. And cause of the board shutting down, my related forum got a boost in activity cause of it.
CaptianSyrup
New Arrival
What if members don't want to use you?What if they just want to come and chill? I've found some very "useless" forums but their community has a lot of topics and a lot of discussions going on. Even though most of it's pure off-topic spam, the members are still enjoying themselves.
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