How to bring in members and grow your forum: Uncensored!

[SoCalled]

jplush would take an expieranced Admin or Mod at most ten minutes to work out what was going on, and then ip bannage would be raining down. Not a good idea to really upset larger sites, they may just return the favour.

I tend to join sites with similar sibject matter, use sig links etc (after confirmation that this is okay via the admins), and generally earn some respect from the other sites. If your posts are informative/funny/whatever you will find members signing onto your forums from the other forums. We got three yesterday from a major rugby site that wanted more information than they were getting.

We retain good relationships with the larger sites and are getting some promotion from them.

Better to have some allies from the larger sites than a whole lot of enemies. A lot of subject sites known each other and will get the word out about people spamming etc.

Strangest one we have had so far is a couple of large movie sites already linking up our next proposed site. They know our guys from other forums and are happy to help us out. We are even going to get some news announcements happening from the other sites when we go live.

Generally if you talk to people running large sites which are in the same general area as your own, they will be happy to do something for you. We haven't gone live with our rugby site yet but have forum redirects happening from some of the S14 rugby sites already. Of course we will return the favour.

[jplush76]

If done correctly it will look like just another harmless posting. Never had anyone delete a post. Besides if everything is run through a proxy, IP banning doesn't matter.

[SoCalled]

Jim you are setting out at the onset to irritate the heck out of other site owners. No one likes their sites to be spammed. Building a bad rep is not the way to be seen as a legit forum admin.

There are any number of large sites prepared to help out the new guys on the block. Don't alienate anyone is my word of thumb you never know what future opportunities you will miss via doing that. At one tech site l used to help out with we got linkage and 100s of members by posting at another forum under their guidelines. We offered some stuff the other site didn't have the expertise in.

Spamming via proxy is simply going to get your site a very bad reputation.

Any Admin worth his/her salt will check links being put in. A number of sites have banned linking in posts due to this activity, (see vbforums.com), which will really upset other forum Admins who suddenly find their links gone.

A spamming operation can really backfire on you. A number of forum products offer the ability to replace words and phrases, guess what that get's used for

[jplush76]

I dont do it anymore since the band broke up but this is the uncensored post so I was just giving my 2cents on some things that albeit sneaky... worked. Would it piss me off if someone did that in my forum? of course

[SoCalled]

Jim l post on three other large rugby sites and the admins at those sites are well aware that l help run a rugby site myself. They have quite happily allowed sig links etc and the odd mention in posts of our site because our guys add value to the other sites. We in no way put that relationship under pressure.

[wahyudinata]

I think you guys dont realize by looking at this whole thread, he proved this point VII. Post conversationally controversial topics

[SoCalled]

One part of this that I don't agree with is your contention that your name has anything to do with your success rate. Something that will matter much more here is your standing within the community. If I got a PM like the one above from a member with 0-5 posts and who had just registered, I don't care what the name is, I'm going to ignore it. Conversely, if I get a PM like the above from a member who is established in the community (been registered for awhile, high[ish] post count, helpful posts, etc.), I will be less likely to think of the message as spam, and more likely to actually check it out. And it won't matter what that member's name is.

PM on the way Bleys ... j/k

Actually a number of sites l belong to encourage members to post their sites for review PMing the member base however is apt to get your account wiped out very quickly.

PMing other site's members is not a seriously good idea, considering the number of people who have read member PM hacks in place. Another practise l totally disagree with btw.

Would agree on the point made way above about forums not being democratic. We tried that and it was a complete waste of time. Forums do not strong leadership.

[DateinaDash]

I agree with just about everything you have to say mate!

[rockmyway5]

me too

[Gamermk]

This thread was excellent and I know that many of the practices he proposes I will do in order to grow my community. I don't really agree with the Rob blind approach since it seems kinda risky, but it does seem like a good way to get a lot of members fast. Nonetheless, simple ideas such as welcoming members with formal greetings to direct them where to go combined with the authorization link for email seems like a good idea and only starting a new community with 3 to 4 sections max is an excellent point and I think I would have incorrectly tried to grow too fast had I not read this.

I must say though that while I agree post counts and reputation are necessary evils of forums and they are awesome once you are "into" the community that they are intimidating at times and it is frustrating when it is obvious that some of your strong points are discredited due to low post counts.

I still don't know about the personal vs impersonal admin. I think it is best to try to be active with the community, but you have to be constantly aware of the fact that you are a moderator first and a member second.

Anyway once again a great read and I must say that I really do believe Crooked has a successful forum.

[jplush76]

perhaps a better way to get started is to not display post counts on your forum

[shellspeare]

That could antagonize the regulars already inplace if they've built them up

[jplush76]

I'm talking about a new forum that you're just starting, hold off post counts until someone hits 50 or 100. When I check out a new forum, I look for activity and people that contribute, if there isn't either of those I move on to a forum that I'll actually get a reply on.