How Do You Keep Returning Users Engaged Beyond Their Original Interest?

[Maya]

Users often come for one topic and leave. How do you expand their engagement into other areas? What design choices encourage exploration without overwhelming them?

 

[Shawn Gossman]

Users often come for one topic and leave.

If they just needed an answer, most of the time, they won't be back unless they need more answers. Sometimes they forget they joined.

How do you expand their engagement into other areas?

I say answer their questions but also ask further questions to keep them engaged. You can also tag them in relevant other posts to get their views and replies on those posts but make sure they're relevant to the original posts they were discussing.

What design choices encourage exploration without overwhelming them?

Keep the design as minimal as possible. Sometimes, themes are too much and take the attention away from the discussion.

 

[Baw$e]

Having discussions outside your niche can help keep active users engaged when they’re not in the mood for specific topics.

 

[Page]

Doing giveaways, that tends to keep them coming back XD

 

[Eclipse]

I agree with everyone's answers above, was literally going to write the same thing. I noticed that giveaways, especially for launching a forum, prove to be really beneficial. Whenever I launch a forum, I usually hold a giveaway that rewards active members. This drives users and drives content.

Another thing that easily throws me off when I visit a forum, if it is too complicated to navigate. The theme/software needs to be UX friendly, complicated or "busy" themes are a turn off and are not visually appealing. I'm a UI guy, if I see a beautiful interface and clean design, I usually stick around