Uhhh, any ideas on how to make a cool, (active member) forum

[Mark Santana]

Hey, guys. I've had a forum for awhile but only like 6 members, but I wanna make a nice forum that lots of people like/love so I want to know how to make a awesome, active forum. Thank you, everyone for all of your nice ideas and help. A'ight, good day.

[Former Member]

What type of forum are you looking to setup would be the first question.

There is no, one solution fits all type of thing. Forums are alot of work.
The minimum thing you can do, is create good/engaging content, even if your using the default theme, that should not matter If your content is good.

Don't sit Idle, waiting for members, you need to chase them.

[seedian]

What undefined said is true, the first thing thats most important is an engaging and interesting forum that people would be interested. After that presentation is key, you can have a forum about something everyone likes and would be normally popular, but if its off putting for people to be there(IE eye bleeding color blends that are too bright or don't mix well, bad pictures, or poorly structured template ect.) then they won't want to stay. But when you have a good topic and a nice looking site the biggest key is advertising, like undefined said, they won't just come to you. 

The biggest mistake I see people make is limiting their scope to just proboards advertising, some people even limit their advertising to right here in the advertise section and then they quit within weeks sometimes. We live in a world of social media now and proboards isn't the only forum hosting site with popular things like play by post role playing so go big or go home. Use facebook, twitter, twitch, reddit, tumblr, and youtube to your advantage. Go find sites where you can advertise that don't have anything to do with proboards but instead they focus on your topic. If its RPG's find sites about rpg games in general, if its sports discussions find sports blogs and stuff, and so on but don't just hit up forum based sites. Lastly for advertising, understand that things are not just going to pick up over night. If you are spending a ton of time advertising and you don't see any members but its only been a few days, don't quit, keep going. If things don't look up in a month, thats when you find a new strategy for advertising. I have found the easiest way is word of mouth. Getting close friends to join and they get their friends and that helps when people do visit and see a populated site, they are more likely to want to stay. Then maybe you only get 2 more members but they might tell a bunch of their friends. 

Also, be happy with who you have. If you only have 5 members, make it work. For myself if it was just me and my fiance rping on my site then that would be all I need. People would see activity and be more inclined to join in if the story-lines interesting. Formulate a plot that works with only a couple people, don't spend all your time trying to get more members and ignore the few you have, make sure you are engaging with the ones you have, even if its only one or two. 

Lastly, don't be afraid to break things down in pieces. I have seen sites with barebones templates explode because their topic was either unique or interesting and the staff were engaging. Creating an atmosphere where people want to stay is key. Be social, have some sort of chatbox, and take an interest in peoples ideas. A cool or perfected template for your site, neat plugins, and great graphics can come later. Don't be in a rush to do everything at once. And thats all the the advice I have. Don't give up, be patient, set time everyday for advertising, advertise beyond the scope of proboards, and be engaging with members when they come. 

[Kami]

1. Define "a while". A lot of forum admins have a forum for a month or two and think that they should be bustling with members. While sometimes that happens (and it is the dream), it's a rare occurrence. If I had a nickel for all the admins that worried about inactivity before the six month mark I'd be very wealthy tbh ;x

2. Define "active"; each forum will have different standards of activity. For me, I consider my forum active with a smattering of posts per day -- people log in daily and there's at least one new post every day. That's active enough for me and my members. Other people would find that incredibly INactive, though, so it all depends on what you are looking for.

3. Content, content, content! Not simply just engaging content, but content that is relevant to your forum's genre. This is the best way increase your SEO rankings without the multibillion dollar budget of huge corporations. The more relevant keywords repeat in your content -- note that bots can now generally differentiate between spammed keywords and keywords that occur organically -- the more bots will pick it up and index your site for those keywords.

4. Honestly, give members something to DO. A lot of admins are like, "Oh I don't want to overwhelm people by posting a lot". Yeah it can intimidate some people but forum users are less likely to create their own topics if an admin doesn't start a few of their own. And, if the admin doesn't respond to topics, then there's really no point in posting because the admin will seem disinterested.

5. Ask for input from your members. While I don't advise putting all of their feedback into action, at least ask for it so you can see if any of them share the same opinion about things. If you see a recurring idea or suggestion -- perhaps you keep seeing that the members want more theme options, for example -- then look into the best possible way of implementing that suggestion while still doing so on your terms (in this example, perhaps selecting a handful of themes you personally like, rather than leaving it for a vote).

[Mark Santana]

Feb 19, 2017 1:30:35 GMT -8 Kami said:

1. Define "a while". A lot of forum admins have a forum for a month or two and think that they should be bustling with members. While sometimes that happens (and it is the dream), it's a rare occurrence. If I had a nickel for all the admins that worried about inactivity before the six month mark I'd be very wealthy tbh ;x

2. Define "active"; each forum will have different standards of activity. For me, I consider my forum active with a smattering of posts per day -- people log in daily and there's at least one new post every day. That's active enough for me and my members. Other people would find that incredibly INactive, though, so it all depends on what you are looking for.

3. Content, content, content! Not simply just engaging content, but content that is relevant to your forum's genre. This is the best way increase your SEO rankings without the multibillion dollar budget of huge corporations. The more relevant keywords repeat in your content -- note that bots can now generally differentiate between spammed keywords and keywords that occur organically -- the more bots will pick it up and index your site for those keywords.

4. Honestly, give members something to DO. A lot of admins are like, "Oh I don't want to overwhelm people by posting a lot". Yeah it can intimidate some people but forum users are less likely to create their own topics if an admin doesn't start a few of their own. And, if the admin doesn't respond to topics, then there's really no point in posting because the admin will seem disinterested.

5. Ask for input from your members. While I don't advise putting all of their feedback into action, at least ask for it so you can see if any of them share the same opinion about things. If you see a recurring idea or suggestion -- perhaps you keep seeing that the members want more theme options, for example -- then look into the best possible way of implementing that suggestion while still doing so on your terms (in this example, perhaps selecting a handful of themes you personally like, rather than leaving it for a vote).

About 6 months for my old forum.