Hi guys, sorry for another forum topic... I have read through a few other threads, but I will feel more confident if I can get some 1-to-1 advice, so to speak. First of all my forum is www.JibbaJabbas.com/forum (remember if you don't like the 'stretched' skin you can change that at the bottom of the page.) Feel free to review it if you think it may help. A few details: We have been open just over a month, maybe 5 weeks. It is very lively for the amount of people that come on. (Usually around 9/10 members will come on a day and post) I am basically looking for you all to let me know what I can do to better advertise my site, I do not mind paying, but I am looking for free options ASWELL. We are currently working on a new banner (fingers crossed) so hopefully that will be more eye catching. I am not sure what else I need to say, so if there's any questions then feel free to ask! Thanks in advance!
I like the look of the site. The dark greys and bright blues work really well. I think a new banner will do you well though. Nice forum. One thing I've learnt from forums is to start with a small number of categories, and then expand them as the site gains popularity/more members. Otherwise it looks kinda daunting and empty. Good luck with your new forum!!!
I like your forum . If you need more traffic submit to "Directories" or you can crawl it, good luck !
Thanks for the advice/comment! Agree on the banner, the one at the mo was just a stand in so something was there. With the catagories I was a little hit and miss on the amount to put in... But since the forum is completely general we decided to stick to those, although at a glance it may look 'a lot'... When you actually look at them 1 by 1 they all play a decent role in the forum. We also have a special VIP section which we shall be introducing soon, but I am wondering if it's a good idea to announce it on the site, and say something like "Once you are a decent contributing member your account will get upgraded to VIP" or somethinglike that... Or just let them do their thing and then just 'suprise' them with the upgrade? But thanks for the comment Noddegamra and RockWilder and I look forward to everyone elses!
So many topics for one problem Take a look at that topics, which are located near to this topic. Good Luck! 1 - http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=311161 2 - http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=385444
I think, that will read these posts is interesting and useful. In my topic I also ask a similar question about my invention of a forum promotion system. My idea already works, and only it would be desirable to hear opinion of other experts. Or maybe I'm wrong. Sorry if I...
The bad thing about forums is you have to invest some serious money to promote them... always. The design doesn't matter as far as there are some really quality forum members posting interesting and useful stuff every day.
All they was saying was that it needs quality posts and posters and stuff, which I understand and which is what I have, my question is how I go about making people aware that my forum even exists. Also your "thing" didn't really attract me either, I am looking for real people to come and post and not some automated post thing. But good luck. I understand about the money I would just like to know how I go about spending the money wisely...
There are some companies that offer forum posting services here on DP. Look around, get some feebdback and then decide if it's worth it or not. You can even try to hire some of the quality posters here on DP, I'm not sure about their rates though...
You could try a PPC network, why not Ad-Money? we charge around 1-10cent per click. www.ad-money.net!
I understand that a real people should come and post. But that they came, it is necessary to have many indexed thematic pages. I am confident, to explain for what it is necessary - there is no sense. But! To create few thousands of thematic pages, you need or to post by yourself or you need to pay people for posting at your forum. Believe me, it is really expensive. My program is automates this awful part of any forum promotion. Certainly, there is other ways, but personally I find them all very expensive. If you will not spend a lot of money, your forum or will be grow very long time, or it will die shortly. Thanks!
Theres always people looking to sell there services, just take the time to try and find them. I usually take the risk of buying things in bulk as this reduces cost and usually the guy im buying off will start getting more traffic offering a double deal. Obviously its down to you to decide whats a good deal or not but testing is a major priority in generating traffic. You might also consider spending a little extra cash or investing the time to make sure your forum is optimized to a great degree, not only will this get you up search engine rankings but hopefully make you more profit to. Looking forward to other peoples replies
Thanks for the reply Stevie. I did have a go at purchasing traffic to the site but to very little avail, so I don't think I will be taking that route anymore... So what other services can you guys recommend me looking into investing in? In the mean time i'm going to give word of mouth another go and encourage my current members to do the same, should hopefully generate a couple more members. Looking forward to anymore replies! Thanks!
Add it to some paid directories, buy advertising space, and pay some people to make quality posts on your forum so that it looks very active.
Well the best alternate would be to register on different similar forums and start posting replies with your signature in it.
Advertising is the best way to get new folks to find you. From a design perspective, I would recommend enlarging the font used for the thread list pages. Good luck!