Ideas for generating members

by freeauction

Posted: 13 years ago 23 replies

INTERNET MARKETING

Hi, I have a new HTML support site at http://www.htmlhelpforum hosted as a vbulletin forum. The idea for the site is to offer a fresh look at compatible, accessible, search optimized web pages and how best to build them.

I am looking to build up a user base and then hopefully offer advertising spaces on the board in order to generate revenue.

I am looking for several things:

1 - How to generate new members quickly (without spamming)
2 - Other income generating ideas for the site
3 - Some ideas that will make the site different to other support sites (although I have stated on the site that I am looking at cutting edge XHTML and CSS, Semantics, optimization and accessibility.

I know it is difficult to get a new site off the ground but hopefully some folk out there will be able to help out. One of the things that I often find in other support sites (when searching) is that I find lots of suggestions and fixes but because the web moves so quickly I am often left inserting inaccessible, worst-practice old school work-arounds on my sites. I'll be checking the site often and will be relying on the expertise of others to help run the site so I can archive off any older posts and keep the suggestions as close to best practices as I can.

Thanks in advance for your suggestions.

PS. I know I have to change the theme away from the default.

#generating #ideas #members

Shoot 13 years ago

Keep building your content. once you have content PM me and I will show you how I get a few thousand new users every month.
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- 1 reply
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- freeauction 13 years ago
  
  Thanks for your quick reply. How do I build content with only a few members? Do I have to put in as many questions and posts as I can (with my main user)?
  
  Thanks
  
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birdie28a 13 years ago

What about creating a squeeze page and offering a video tutorial that is hosted on your forum?

Their is a number of ways of driving traffic to your squeeze page including SEO and even EzineArticles. The key is finding keywords people are searching for an building content around that.
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erskinem

13 years ago

When I started a forum a few years ago I had to have conversations with myself to get the ball rolling (some of the best conversations in my life).

It sounds like you work in the webdev field. Why not invite some of your buddies to check out your forum.

Thanks
2 replies

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freeauction

13 years ago

Originally Posted by erskinem

Quality advice...lol. How long did it take before you started seeing an increase (other than yourself)?

Thanks

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Torreylee

13 years ago

Originally Posted by erskinem

Yup, build up traffic and then start talking to yourself until people want to get involved. Sounds crazy but if you make sure that you are getting eyeballs on the convos people will interject.

You can also pay people off elance and similar sites to give you "activity" for a while until you members build.

Thanks

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jamesrich1 13 years ago

erskinem very unique and effective advice. lol, the part about some of the best conversations of your life. Targeted traffic from other forums would be a good way to start.
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pbarnhart 13 years ago

I always think it helps to have an intro page - maybe create a banner that links to your page.

Create sticky posts like "Top 10 mistakes developers make with the new HTML5 Tags" - think of them as blog posts. Make sure everything is indexable and searchable.

Get some key profiles and use them to harvest the best comments (even if you use the eskinem approach - which is typical) or questions. Post them on Quora, a dedicated Facebook Page, and Twitter - don't be spammy, just put the forum URL in your profile and leave it at that). According to namechk.com "htmlhelpforum" username is not taken yet (be nice fellow readers) so jump on it.
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freeauction 13 years ago

Great advice Phil. Thank you. I've created the twitter account and will set up the rest soon.
Lots to do....
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manicmethods 13 years ago

People don't like to join empty/inactive forums so you need to get something like 100+ threads going in each category (boring/time wasting/REALLY BORING).

What I did for a forum I have, is hire a guy to do some forum posting. It's REALLY cheap. I think I was paying about $50 a month for nearly 1000 threads/posts mixed over a load of users and spread out across the month so it was natural.

$50 a month is doable.

And it allowed it to pick up.

Go to Freelancer, Odesk or wherever and post a job.
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freeauction 13 years ago

Great advice manicmethods.

If I do this do I get the user to log in with different accounts to mix things up a bit.

I'm going to follow this advice as it's worth paying for this sort of thing.
Thanks again.
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wfhblueprints 13 years ago

Freeauction,

You might want to try starting a Facebook fanpage for the forum.

Then you can start a targeted Facebook ads campaign in order to generate Fans, which you can then channel into the forum.

As long as you keep the Fans engaged on your Page and forum you should see some natural growth after that.

Chris
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Aha moment 13 years ago

Ok, in this phase, it comes to traffic generation man ... you should do CRAZY promotion, post content related to your website.. I'm sure, if you can do good promotion to generate traffic, you will get lost of members .... just give good valuable content to build your authority, people will sign up to your forum..
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- freeauction 13 years ago
  
  Thanks again for another great idea.
  
  I am looking to add a lot of new posts and then do some promotions.
  
  Cheers!
  
  Thanks
  
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Daniel Wilson

13 years ago

Give stuff away for free! And not just any stuff that you write or even steal, but some high quality content for example.

Do some videos on a subject people are interested in your niche.

Thanks
1 reply

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freeauction

13 years ago

Originally Posted by Daniel Wilson

Give stuff away for free! And not just any stuff that you write or even steal, but some high quality content for example.

Do some videos on a subject people are interested in your niche.

Is it worth setting up something like a YouTube channel and posting some content to this to get things rolling?

Has anybody had any success with this?

Thanks

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zamzung 13 years ago

there is always possibility to go with paid traffic for some time... there are microworkers who can help you with quick promotion or to act like "your members"... you could try with video promotion, making related videos for Youtube... or you could try to spread story about your forum on social networks...
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freeauction 13 years ago

Where do I find paid traffic?
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- richjr72 13 years ago
  
  Originally Posted by freeauction
  
  Where do I find paid traffic?
  
  There is freelancer.
  
  You can also try Fivver. Find someone that has followers that are targeting your market and pay them to a recommend your forum.
  
  Thanks
  
  1 reply
  
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  freeauction 13 years ago
  
  Hi,
  
  Thanks so much for recommending Fivver - I have just purchased 6 individual items to help me with my site posting/members/ranking etc.
  
  This is a great recommendation.
  
  Hopefully I'll see some quick response from this.
  
  Thanks again - :-)
  
  Thanks
  
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tryinhere 13 years ago

Originally Posted by freeauction

I am looking to build up a user base and then hopefully offer advertising spaces on the board in order to generate revenue..

have you looked if there are any affiliatee or ad opprotunities for this first ?

one quick way is to type some search terms into google and see if there are ads showing / you want ads

html help - Google Search

http://www.google.com.au/search?sour...w=1441&bih=653

but check all options

I am looking for several things:
1 - How to generate new members quickly (without spamming)

in my profile i have just started a forum post swap service where people with new forums can trade posts per say to hlp each other get started your welcome to add your information.

the topic is not on for me but there will probably be others that it may suit.
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freeauction 13 years ago

I used to use Google Adwords to place ads for my sites in order to get more members but I have found that I was spending more and more money and getting less and less results...greedy Google!

I have since used Fiverr.com as I mentioned above and have set up a Facebook page and a twitter account.

I may attach a wordpress blog to my account to push more members towards my forum but this will be extra work.

As for forum post swapping...any offers? Sounds like a great way to get posts quickly.

Thanks again to everyone who has posted in this thread thus far....
- Thanks
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freeauction 13 years ago

Hi Torrylee,

You say "Yup, build up traffic and then start talking to yourself until people want to get involved. Sounds crazy but if you make sure that you are getting eyeballs on the convos people will interject."

How can I build up traffics quickly as having content is one thing but having traffic with people who will stay/sign-up is a bit of a struggle.

I managed to get people coming to the site through Fiverr.com but it looks as if they were all "one-off" visitors. It's getting them to stay is the hard part.

I'm also trying to get my site higher up in the Google rankings but most of the search terms coming back relate to "forum", "post", "vbulletin" or some other forum related word rather than my keywords which relate to "HTML", "CSS" etc...

It's a struggle but getting there slowly.
- Thanks
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