I recently started a forum, MoneyMakingTeens.com. I have been promoting it on other teen forums, not straight out making a post about it, but by replying to other people with it in my sig. I also wrote an article about eBay, it did sell for money at one time so I thought it would be good enough to use to promote my forum. It can be found here on my site. I also submitted to a few article search engines and directories, making sure I include my link. On the forum itself I offer Free Banner Advertising to anyone who accumulates 25 posts, a Link Exchange, Referral Swap, and Site Review. Along with categories like Jobs and Employment and Making Money with Affiliate Programs. I need some more help on getting members for my forum and getting better traffic. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
it's maybe not ethical but you could try to use such forum post services who fill your forum with quality posts and stuff. Then it's just a matter of a few bucks you'd need to us in PPC. Alternatively, you could write more and mroe inetresting articles and distribute them. ALSO, you could buy a link on another forum or use site-wide advertising on Adwords on other forums!
And, I must have forgotten, open some interesting non-rhetorical threads asking questions to "convince" people to sign up and answer them.
Well I looked at your site and to begin with I suggest you maybe try and get one of those forum posting companies to make a few posts, just so that your forum looks active. If it looks as though there already is an established community, people may be more likely to register.
Keep few things in your pocket/head !) Forums are most difficult project to make it successful (though it looks easy) @) There are 99.9% chance of forums failure if you have nothing additional item(services,softwares,books,articles....etc) to provide for free to members. #) In the beginning don't open more than 5-6 forums with 0-10 posts.
Make a myspace account. There is really no better way on the internet to reach teenagers than with myspace.
no problem but I found it hard to write even one post so my count is at zero now Maybe you should also include a introductions forum (and do not forget about my other proposals )
You got too many forum with too few posts. people will just come and go. they will never come back. that is the problem.
Create a forum and make daily posts on something you're very familiar with. It will take some time until people will notice, and will start joining. Nobody wants to join empty forum. Get a couple of friends to post there too. Or simply create a bot and discuss topics with yourself until users start to join in. I know several owners of popular forums who have done it at the beginning.
All good points above. First you need traffic. That's got nothing to do with your site unless you're doing seo. But seperately from the forum, you've got to have people visiting. So promote the crap out of it. Getting posting going once you've got visitors is another ballgame. People won't post unless it's very active, it's a vicious circle. And even then, most visitors won't post no matter what, and the odd one that will post, will only post if they see something that sets them off. They won't just drop in and comment at the beginning. So, you've got to make the site busy. Get some friends together and do whatever you need to have 5 or 6 people post 2-5 posts per day for the next three months. Then MAKE them post every day for the next three months. When you're posting, post informative stuff to a certain extent. But also solicit comments, like 'here's a news article, it's crap, what do you think?'. And you also need some controversial posts. The best example I have of that is the linux vs. ms battle. If you have a tech forum, post 'linux sux rox, ms rulz!'. Followed by 'MS sux rox, penguin rulz!'. That kind of thing. That's the kind of thing that will get people on their way to their first post. Do all that - but more importantly realize this is not a couple of week endeavor. You need active posting and traffic for 3-6 months to even begin to touch this. You can't let it languish. I think most forums fail because they give up too early. I've just left a very busy forum (500-1000 users online) and am starting a new one. I've been at it for about 3 months, have 3-5 people online throughout the day, decent rankings for the niche, and consider myself doing well so far. The last thing a forum is, is 'fast'. But once you've got it, it's stable .