I have launched a few forums, will just be using AdSense for the time being. I was just wondering if there are any other forum owners using this or any other method of driving some revenue?
Adsense is ok, if you position it very good (like on DP forum) You can use url shortening websites (very popular these days), or affiliate sites.
Forums are not the best place for adsense but really there's not to many other good options for many forums. Often times people visit forums every day and they will get 'blind' to the ads and never click them. I run some forums and make a money from adsense but my point is you'll make FAR more with 1000 visitors on a blog than you will from 1000 visitors on a Forum (on average) from adsense. Good luck!
I have a forum http://oddfuturetalk.com/forums averaging about 10-15$ a day. I know my blog could make more, but I wanna keep it nice and simple to keep people coming back. ads are on the top and side of the forum, doesnt really stand out and it kind of looks nice in my opinion.
I agree...but generally they get more hits compared to blogs...I'm using skimlinks as well which helps!
Using contextweb with an adsense backup, Working better of some of my forums than direct adverts would bring in, Its very dependent on the niche as to what ad networks you go with. If your forum is pretty new with little traffic you will find it very hard to get into the bigger networks. At the early stages of a forum until you hit at least 100k impressions a month you will find it hard to earn anything decent . Adsense and direct adverts and affiliate programs will be one of the better options. Skimlinks is very very dependent on your niche, Tech related forums which talk about actual products like camara's and physical goods generally do very well with Viglink or skimlinks . Personally i would rather use an auto linker and insert my own affiliate links instead of getting a tiny portion of the revenue from skimlinks, Of course that means more maintenance on your behalf though and ensuring your targeting the correct programs.
If you are worried about monetizing your forum and it's brand new, having a forum probably isn't for you. Forums are not a good money making endeavor until you have quite a bit of traffic. Also, you are better off developing something truly unique (that people want) and selling a subscription to it. Premium membership is something you can offer as well if you have something unique that people want. We didn't start offering premium membership until we had around 12,000,000 posts, and even then we offer users a pretty massive amount of benefit for it (for example the vBulletin 4 search replacement that more or less every large vBulletin 4 forum uses now). if you aren't getting a ton of traffic yet, it's probably easiest to just stick with AdSense until you have enough traffic to support looking at other options.
Yeah I guess I agree Shawn, just looking for the future really. The forums are basically hobby sites, but I'd like to see them making some money in the future, so just interested to see what others are doing. I'll stick with AdSense for now, although one of the forums I've had a couple of sponsorship offers which will cover all costs etc for now.
I also use adsense, sometimes I'd think if I wouldn't be better off without it and I account with a good affluence of people and quality content. Forums are just not ideal for those interested in significant profit. You can see some who do very well and ignore all the many thousands that do not. Personally, I don't work on my community because of the revenue. I just do it for the fun and sense of making something that helps many others.
Monetization is probably best done by offering products relevant to your forum. If your forum niche is cooking, you might want to offer your members recipe books or blenders and other cooking products of value to them.
There was a rap hiphop forum now dead admin was making like $750 a month off ads with a lot of hits so I know making a good amount of $$$ from a forum can be done
If $750/month is all you need to pay your bills, then sure... I guess that could be considered a lot of money.