What's the best way to start a forum?

T

teamversion

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Jul 24, 2010
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I'ved read about someone who had to create hundreds of email accounts and register these in his forum and ask questions so that it appears busy.

Not my cup of tea though. Are there any other ways to attract users?
 


Yeah there are several services out there that offer packages you can buy for a fixed price. These guys will have a bunch of people (probably cheap labor from some 3rd world country) sign up with multiple usernames and even post a bunch of posts w/replies for you in the sections and topics you request. Last time I looked I think these start in the $200 range and up but that was also like 3 years ago.

Not free, but probably the fastest way you can build up a forum fast with a large number of "members". When real people start finding your forum, it will look like it's the happenin' place to be. :)
 
hey thanks for that info. i guess 94 members is a good start.

i was thinking about doing a give-away promo. the member with the most posts wins - which hopefully would encourage others to join too. anybody did this before?
 
build a good blog/site/community -> launch forum -> profit

It's not my cup of tea but I know someone who's got a few rather successful forums and pretty much every time he launches one he starts a blog and becomes an "expert" in his niche. Once he gets a decent amount of readers and followers he'll launch a forum.

This isn't the only way of course but just sayin and you'll probably find the services you're looking for over at DP. I doubt this will work nearly as well though. I've used these services before and they are pretty crappy.

Once you have a following from a real website it shouldn't be too hard to entice your users to join a forum. Heck they might even pay for it...e.g. ubercamp, shoemoney, etc. (not a knock just sayin)
 
several guest blog posts in the niche > announce a contest with a prize for the most value-added posts on the forum > ????? > PROFIT
 
unbelievable! started this thread only a few hours ago and now it's on the first page of google for the search term: best way to start a forum.

i wish my websites can be indexed & ranked like that!
 
teamversion said:
unbelievable! started this thread only a few hours ago and now it's on the first page of google for the search term: best way to start a forum.!
Click to expand...

haha that's awesome. it's also number 1 for "how to start a gay webmaster forum".
 
1. install phpbb with subsilver template
2. come onto wickedfire and offer people free 'how to make monies from internet forums' eBook if they come over to your forum.
3. bank
 
Money. Period.

1. Give away free shit for X quality posts.
2. Pay people to post in your forum with no way to win the prizes.
3. Pay for shitloads of advertising.

Money. Fixes everything.
 
thanks everyone.

@Soupy - still couldn't decide whether the forum should have a separate URL or whether it should be in the main site. If they are togehter I guess that's less expenses for me and also it keeps the brand together.

If it has its own URL (and perhaps a separate server), i guess the advantage to this is when one goes down at least the other site can still be up and running. And off course the band width quota, and so on and so forth.

Just wondering what the best set up is.
 
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