I know that many of you have heard about the tremendous power of the online forum community. You have probably already actively participated in numerous forums and started to create a network of friends in these forums.
The next thing that comes to mind is “Why don’t I start my own Forum!” So you continue and start exploring how to do it, and you realize that starting a community of online forums is much more difficult than you thought!
Well, this article describes how to start your own online forum in the easiest way. So let's go here:
1. Create your niche topic for the forum.
I have seen many forums to which I go, and they cover everything and everyone in my forum. Now it's always good to have the Chit Chat or Lounge zone of your forum to allow members to talk about anything. However, the success of your forum is to have a specific niche that will not only allow your forum to be indexed by search engines, but also something that will attract your main audience.
This is one of the biggest obstacles to overcome, although it may seem like the easiest way to understand. Many beginner webmasters of the forum see that they can add as many categories and sub-forums as they can to their general forum, and the main topic is lost. In turn, when a visitor enters a website, he is disconnected using the Forum.
2. Choose the best web forum script.
There are so many forum scenarios in which this is another major obstacle faced by an aspiring webmaster.
Your first tendency will be to use the forum script, which forum you most actively use has the right? Ha! I caught you!
Now there is nothing wrong with this, but sometimes these forum scripts are so modified and “hacked”. as it is sometimes called modified forum scripts, it will be difficult for you to create such as your favorite forum.
I would advise starting with a free forum script that has the function of migration & # 39; forum information on another forum script. For example. Start with the free phpBB forum script. This is by far the most powerful free script. Even most web hosts have a part of their package that you can install with one click (we'll talk more about web hosts later).
As soon as you have installed phpBB, this is definitely the best forum script in which others paid for the # in the forum scripts there are so-called “migration tools”; for. These migration tools are a script or tool that can transfer all the information about your forum.
For example, your site is successful, and you want to change your forum script. to the paid script & # 39; such as vBulletin. vBulletin has a migration tool for phpBB, the process will be smooth and you will not lose information about the forum.
The worst thing for the forum community is to work a lot on the forum, and then the webmaster decided to change the forum platform, because the free one from which they started simply does not have all the functions of other communities. Thus, the webmaster changes the forum script and loses information about the forum. I guarantee it will destroy your community.
So starting from a wise plan at the beginning of growth is a huge step.
3. Choosing a web host
The following, after selecting the forum platform you want to use, is a painfully difficult decision to find the right web host.
A web host is basically a company that & you usually place on your server a monthly payment.
Now, depending on your budget, to start with, I would say, do a Google search for the keyword: “Cheap web hosting.” You will see millions of results. Navigate through the top 10 Google search results and determine which one you want.
I am URGE, you DO NOT run a forum in a free web space. or free forum. community. You are tied to this web host, and most likely you will have a lot of advertisements on your site that will annoy your members and moreover, it really screams that your website is not permanent. home for your members. Perception plays a key role in the success of your forum. If your forum looks and feels difficult to use. No one will use it. Could you?
Please stay away from free forums!
In any case, you will spend a few dollars a month on web hosting, but as you create a community, you can slowly enter your own ad campaigns in Google AdSense or a banner that will allow you to get enough money to cover the costs of web hosting and in many cases, enough to pay for your gas this month and even more!
Choose a website in your budget and make sure that the host you choose allows you to create forums. Because forums consume a lot of what is called “bandwidth” and web space, some low-cost web hosts have maximum bandwidth and space on the Internet.
In my experience, if you start with at least 1 GB of space and 5 GB of bandwidth. This is MORE than you need until your community community is big enough to pay for itself on a larger website, or even rent your own, what is called a dedicated server. Do a web search on Google, for which the dedicated server needs to find out more.
A solid and reliable web host is one that responds to customer support in a timely manner. Make sure that before you decide that the web host should contact this web host through their toll-free phone number or support email address. If they do not respond quickly to a potential customer, how will they react as soon as they know that you are a customer?
Do you get a homeland and make sure you like the web host you choose, because the last thing you need to do is move the web hosts and lose the community information on the forum.
4. Traffic to your forum
Once you have everything, you have chosen your niche, you have found your community script, you have installed it on a reliable host, you expect the stream of visitors to become a member!
This is what makes it or breaks its part of the forum. If you do not have visitors or participants, your forum will not grow.
My advice is to start with the circle where you started. In your network of friends online. With so many forums and social networking sites these days there are so many to choose, why should someone join YOUR forum?
Well, you can use this network of websites to your advantage. Start with the forums in which you are active. If they allow you to advertise your website or website, do it. Otherwise, add the link to your signature. If you have thousands of posts, your link to this forum will appear in thousands of places at once!
Then go to other forums related to your topic and try to be active there with a link in your signature to your site.
Announce the launch of your website to your friends on your Messenger systems.
Better! Try a marketing trick to give out something to a random member once a week.
First of all, make sure that you are active. Even if no one writes that day. Log in and post. Try to provoke a conversation with your messages. When participants join and are active, they give them the honor of being the initial moderators of your forum. This will encourage them and make them feel that they are part of your community and will maintain loyalty to your forum. In turn, what will they do? Tell THEM to your friends about it. Now you begin to see what is called "viral." effect to drive traffic to your site.
Don't give up the most. Keep talking about your forum and invite people to join. The more passionate and excited you are about your forum, the more others you and your friends will see, and you will want to spend time on your forum to create it.
After you go through these initial steps to start your online community of forums, you are on the right path to have a successful community. Once this happens, you can easily think that you can make money from your site, which will cover your expenses and post some “spare changes”. in your pocket. This, of course, if you have the right niche, the right forum script, the right web host and the right methods to drive traffic to your forum! To your success!
Copyright 2006 - Cosmin Ghiurau
Founder and Administrator of ROYOUTH.com - Connecting Ethnic Romanian Christian Youth
