What do you consider an "empty" forum?

[Sharon]

I just got through reading a relatively critical forum review and one of the things that they pointed out was that the forum's boards were empty and that we need to improve that area. Every day we are actively creating new threads and trying our best to keep the conversations alive and when we hit our 10K mark we really thought we were doing well and for him to say that our boards looked empty I asked him to elaborate and he responded with every forum on the internet if their boards have less than three digits (threads) then they considered empty.

What are your thoughts on this? Do you agree with this statement? What do you consider an "empty" forum?

 

[Vocal.]

I do not think empty means having less than 100 threads, especially if it is a blossoming community trying to build activity. Having 50 or so threads per forum is enough to get new members actively engaged in my opinion. I wouldn't consider it empty.

 

[LadyAnna]

I'd consider a forum empty if there's no new content posted for a few month, up to a year.

As long as there's active users (more then just the staff), it's not empty in my book, even if the activity might be limited to a few posts a day.

Activity is gonna build up to a thriving community at some point, we all start with basically zero posts 🙂

 

[Sharon]

Thank you both for your response. I can understand why thread/post count isn't as imperative when it comes to newer forums however... speaking of established forums, what would you consider "empty?"

After posting this thread and thinking about it some more - I would say it depends on how many regular members get online. Most forums have it so you can view the registered members who have logged in the last 24-48 hours. If your latest activity is dated months ago I think that would give a forum a really empty feel.

 

[CM30]

For me, it's near zero posts in a section or on a site.

Or to be more precise, an empty section would have less than three posts, and an empty site/forum would have less than 10 posts in total.

 

[Sharon]

For me, it's near zero posts in a section or on a site.

Or to be more precise, an empty section would have less than three posts, and an empty site/forum would have less than 10 posts in total.

I have to agree with you. Whenever giving feedback to others I recommend they at least post an introductory thread to an empty board so that it does not reflect zero posts on the main page.