How is forum running business? [Archive]

Fergal

Fri 22nd Feb 2008, 20:55

Cynthiab

Fri 22nd Feb 2008, 21:34

Unless you have something special - ie a connect to the industry that others don't have - it's very difficult to get a forum up and running in the kind of numbers you need to make money. It happens but it's not an overnight thing as Fergal said.

BlueEew

Sat 23rd Feb 2008, 15:35

I want to start a forum soon on tech news and nanotechnology.I will run that on vbulletin.Can anyone tell me how is this business online?what are its hurdles and advantages?How much time will it generally take to build about 1000 active members.Anyone having expert experience here?

To answer the threads title. Well, forums are not a business. However they can be. Having a free forum hosting company, that provide free forum hosting is a business. :)

Also using a forum to sell products for your business, that would make it a business forum. You could also have a forum connected to a business, thats sort of a business. :)

Fergal

Sat 23rd Feb 2008, 19:56

... forums are not a business.

It would be true to say that forums or online communities in their truest form are not businesses because their primary purpose is not to make money.

Saying that, there are large forum sites that are a businesses and their main function is to make a profit for the owner/s. For example Sitepoint.com (http://www.sitepoint.com) is a huge webmaster community that is very much a business. It is a company that employs staff and generates revenue by selling books promoted on the forum, selling forum marketplace listings and selling advertising space.

Other forums have different revenue models such as relying totally on advertising sales or generating revenue through paid membership.

pendelton

Sun 24th Feb 2008, 00:51

Cynthia, you have a good point, but that is the neat thing about the internet, you can make those contacts that are needed to launch a forum, it just takes the willingness to motivate yourself in to taking action.

I belong to several forums that are not businesses in the least, but communities of semi like minded people talking over their favorite subjects. Some are small and very cliquish, but, once you are in you are in. I have taken leaves from some of them for a year, and jumped right back in to the group as if I had never left.

BlueEew

Wed 27th Feb 2008, 15:37

It would be true to say that forums or online communities in their truest form are not businesses because their primary purpose is not to make money.

Saying that, there are large forum sites that are a businesses and their main function is to make a profit for the owner/s. For example Sitepoint.com (http://www.sitepoint.com) is a huge webmaster community that is very much a business. It is a company that employs staff and generates revenue by selling books promoted on the forum, selling forum marketplace listings and selling advertising space.

Other forums have different revenue models such as relying totally on advertising sales or generating revenue through paid membership.

Yep thats right they are communitites. I would suggest the following;

"If your making a forum for money not for your intrests, quit now!"

They are hard to get going, it's a lot easier if you have one on a subject you love.

pendelton

Wed 27th Feb 2008, 19:43

Think about it like a community, you have your residence and your businesses. There is a balance to be maintained for it to function properly.

Slacker

Sat 22nd Mar 2008, 01:28

Yeah it will take a lot of hard work an patience before you can start making money from a forum. They are probably one of the worst ways to make a quick buck, but in the longrun they pay out

sarahFreder

Sat 22nd Mar 2008, 10:45

its really a very tough job in online creating forum and developing it with great no of users are not very simple to achieve. you have to put up your effort and time to achieve it.

better have a look in webmaster forum like digital point, webmasterworld, V7N etc., to get better idea of developing the forum.

pawanjot90

Sat 22nd Mar 2008, 19:56

Running forums takes a huge amount of time and commitment. It is certainly not a quick way to make money online. My experience has been that other types of websites are a quicker route to online income.

It is impossible to predict how long it will take to reach 1,000 members. There are too many variables. It depends on how well you mange the community, how well you promote it and the topic of the forum, amongst other things.

Please feel free to ask any more questions that you have and good luck with your own forum.

i totally agree with you. Making a forum grow is really very hard job. Best way is to update your website content so that visitors see new content everytime they visit again.

Technologically

Wed 2nd Apr 2008, 17:23

I want to start a forum soon on tech news and nanotechnology.I will run that on vbulletin.Can anyone tell me how is this business online?what are its hurdles and advantages?How much time will it generally take to build about 1000 active members.Anyone having expert experience here?

I'm in a good position to tell you it's really hard. My technology forum is running since 2.5 months. I've spent quite some time on it and I'm disappointed with the result so far. After reading this thread I'm not really cheerful.
I have a long term view and since I like the subject it's not all that bad, but I really thought I'd have much more traffic and posting members before I began.

Fergal, thanks that was a helpful post. If you have any advice for me, I'd appreciate it.

Fergal

Wed 2nd Apr 2008, 20:52

I'm in a good position to tell you it's really hard. My technology forum is running since 2.5 months. ..
Fergal, thanks that was a helpful post. If you have any advice for me, I'd appreciate it.

I like the subject matter of your forum, I've actually joined and started posting. It's also a great domain name and the layout of your categories and forums is very well done.

One suggestion that I would make is that you create a category for tech news and make all your news posts in there, obviously you need to be conscious of copyright issues.

The way you post news stories in the other categories has advantages in terms of helping to build post count and provide food for the search engine spiders. However, it has the potential disadvantage of being a deterrent to discussion.

Seeing lots of news posts with zero responses, in a particular category, doesn't encourage new members to join the discussion. You might want to look at this by creating a new category, as suggested above, or by making your news posts briefer and asking for comments, opinions and suggestions at the end of them.

Good luck with it.

Edit: Your forum must have some level of activity, I'm no longer your newest member, two minutes after joining :)

Technologically

Fri 4th Apr 2008, 08:52

I like the subject matter of your forum, I've actually joined and started posting. It's also a great domain name and the layout of your categories and forums is very well done.

One suggestion that I would make is that you create a category for tech news and make all your news posts in there, obviously you need to be conscious of copyright issues.

The way you post news stories in the other categories has advantages in terms of helping to build post count and provide food for the search engine spiders. However, it has the potential disadvantage of being a deterrent to discussion.

Seeing lots of news posts with zero responses, in a particular category, doesn't encourage new members to join the discussion. You might want to look at this by creating a new category, as suggested above, or by making your news posts briefer and asking for comments, opinions and suggestions at the end of them.

Good luck with it.

Edit: Your forum must have some level of activity, I'm no longer your newest member, two minutes after joining :)

Fergal, thank you so much for your great help.
I agree with you completely but I would rather prefer to keep the concept as it is and ask for comments or opinions rather than having one section for tech news.

There is some level of activity but the past days have been slower though. I haven't been on the ball the past few days.
At the moment it's a forum that serves as a blog and I have, for a beginning forum, a good amount of readers. New signups are unfortunately mostly spammers.
I'm thinking about finding 10 - 15 people to swap posts. If anyone is interested, please contact me.
We're also thinking about a new skin.

Thanks again, Fergal.

BlueEew

Fri 11th Apr 2008, 15:38

The way you could make a forum into a business could be by doing the following;

Create a service that is around a forum. Lets say SEO. Then create a forum that will be the example on how good to done the SEO on the forums. Then you can sell your service on that example forums.

Just two cents. :D

shadow12345

Sun 20th Apr 2008, 14:26

Building a nice and professional looking forum is hard enough as it is, while managing it and making it to the top requires even more time and patience. I myself have created three fully equipped forums (Forums running SMF with a CMS bridged) so far, but none of them was a success :(

I believe that in order to make your forum "busy", you can either have useful and unique articles that will make people come back or providing someting in return of posting. Also, running a stand alone forum is not a good idea, you should make a site and the forum is a component to it or at least bridge it to a well-known CMS. I have seen quite some persons who have just started their communities recently but up to now, the results are pretty good.

Nazreen

Sun 20th Apr 2008, 15:16

Yes, I guess you really need patience when you're just starting your forum. When you have just launched your forum, I guess it would be good to give away prizes like the $50 award for the most helpful and best article here in businessadviceforum. You also need to advertise your forum and ask the members to promote your forum.

Footzilla

Fri 25th Apr 2008, 09:30

More and more people would be attracted if you are holding some contests on your forum. If you aren't holding any competitions then the traffic would not increase rapidly. The more the interesting contest, the more posts and members you will get.

upineter

Fri 25th Apr 2008, 13:10

I want to start a forum soon on tech news and nanotechnology.I will run that on vbulletin.Can anyone tell me how is this business online?what are its hurdles and advantages?How much time will it generally take to build about 1000 active members.Anyone having expert experience here?

The most of online business depend on adsvertisment. Google, Yahoo, youtube are example of that. Forum have good prospect but you should make the vision and mission of that forums. You should analize user of that forums with specify topics. After that marketing strategy, how to promote the forums. To promote your forums you can start with reward like in this forums.

devilbatista

Fri 2nd May 2008, 06:26

I want to start a forum soon on tech news and nanotechnology.I will run that on vbulletin.Can anyone tell me how is this business online?what are its hurdles and advantages?How much time will it generally take to build about 1000 active members.Anyone having expert experience here?

Starting a Forum and building 1000 active members will take time depending on your Forum Quality. Advertisements, Forum Offers, Interesting Contents will help to build your Forum in a specific time period. Better Contents and Rewards can be much more helpful.

archgames

Sun 4th May 2008, 18:42

Starting Contests for posting or something would attract posters than pay per post

Nazreen

Mon 5th May 2008, 01:52

Starting Contests for posting or something would attract posters than pay per post

The $50 weekly contest is still on. See this thread (http://www.businessadviceforum.com/showthread.php?t=457). Aside from this contest, what other ways do you think will motivate others from joining and being active in Business Advice Forum? In the meantime, I'll also ponder on how to answer this question.

maroo2007

Mon 5th May 2008, 09:04

Running forums takes a huge amount of time and commitment. It is certainly not a quick way to make money online. My experience has been that other types of websites are a quicker route to online income.

It is impossible to predict how long it will take to reach 1,000 members. There are too many variables. It depends on how well you mange the community, how well you promote it and the topic of the forum, amongst other things.

Please feel free to ask any more questions that you have and good luck with your own forum.

i'm not a fourm owner or even admin but i saw many forums online and how they stand fergal is right you can't predict how long it will take to reach 1,000 members but you can of course work for it
the most important in my opinion to keep active with your foeum members even they reach 1,000 just benig there and involving with them keep member loyalty to the forum

pendelton

Mon 5th May 2008, 15:51

I am a member of a forum that has been around for well over 10 years, and has yet to reach 500 members. We have a core group that number around 30 or 40 that is a pretty solid group, considering most of us have never met.

Hurbel2k

Tue 6th May 2008, 02:46

Aside from this contest, what other ways do you think will motivate others from joining and being active in Business Advice Forum?

Let me see.... how about if we take apart the name of the Forum?

Business
Yeah, that's our topic. People who are interested in business might end up here, even without a contest.

Advice
Cool, I can get some knowledge here. No need for a contest.

Forum
I can exchange information here. I can make new contacts. All for free.

The name of the forum describes perfectly what I can get here. Popular forums attract people, because
(1) There are other like-minded and successful people. Success attracts success.
(2) High quality content
(3) You get serious input on difficult questions
(4) It's a fun place with great people

Nazreen

Tue 6th May 2008, 03:22

I would guess that the first thing we need to build up on then is content. At the same time promoting the Business Advice Forum in other forums as well. With that, hopefully the community will slowly grow from there. I've been promoting this in the Hostbidder forums as well, but unfortunately, no luck there.

pendelton

Tue 6th May 2008, 04:08

Selectively cruise the net, looking for similar, but not identical, forums and blogs to post the link to this site at. Not too close, or it may well get deleted for trying to steal members.

Footzilla

Wed 7th May 2008, 12:06

Well the first impression counts. The only thing the person first looks at is the forum quality. Quality meaning not the posts but the look of the forum. First this forum's theme should be changed as it's too boring type and common. Quality of the posts comes after because new members only look at the appearance of the forum first. If the look is not good, then the new member doesn't post and leaves the forum. If we are going to call new members to the forum, they won't post because the theme is 'disgusting'. So my advice is that promote the forum when the look of the forum is good enough.

Fergal

Wed 7th May 2008, 18:26

I am a member of a forum that has been around for well over 10 years, and has yet to reach 500 members...

Do you mind sharing what the topic of the forum is?

DEADMAN

Wed 7th May 2008, 18:53

From my part, Forum doesn't exactly runs Business, but however you can use Forum to run your business that you've or you want to start with. A good marketing is a first and better concept to attract thousands of visitors. Interesting contents would be rather helpful to make them stick on your Forum net. Holding competition for money or prizes of Website Domains, etc would run your Forum. But a Good concept is to think in which category you're making your Forum like Business Advice, Earn Money through Home, Online Education etc and so on. A good concept wins good hits and ranks.

pendelton

Wed 7th May 2008, 20:27

Not really Fergal, my apologies.

Fergal

Thu 8th May 2008, 07:43

Not really Fergal, my apologies.
No problem at all, I understand the importance of confidentiality.

ritajones56

Wed 30th Jul 2008, 16:31

I don't think a forum is good for being you're primary source of marketing and generating revenue for your business, but it definitely can be a good add-on to an already strong Web site and it is another way to get the word out about your business.

moromendas01

Wed 23rd Feb 2011, 16:57

It is sure not a quick way to make money online. My experience has been that other types of websites are a quicker route to online income.

JPM

Thu 24th Feb 2011, 15:26

We have been working on our forum, www.productforum.info, for just over a month now - we started January 10th.

I have to agree with all the comments about it not being a get rich quick scheme, we never intended on starting it simply to make money.

We do have one or two advertisements but it is unlikely at this stage in our development that they would even cover the costs of domain registration and hosting.

As far as getting the membership up to 1000 members goes, we are at 132 members with around 5 or so of them being regular, and we think of that as a success. It takes a huge amount of time and commitment trying to promote and increase awareness of your forum, Facebook, Twitter and You Tube have proved useful for us. Also using promotion sites like www.forumpromotion.net has proved really useful.

We have advertised on here and are als looking for good value paid advertising on other sites, but it's not easy.

In summary, it really is a marathon and not a sprint. Good luck.

P.S - www.technologyBB.com doesn't appear to work?

KateB

Mon 28th Feb 2011, 11:01

Yeah it will take a lot of hard work an patience before you can start making money from a forum. They are probably one of the worst ways to make a quick buck, but in the longrun they pay out

I agree...if you want to make quick money you might as well try SEO..but even that is not an immediate process and would take a few months atleast.......