So, onto the good stuff – money! In this article I will be talking with you on how plan a future income stream from your forum. Since I have already talked about the importance of topic, audience, and design, which all tie into monetization, this article will not be as lengthy.

We can break forum monetization down into three parts:

1. Deciding what kind of offers our audience will be interested in
2. Finding appropriate companies to sell through
3. Implementing those offers

Basically we need to know what they want, who has it, and how to effectively sell it.

Appropriate Offers

The first step should be pretty easy since you have already pinpointed your audience and have designed your forum based around their interests. You want to show them ads that they will be interested in, based around what your forum topic is. Continuing my previous example, if your forum is about the XBox 360 game “Gears of War”, then showing your members ads to buy that and other video games is a good choice, while offers to “lower your credit card debt” most likely are not. This is probably common knowledge to you, but it’s an important part of forum monetization.

Finding Appropriate Advertising Companies

This part can be somewhat hard if you choose a really obscure niche. Otherwise, you can almost always find offers relevant to your topic. Google Adsense is a perfect example, although let it be known that generally Adsense has poor performance on forums. Amazon associates will always have relevant items for you to sell and you should be able to find at least a couple good affiliate offers at CJ, Azoogle, Clickbank, or Copeac. Look around, be creative.

Implementing Advertisements

This is probably the hardest part when it comes to monetizing your forum – how do you implement the ads so that they will get attention? You can’t just place a banner in the usual header position (try it if you want but you’ll see how blind your users are to it). You have to be creative and test things out. It may take you a while to find a offer/placement combination that has any success.

Some of the best placements I have seen are inserting the ad after the first post in a thread how it looks like another post between the first and second posts. If you are running vBulletin, check out this thread at vBulletin.org (you’ll have to validate your license first) or this thread at vbseo.com. If you are using phpBB, check out these two posts.

Also, some people have success with placing the ad at the very end of each thread, before the quick reply box. This way the user is not in the middle of reading the thread, like they would be in the above example. Another way is to implement ads into the category and thread listing view – this is a little more difficult but I would imagine that the results are better. For example, make it how the first thread title in each forum category is actually an affiliate link or an Adsense block.

One more idea is to find sponsors for each category. Each sponsor gets a small image and tagline right next to the category name on the forum homepage for $x a month. Check out the forums at Rapmusic.com to see what I am talking about (just the first example that came to mind ;)) Branching off of this idea, try selling sponsored sticky posts. If you are creative there are a hundred possible ways to monetize your forum.

Try searching for forums that are in your niche and see what kind of advertisements they are pushing and how they incorporate them. Remember, if you just stick a leaderboard at the top of your forum you won’t get but a few cents. Monetizing forums takes a lot more creativity and testing than it does to monetize a regular website. Also, don’t expect big results anytime soon – like I said above, if your main goal is to make money, then a forum is not for you. They are hard to profit from and take a lot of time and effort. But building one can be a very rewarding experience!

It’s kind of like a catch-22. You need users to get more users, but you can’t get those first users because you don’t have users (say that 5 times fast). So how do you go about making your forum active and attracting those first registrations? Funny you should ask, because that is exactly what this article is about. Below I describe multiple tried-and-true techniques.

1. Creating Fake Accounts

When you start a new forum you of course have your administrator account, but you should also create another 5 or so “fake” user accounts, meaning accounts that you control. Post some through one account, then login as one of your different user names and post some with that one. Rinse and repeat. Try to make each different fake user have their own personality and vary their posting order. This is an easy way to get the initial activity going in your forum. When you start to get a good amount of real users, slowly fade out your fake ones.

2. Forum Post Exchanges

Webmasters are always looking to do forum post exchanges – i.e. you post in my forum 10 times and I will post in yours 10 times. This is a great way to get more user registrations and unique content for your forum, and it has the added benefit of relationship building with other new webmasters. You can set up these exchanges yourself (most webmaster forums always have people looking for these) or you can use ‘official’ forum post exchange websites. I’ve found three main ones, though I am sure that their are more.

• ForumPostExchange.com
• PostExchangeClub.com
• PostSwappers.com
• AdminFusion PostFusion

I cannot vouch for any of these sites as I have not used them. I was a member at a very nicely implemented post exchange site, but it appears that they are no longer online.

3. Keep Your Category List Small

I wrote an article previously on the importance of keeping your category list small. Potential users will be turned away from forums that have twenty different categories and only one or two posts in each one of them. Keep your forum structure small and concise until you truly have the need to add more categories – it helps make your forum appear more active. It is very tempting for new webmasters to want to create a whole host of categories thinking that this will make their site look authoritative, but trust me, just don’t do it. Now i’m not saying that you should bunch every topic into one forum category – you still need clear delineations – but just don’t go overboard with it.

4. Registration Prompts

Most of the popular forum software default templates don’t have a very eye-catching registration prompt. You want something that immediately catches the eye of an unregistered user and says “Hey! You should register!” It’s pretty easy to go into your template and add this yourself, but if you are not familiar with your forum package most of them have mods for this functionality. If you are using vBulletin, vBulletin.org has a great selection of mods, and you can find code snippets at vBulletin.com also. For phpBB, you can find all the information you need at phpBB.com.

A good prompt might look like this:

Hello guest! We’ve noticed that you still haven’t registered[link] yet. By becoming a member you’ll get these great benefits: no ads, access to our members-only forum (which has some great information), the ability to create and reply to posts, access to our arcade, the ability to search our forum, and much more! Registering is quick and easy, so what are you waiting for? Register now[link].

I’ve personally used this trick before and it does help. Try not to make your message rambling, but include enough information to make the guest want to register.

5. Have Registration Benefits

Make registration a must-have. There are a lot of ways to do this, but you have to be careful – some of these techniques may just piss your readers off instead of making them want to register. Try it out and see what works for you.

• Only registered users can read threads – warning: if you go this route you need to make sure that search engine spiders can still access posts
• Only registered users can use the search function
• Guests only have access to certain categories
• Registered users see no ads

I’ve even seen one forum that let guests only view five threads in a twenty-four hour period, which I thought was great – give them a taste but leave them wanting more. All they have to do is register.

Again, I will state that you need to be careful if you decide to implement any of these ideas. It may hurt instead of help, it really depends on a site-by-site basis.

6. Search Engine Optimization

Forum software generally hasn’t been all the great when it comes to SEO, though newer versions are partaking in better practices. Basically, URLs like myForum.com/viewthread.php?t=112 aren’t very SEO friendly. A lot of forums now have mods where you can use URLs like myForum.com/title-of-my-thread/threadID, which has the obvious benefit of including keywords inside of the URL. Also, the thread title or category title should go before you forum name in the page title – display the most important information first. For example, the best structure for a title would be: Thread Title – Forum Title, instead of the default Forum Title – Thread Title. Here are some good links that I found:

• How To SEO Your vBulletin Forum
• Zoints SEO for vBulletin
• Magic SEO URL for phpBB (paid)
• phpbb-seo.com
• phpBB SEO URLs v2

7. Create Enticing Content

You need to create threads that will make a guest want to register and participate in. Ask questions to your users, post polls, start talking about a controversial subject. Anything that will make the user want to add his or her two cents.

8. Become Influential In Similar Forums

Find a couple forums that are in the same generally niche as yours is and register there. Make great posts, be kind, and become influential, someone that other members look up to. Maybe even rise in the ranks, if you’re able to. Create a well-crafted signature, and people will come. When you have respect and clout people will more likely want to check out what is in your sig. Now don’t just have the name of your forum linking to its address – have something creative, eye-catching. Use colors and maybe an image. Just don’t make it too obvious that you’re trying to steal their users.

9. Make Registering Easy

No one likes to go through a long process of registering. Therefore, I suggest that before you start having problems of spam bots and the likes, don’t use email verification or image checking. Don’t ask your guests to fill out a whole page concerning their location, interests, and biography. Make it easy and quick. One forum I saw had a new user registration box on their side menu on the front page. All it asked for was a username, password, and a checkbox asking if they agreed with the terms of service. Filling it out would take all of ten seconds, then bam, you’re logged in. There are also mods for this sort of functionality if you search for them.

10. Hammer To The Pavement!

Forums are hard. So just keep promoting and don’t stop. Use all of the techniques that I outlined above and then some. Come up with crazy new ways to get more members. Don’t give up. Once you achieve a large community, the feeling is great. And remember, the more members you get, the easier it is to get more.

I hope these ten tips at getting your first 1000 members will help you! Those who persevere are those who are dedicated, so there is just one question you need to ask yourself before starting a forum – are you dedicated?

Note: even though this is an article inside my Forum Promotion 101 series, the advice given is critical in developing every type of site.

Now that we have discussed how to appropriately choose the topic of your forum, and you have hopefully chose a topic from the list you compiled, it’s time to learn about your target audience.

What is a target audience? It’s the demographics that your website is going to appeal to – who you are catering for. Demographics is defined as “the statistical data of a population, esp. those showing average age, income, education, etc”, and we are going to be looking at, in particular, age, gender, and income.

Step 1: Identifying Your Target Audience

This step is pretty easy. You should already have a pretty good idea on who your target audience is going to be just by common sense. For example, using my example in the last article, if your topic is “Gears of War” under “XBox 360 Video Games”, then your target audience would be mainly young males. Keep in mind that you are looking at the majority of what your audience is going to be – there will always be the odd one here and there.

If you are having trouble identifying exactly who your target audience is, I suggest that you pick a new topic. If your audience is unclear, then the rest of the process is going to be a lot more difficult. A lot depends on being able to establish a good connection with your user base.

Step 2: Defining Your Target Audience

Now that you know who your audience is, we need to ask ourselves a couple of questions:

1. What do they like?
2. What is their background?
3. What are their tendencies?
4. What are their characteristics?

Basically we want to know everything about them how we can build the forum exactly to their needs. Your forum will differ greatly depending on the answers to these questions.

What do they like? Maybe your audience is young and technologically oriented, the YouTube generation. They like access to tons of information, fast. They use all the new applications and are very savvy when it comes to using a forum and a computer in general. On the other hand, maybe your audience is older and would be put on information overload by all of the stuff that appeals to the young crowd. They could still be using Internet Explorer 6 and get confused about having to register to post on your forum (may not be your best bet for a target audience ;))

This information will greatly impact how you build your site. It may make you lean towards a flashy design with tons of options or a simple and easy-to-use approach. Don’t underestimate the importance of designing for your target audience.

What is their background? This is affect what they like and how they act. Like I said above, if your audience is young their background is probably very technologically oriented – they are comfortable with using a computer and can handle themselves well in a digital environment. Perhaps your audience is conservative (i’m not talking about republican or democrat, i’m talking about personality) – this may come into play when you try to monetize your forum further down the road. Conservative people are less likely to feel safe about spending money online.

What are their tendencies? What are their characteristics? In general, does your target audience like to spend a lot of time online? Are they big spenders or do they not have money to spare? Are they vocal and aggressive or like to stay behind the scenes? Even consider aspects like their eye site – will they need large and easy to read fonts or can you stick with classic verdana? Some of these questions will be hard to answer but others you will be able to find out through research.

Step 3: Designing Your Forum Around Their Needs

I touched on this briefly above, but I will go into a little more detail now. Once you have answered the questions about what your target audience is like you can use that information to effectively design and build a site for them. Think of your target audience when you are choosing design aspects of your site, like:

1. Color scheme – bright and flashy? Earth tones? Something more conservative?
2. Template – simple and easy to use, or packed with options and cool widgets?
3. Forum Software – some forum software packages have a lower learning curve while others are harder to use but offer lots more options.

Now that you know how to properly design and build your site around your target audience, you should put this information to use. While you’re anxiously waiting to read my next article in this series, start research on your audience, keeping in mind all the aspects that I told you to look for above. The next article will discuss ways to monetize your forum. It doesn’t have a whole lot to do about promotion, but it’s something that we’re all interested in!

We all know that forums are notoriously hard to get off the ground and this problem is frequently aggravated by webmasters who have not done proper research before launching their forum. It takes time and patience – a lot of both. You must expect to put many hours into your forum before you start to see gain. Building and promoting a forum is considerably different than building and promoting a standard website.

Promotion is present during all life-stages of a website – planning, building, launching, and maintaining. This tutorial series will take you through the basics on how to properly perform these four steps to successfully promote your forum. So, without further ado…

Step 1: Planning

Before you even purchase hosting for your future forum or download the software, you should have a battle plan. I say battle plan because it is exactly that – a battle. There are thousands of forums on the internet, and hundreds of them are on exactly what you want to create yours about. This is why proper planning is crucial – you need to come out swinging, and swinging hard, or you will undoubtedly become just another no-name forum that couldn’t surpass the 1,000 member mark.

So, grab a pencil and a sheet of paper, and let’s start planning. There are four main items that you need to think carefully about. Today we will be discussing the first one.

1. Topic
2. Audience
3. Design
4. Monetization

1 – Topic

Your topic obviously defines your forum. What is it going to be about? Maybe you are creating a fan-site for your favorite game, or a place where members can discuss technology. Generally speaking, the more refined your topic is, the better your chance is at becoming successful. You can’t be a jack-of-all-trades – it’s impossible to promote.

For example, if you chose “video games” as your topic, do a quick google search for video game forums and you will be overwhelmed. There are thousands of video games and millions of gamers, and at first this may make you think that with such a huge audience base it will be easy getting traffic and members. In reality, this is a bad idea – you want to become the go-to source, or authority, for your subject, and you cannot achieve that status by covering dozens of different subjects.

I’m sure you have heard other webmasters go on about the importance of choosing a niche market. Niche is defined as “a distinct segment of a market.” “Video games” is not distinct. Try to narrow it down to something more specific. You may be thinking “XBox video games.” Well, that is better, but it is still too broad of a target. Try focusing on one specific xbox game, like Gears of War.

Now you also have to be careful when you have narrowed it down as far as you can go, because some niches are still far too populated for you to have a good chance of success in. Using my above example, if you chose Halo as your niche, doing a search for Halo forums produces an uncountable amount of results. If you are really passionate about the niche you chose, then go for it, but it’s going to be magnitudes harder. Otherwise, find a niche with less competition.

On the other hand, you also have to keep in mind your traffic potential. You will need a decent amount of potential traffic to grow your forum and profit from it. Some niches are just too small to get any amount of measurable traffic from. It’s all about finding the right balance between supply and demand.

I have compiled a list of helpful links in selecting and judging a niche:

• Niche Tools at NetBlogger.be
• NicheBot
• Wordtracker Free Trial
• Google Adwords – use their Keyword Tool and Traffic Estimator Tool

I will also be writing an article dedicated on how to choose a good niche in the near future.

So now you know how to go about choosing which topic your forum is going to be about. Let me say, however, that the above was in no ways a comprehensive guide on how to choose a topic. I suggest searching google for articles on niche choosing techniques. Here are some good ones that I have found (although some of them talk about blog niches, the same principles apply):

• How To Choose A Niche Topic at Problogger.net
• How To Choose The Right Niche at DoshDosh.com
• Choosing A Site Topic at Websitepublisher.net

I think that that is enough information to digest for one day, so here is what I want you to do:

1. Create a list of all the possible topics that you would want to create a forum about.
2. Do some research on each of those topics, keeping in mind what I said above. How fierce is the competition? Is the traffic potential high enough? Is my topic too broad?
3. Shorten your list down to just a couple of candidates that, after doing step 2, you think are your best choices – then choose one!
4. Come back and read my next article in the Forum Promotion 101 series, which will talk about how being able to properly identify and develop your site around your target audience is a key part in creating a successful forum.