I think it does, however it also depends on your niche, for example if you have a pets site and advertise it on a tech forum, you aren't guaranteed good exposure, so try to stick with your niche. Meti
I think it can work either way, if your forum is empty and no one ever posts there, people might think your site is abandoned / look at it strangely If it's relatively active and you have good content / discussion, then sure it can help. If nothing else, it provides a place for your customers / viewers to discuss various things on the site..
I think forums help, but forums with little posts - more hurt the site than no forums at all... i think
NO! Well they can... A forum with only a handful of posts is not going to help all that much. In order forum to truly be beneficial it must first have an active member base that post daily. While not having that may being in a little bit of traffic, a forum that has not been posted in for months is likely not going to keep any traffic it does bring in for very long.
In addition, I would say forums like digitalpoint and so on (large forums, with high activity) usually are great way of promoting your web site(s); would also help if your forum was webmaster related here on DP. Meti