Why do you think most new forums close?
- Thread starter Cierra
- Start date
D
Deleted member 17779
A lack of commitment on the part of the owner/administrator that started the forum in the first place. If the person who created the forum is dedicated enough, they can usually make it work.
Forces of Steel
Resident
That is true, but you must also consider the fact that the competition and the oversaturation of other similar forums can hurt the chances of success.Grimalkin said:
Basically, what will your small forum offer me that another larger forum won't, and is that offering substantial to convince me to sign up?
Running a forum may seem easy at first, but try to keep that going for at least a year. Administration is a very demanding job. Always on top of things, making sure that all of the plugins, themes, and other aspects of the forums are working smoothly.
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Deleted member 17779
Forces of Steel said:
You do have a point there. That is another aspect of running a forum. Trying to be original and make yourself stand out from others.
Forces of Steel said:
This, I kind of feel, goes along with what I mentioned before. It's still a good point though.
Numerous things, though I think the main reason is because everyone else is making forums. "Everyone else is, so why shouldn't I?" type of thing. You have so much supply and yet so little demand - and the people that want to create a forum just for the lulz usually don't have the time, knowledge, or motivation to actually get the forum up and running. People also do not realize, you cannot simply run a forum for a week and expect hundreds of people. It takes time and effort to get a member base going.
There are lots of reasons behind this. For example, not enough investment, idea is not unique, didn't plan it out properly, not enough dedication or give up when things are going downhill.
You will need a lot of time and investment in order to create a successful website these days and with increased competition, it makes your life harder and lots of people just give up too easily.
You will need a lot of time and investment in order to create a successful website these days and with increased competition, it makes your life harder and lots of people just give up too easily.
Forces of Steel
Resident
I still think that if not for social media's mainstream acceptance, then more people would be frequenting forums.
I remember forums back in 2004 always being lively, and they weren't limited to just the trashy types, either. It seems that a lot of the "good" forum members these days have "moved on" to social media.
I remember forums back in 2004 always being lively, and they weren't limited to just the trashy types, either. It seems that a lot of the "good" forum members these days have "moved on" to social media.
I agree with what has been said previously.
Main reasons that I see for forums dying/closing is lack of interest and activity from the owner and being to wide in target audience.
You're gonna have a hard time getting activity if your forum doesn't really have a main subject that it orients around, you're probably gonna find that the forum is more likely to succeed if you target say hockey fans to discuss hockey primarily then if you target sports fans in general. Why should the hockey "nerd" join your forum where football, basket, golf and what not is discussed when all he wants to discuss is hockey?
That said, it never hurts to have some areas that allows for general discussions, but there has to be a main subject to attract the good users that will actually be part of the community for the long term.
All that said, I kind of do what you're not supposed to do, I'm not very active on my own forum, I don't market it, I do sort of have a main subject to it however. On the other hand my main reason for starting it was never really to have a successful forum but rather learn something.
I have ideas for it obviously, but I don't execute them effectively. The forum is of age, but mostly empty so isn't really gonna attract any new, active, members any time soon. I do have an arcade up though for those that wanna kill some time playing silly games 🙂
Main reasons that I see for forums dying/closing is lack of interest and activity from the owner and being to wide in target audience.
You're gonna have a hard time getting activity if your forum doesn't really have a main subject that it orients around, you're probably gonna find that the forum is more likely to succeed if you target say hockey fans to discuss hockey primarily then if you target sports fans in general. Why should the hockey "nerd" join your forum where football, basket, golf and what not is discussed when all he wants to discuss is hockey?
That said, it never hurts to have some areas that allows for general discussions, but there has to be a main subject to attract the good users that will actually be part of the community for the long term.
All that said, I kind of do what you're not supposed to do, I'm not very active on my own forum, I don't market it, I do sort of have a main subject to it however. On the other hand my main reason for starting it was never really to have a successful forum but rather learn something.
I have ideas for it obviously, but I don't execute them effectively. The forum is of age, but mostly empty so isn't really gonna attract any new, active, members any time soon. I do have an arcade up though for those that wanna kill some time playing silly games 🙂
Honestly, people are super impatient. Sometimes your site doesn't take off for a long time or you just have to keep passionate and dedicated. Unfortunately that is one of my flaws. But with my new site I'm really going to let it run its course and see how it does. You never know when something will be big or not.
D
Deleted member 5665
What I think about why most new forums close? Well, it is a contribution of multiple of things.
1. Impatience
This is by far the most leading cause of newer forums to dying out. Some people are simply not patient enough to allow their community to grow or have any form of interest they expect a large community to pop out of thin air, but it doesn't. It takes time and hard work, but that is a rare talent nowadays, sadly.
2. Knowledge
Knowledge is another reason why most new forums die. People think it is simple to open a site and start a community and expect it to kick off. The ones with little knowledge don't understand about advertising, content building, etc. They expect they have to do nothing but set up the site and expect the community to do the rest of the work, but that isn't how it works.
3. Dedication
Dedication is another leading cause of why most newer forums die. Some people can have the dedication at the start for a short time but lose it later on when things don't go their way. I understand it can be rough at times, but if you're not going to be dedicated to your work till the end then there is simply no point to start to begin with.
1. Impatience
This is by far the most leading cause of newer forums to dying out. Some people are simply not patient enough to allow their community to grow or have any form of interest they expect a large community to pop out of thin air, but it doesn't. It takes time and hard work, but that is a rare talent nowadays, sadly.
2. Knowledge
Knowledge is another reason why most new forums die. People think it is simple to open a site and start a community and expect it to kick off. The ones with little knowledge don't understand about advertising, content building, etc. They expect they have to do nothing but set up the site and expect the community to do the rest of the work, but that isn't how it works.
3. Dedication
Dedication is another leading cause of why most newer forums die. Some people can have the dedication at the start for a short time but lose it later on when things don't go their way. I understand it can be rough at times, but if you're not going to be dedicated to your work till the end then there is simply no point to start to begin with.
Most of the time it's because the forum owner/creator gets angry because the forum doesn't get thousands of posts within the first week, so they close it. I've been staff on a few forums where that has happened.
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Deleted member 1609
I think that people sometimes start forums because they want to be successful rather than because they are legitimately interested in a topic. When someone is starting a forum simply to be successful and have no interest in the topic of the forum, that forum will almost certainly close quickly.
Personally, it has a lot to do with the person running the new forum. I've found, more times than not, that if a forum owner is on a power trip; the forum fails. People get greedy and power hungry as administrators and that causes issues.
Another reason new forums tend to fail, is because forum owners get discouraged if their site doesn't take off right away. They get bored and move on to other projects. I've done that a time or two myself.
Another reason new forums tend to fail, is because forum owners get discouraged if their site doesn't take off right away. They get bored and move on to other projects. I've done that a time or two myself.
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