Finding members

Probably already been asked but, what are recommendations for finding new forum members?

Thought it would be worthwhile opening one with not too many rules, but struggling to find users!

 

I guess so but the trend I notice is tons of restrictions, non cared for webmaster forums full of spam and junk, so the idea is to build a good community with clean looking forums and no spam - It is not for money just for pleasure so there is no intention money wise from it

 

Indeed so we have a few mods already and myself which will be active regular to keep on top

 

Yeah that could be something, we have not setup a full buy and sell forum yet but hey soon

 

Most people really underestimate the challenges involved in launching a successful forum. Getting quality traffic is the first hardest part of the battle, converting your traffic to signup, is difficult. There is a great resistance that prevents most people from joining a new forum, and those that do, often only join for a few questions (or to meet requirements for signature link). Even fewer will become long term members.

I havent tried this, but this is something that I am planning to do myself as this fits in with my business plan. I will setup a forum (not necessarily open to the public to join) and write some quality guides and material on specific subjects that relate to my niche. I will then use adwords, targeting specific questions that my guides provide the solution for. If I am on other forums, and there are questions that noone has answered, I might quote (and reference) my guides.

If your doing a webmaster forum, then perhaps some up-to-date guides on SEO for 2014 would be welcomed. Digitalpoint has alot of information on the home page, (not actually hosted on the forum, just indexed) and I am a sucker for reading most of the stuff that shows up on that page. But this strategy, isnt meant to get signups, but to establish the site as being a place to find quality information -> most forums, (digitalpoint, webhostingtalk to name just 2) I visited them for the information, for years before I became a member. Its then like, well, I need to find an expert, so I join said forums, to connect directly with experts that I know can answer my problems. So in my mind, by having that quality content, and guides helped to establish that as a quality source of information.

Like anything that requires members to help drive the content, you have this battle where you need content for members, but you need members for content. Most people seem to do this by having post loop (paying for members and posts) -> i believe digitalpoint did that when it was starting out, offering a payout for 1000 posts or something.
Some other things that I have seen to help get signups would be forcing visitors to signup to download stuff/ view attachments, and so on.Just helps convert casual visitor into a member.

Truth is, I have seen soo many great ideas over the years, but most of them fail miserably and I hate it when webmasters lose big investing in something that had potential. For some people, it would have been cheaper to give $5000 to charity then to try to start a forum, and there is no real easy solution that will guarantee you success.

Most important lesson to learn when it comes to websites, is that false hope is more common then brutal honesty.

 

I agree with you, so far not so bad but I do not expect something massive and a huge investment will not be going into it, just a few 100 to get it going.

I will do what I can and it may or may not work, but as a sideline thing for a hobby something more to do in a day, I don't see no reason not to give it a go Great post thank you for the feedback and advice