Start some community forums but i dont know anything that will draw people in and want to post :/. I love computers/tech/programming/computer hardware/video games. Only problem is there are SO MANY that its almost impossible to start some forums without someone saying "screw these forums i rather post at so and so's forums these are lame" etc etc. If anyone has any ideas i would love to hear them. thanks.

the way I got my forums to start up was to convince all of my friends to sign up and post... slowly others started posting as well.

It sort of helped that its a gamer/geek oriented forum, and I run LAN parties, and people need to register for my site in order to attend the LAN Party, so often times people that come to the LAN's chat in the forum as well. :)

(my site is www.thegamelan.com)

kur, let your friend's know about your site and spread the word on forums (if allowed), shout boxes, etc)

thats not a bad setup you got man :D. I would love to have a lan for me and 10 or so people only problem is a live in a place that is out of touch with tech so it would be hard to ask people to come to a lan when the normal response is "What is a lan?". Now back to the original problem :P.

Make your forums into a full site with the forums a part of it. That way you will not look like just another forum.

As amish says get your friends or other staff to post and start conversations. You need them going or no-one will post. People are real shy about posting first :)

Then work on the community. Once people feel apart of it they will come back and be very loyal.

Once you get bigger I also recommend deleting inactives. We delete around 200 a month after contacting them. It makes the forum a bit fresher and also stops it looking like you have a really bad member to post ratio. Which you would. Though if you are planning on selling stuff to them via e-mail then keeping inactives is good.

Thats my experience anyway. We have around 700odd members. Which is only a fraction of the site visitors, but due to pruning 200 of them are paying subscribers and all of them visit every few days. It becomes liek a second home to them. Meet up etc.

Community gives the whole site a boost. But I am not a fan of forums on their own (apart from wht ;) ). Better with a site to give things to discuss and bring in new users....

I think the key to forum success is polite membership, and quick replies.

:)

Yes, I think some forums can be very unfriendly to new users. A welcome thread can be good too. :)

Originally posted by HScene Mike
kur, let your friend's know about your site and spread the word on forums (if allowed), shout boxes, etc)

my problem is i need to come up with a "idea" of what the forum would be about and or what to call it. Got any good ideas for names for the forums. I remember seeing a forum called bsforums (BlackSheep) They have like 300 people but they have like 600k posts :/.

start small and basic. Have only a couple different forums

as more members come and a more diverse array of topics is created
your forum will take on a subject of its own within time.

Well, I think if you do not have something you are interested in or very enthusiastic about you may have trouble.

Since people usually are attracted by similar enthusiasm for whatever the forum is about. If you don't have it then you will not know what they will like......?

Edit: So choose somethign you are really interested in or fires you up.

lol now these forums have VERY quick replyers. I cant even type a msg without someone jumping between me :P.

I just re-read your first post. I would choose one of those and concentrate on it. Expand later WS said.

Forums are all about niche I guess.

Originally posted by Fatty
Well, I think if you do not have something you are interested in or very enthusiastic about you may have trouble.

Since people usually are attracted by similar enthusiasm for whatever the forum is about. If you don't have it then you will not know what they will like......?

Edit: So choose somethign you are really interested in or fires you up.

Its not the enthusiasm part. Its that people are OVER enthused about something then just it flops. I have started SEVRAL forums about gaming and computers. We would get several memebers 30 or so but after about a week or so there was me and maybe 1 to 3 people posting they eventually leave and then it just ends up dead again.

Some people say you need a site to go with the forums, but i think if your forums are unique, it shouldn't matter.

I have a new forum (few months old), it's a unique topic that everyones interested in, and it's doing great without a main site.

(Members: 708, Threads: 426, Posts: 4,263)

Getting over 500 uniques a day and 15 registered members, and it's doing great, no one links to me and i'm getting all search engine traffic.

Well anyone got any kinda stupid names to throw at me :D. Naming is probably one of the hardest things i have a problem with is coming up with something good that i like and "sticks" if you know what i mean.

Originally posted by is0lized
Some people say you need a site to go with the forums, but i think if your forums are unique, it shouldn't matter.

I have a new forum (few months old), it's a unique topic that everyones interested in, and it's doing great without a main site.

(Members: 708, Threads: 426, Posts: 4,263)

Getting over 500 uniques a day and 15 registered members, and it's doing great, no one links to me and i'm getting all search engine traffic.

nothing is unique about the weather bc it seems like if we only have 3-5 main posters we get board with talking about stuff OVER AND OVER. Kinda like beating a dead horse. Not like i want it to die but seems like i cant generate traffic. In a month me and 2 other people generated 80k hits.

Oh yeah I think forums can work on their own. I started online by helping with one. But, it was inly when I left and built a site around forums that it was a success and that was in a saturated market. Just my personal pref... But look at WHT :-)

Hmm yeah names are tricky I guess...not much help there I afraid )-:

Hmmm, well see your subject does not need to be unique. But the way your forums look and the tone you set should be I think.

People like little features as well, hacks or whatever.

News for us is prime driver of traffic. Now when we post news in the forum we do not get much interest. But when we post it on the main then peope talk about it on the forum...weird.

I guess if people like the look and the discussions they will stay. But you have to drive traffic to it. Whether that is through search, links from other sites or whatever. Since people will leave and you need new folks.

Another key thing... there are 3 kinds of forums

1) Support forums, these are where questions are asked, and then answered... (i.e. www.linuxquestions.org)

2) Community forums, these are where people come to hang out, get addicted, and post pictures of their cats (like here, only without the cats)

3) Dead forums, forums that have 10-30 users, but 1-2 posts a week/month.

So figure out what you want. You can do a combo of 1 & 2, that seems to work well in some cases.

You said you like tech/geeky things, if you want to do a support based forum, then find some knowledgeable people to be your "Gurus" at first. Maybe write some good tutorials that maybe dont exist yet. (Possibly write a how to on case modding and include pictures) Post it in the forum so people can comment, ask questions.

If you want a community, pick a topic for your community.

One forum I used to frequent grew really really fast. www.umdstudents.com I bet you can tell what thats for :) (students that go to my college, its a forum by students, for students)

If you pick a topic or locale, maybe a regional online headquarters for all the geeks in your area, then get people in your area to start posting and the forum will grow because you will have things in common to talk about. (It also helps to have people like Ub3r to make random threads to get some content going through ;) )

I hope that helps!

Oh, and if you are interested in doing a LAN in your area, join www.thegamelan.com and the guys there can help you figure out what to do to have a great LAN, along with how to advertise/market your lan :D
</end shameless plug :rolleyes: >

Originally posted by Fatty
But the way your forums looks

Again, i disagree, you don't need a flashy style that takes forever to load, my forum is grim and dark grey, with no other images but the stock ones that come with the forums, has no logo or anything else and it is still doing well.

But the mood you set is a big plus, i hear all the time from my members that i am doing a great job of weeding out the immature members and keeping the forum a great place to talk about their problems and other discussion.

Well it does not need to be flashy. But I think it helps if it attractive. It depends on the forum too. Certain groups will be attracted to a certain look. It also depends how saturated the market is.

You also have to remember on a tiny fraction of people who would visit a site on the same subject for news or such will actually join a forum. You get loads of lurkers too.

If yours looks like everyother then they will not remember it. Maybe not even take a look.

But the more information or support based then the less relevant that is I would think. Since people are their for information.

But they do like all the little nick naks etc. It jsut depends I guess. We get barraged with requests to add new icons and what have you. But you can disable them anyway if you prefer text only so you can match users needs with most forum software.

Yes, I agree, no one likes forum admin nazis...

Yeah that can be a problem. That is why I left the small forum I started on and set up our site. The guy ran it like a fiefdom or something. Like you say being polite to people, especially new users can go a long way...

Admin nazi is something i dont do. I think the only time i had to confront anyone about anything is when this one dude set his desktop as a avatar 800x600. Asked him to change it . Even offered to shrink it for him but he left due to me being a forum nazi :/. I tryed being as nice as i could. I guess there is no pleasing some people. :(. I need to figure out a good name that sticks. Yall throw some ideas at me will ya :D. Something like bsforums = blacksheep. Thanks again for all the input. Going to bed ill be checking this tomorrow :D

Well, i don't think i'm a nazi, but when it comes to rules i'm firm, some people call it harsh.

The only two rules i have had to enforce was advertising and under age users. And i tell it like it is.

A points system like you see on experts-exchange.com wouldn't hurt either in driving traffic and interest to your forums !

Anyone have any ideas for a good name for some forums? The forums will be about computers/gaming/techsupport and whatever it turns into.