I was just going through folders of crap on my hard drive and came across a radio show featuring Lee Dodd. If you’ve never heard of him, he’s like the uber-guru when it comes to forums. I think the show was from smallbusinesstrends.com or smbtrendwire.com, and it’s from March 2006, but the advice is still applicable.
Believe it or not, this show actually gave me a few tips, and I’ll admit, it was worth my time! So I’m going to share some tips from this expert along with my advice when it comes to online forums (or discussion boards.)
Let’s dive right in to the forum building process…
Pick a Topic
Start by making a list of topics, preferably ones you’re passionate about. (In other words, a topic you could research and discuss every single day and not get bored.)
Research
Then you need to check competition and analyze the topics (or niches.)
You can do this by opening three browsers (google, msn, yahoo) and searching for “yourtopic forums” where yourtopic is actually your chosen topic. That should give you a good list of competitors for each topic. You’ll want to join each forum, check it out, and see if you can come up with some better ideas. The goal is to come up with a way to differentiate your forum, whether it will be more specific or include member photo galleries or whatever.
Next, pick the forum software you want to use. Lee likes vBulletin (VB) because it is the most stable and you can buy an owned license for $160. (If you want a free solution, I’d say that Simple Machines Forum (SMF) is the best choice.)
Web Hosting
Then find a good host. A shared hosting plan will work if you’re just starting out, and you could move to a dedicated server later. For more advice, Lee recommends webhostingtalk.com.
Domain Name
Every site requires a domain name, so pick that next. But take your time, because it’s a VERY important choice. You want to choose a natural domain, the shorter the better. It’s good to have “forum” or “board” in your domain name. No dashes though. Or you could choose a brandable domain name, sort of like the trendy new Web 2.0 names (Flickr, Bebo, etc.)
Website Design
Almost forgot, the website itself… You need to design the site, which is also a very important step. It needs to capture the attention of the user, and it’s best to get a completely custom theme.
Get Moderators
Once the site is up, moderators are very important. Moderators help watch for spam and angry members, both of which can cause serious problems if not taken care of quickly. There is no magic number that you need; it depends on the size of the forum and how much moderation is needed. The rule of thumb is to get 3-5 moderators on board in the beginning, which will help get the ball rolling.
Each moderator can handle about 100-200 posts per day, so a forum with 1500 posts per day requires 10-15 volunteer moderators. When choosing moderators, get people who love the topic and love your community. They are volunteers, but they get some recognition as a big part of the community.
Get Visitors and Members
Now that you are ready, you need some people to come and participate!
For that, it’s all about the content. You simply have to have the best information. To get people coming back, never have an empty forum. The “zero posts” will drive people away instantly.
One common cause of “zero posts” is having too many sub-forums on your forum. Start with 6-8 sub-forums and make sure each one has posts. You can increase that number as membership and activity increases.
You want people to post, and there are a few ways to accomplish that. One is to hire paid forum posters, although that is pricey if you want quality posters. Watch out for people who don’t speak English! Another idea is to offer incentives, such as contests for posting quality topics and Adsense revenue sharing.
Here are some ideas to get traffic:
- Use digg, social bookmarking, and free press releases to get the word out.
- Post on other forums and use your sig link to display your forum’s URL.
- Advertise on similar sites that don’t yet have a forum.
- Do basic link building, directory submissions, etc.
- Use mod-rewrite to get Search Engine friendly URLs (for better organic traffic.)
Tip: When using your sig link at other forums, be sure to use descriptive anchor text to entice people to click. (Also note that some forums frown on posting links to competing forums!)
Monetizing a Forum
Now let’s make money!!
No matter what ads you’re using, TEST, TEST, TEST! How else could you compare which ads work best?
Here are some options for display ads that make you money:
- CPC ads like Adsense and YPN.
- CPM ads like BurstMedia, Tribal Fusion, Casale, and FastClick.
- CPA ads like CJ, Linkshare, and Lee’s personal favorite, Azoogle.
- Private advertisers.
- Forum sponsorships.
- Use the forum’s archive pages and put ads on them, too.
- Sell links (try TLA.)
- Donations from members.
- Have ads in your newsletters.
Note: The newsletter is a MUST, since community is all about communication. Keep users updated on the site, and make them feel like part of the community.
How Much Money?
So how much money can you make running a forum?
For a young forum, if you do hard work for 6 months: Expect 1000-2000 visits daily for $20-60 daily income.
For a year of continued growth: Expect 3000-5000 visits daily for $2000-5000 per month.
Make sure you researched profit potential of your niche, though, or you could be in for an unpleasant surprise!
Now let’s go back to forum sponsorships for a bit, because Lee had some extra advice for that. You might be thinking “why would a company sponsor one of my forums?” so Lee has an example…
Take sprintusers.com… Maybe a company sells ringtones, and that would be a great thing to advertise on such a forum, especially for a “Ringtones” sub-topic. Underneath the specific forum’s link would be a text link like “Thanks to X Website for sponsoring this forum” (where X Website is the sponsor’s website.)
There you go, now you should be building forums like a champ! I’m sure Lee Dodd has plenty of secrets still up his sleeve, and you probably won’t realize how hard it is to create a forum until you try, but hell, go for it anyway!
Final thoughts on Forums:
If you’re looking to build a successful forum, you better have some time to do it, be very hands-on, be part of the face of the community, be ‘out there’ posting many times per day, be visible, and expect to work hard and put in the time.
Want to learn more? Take a look at Lee’s blog TheForumFix.com along with one of his newer forums, EarnersForum.com.
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