chicken or the egg? Strategy for the problem with no users and content

[CyberCommander]

Hi guys

i have a question and hope some experts with a lot of experiences can help me.

If you have the business case to create a multivendor shop, classified page, dating website or a new forum, in the beggining you have the same problem "chicken or the egg?" with no content and no members/users.

What is your strategy in this case and works great?
Do you create in the beggining fake users/content?
Or do you start a massive marketing kampagne with a lot of traffic?
Or any other ideas?

My experience is that nobody wants to register if there are no users or content on the platform.

so how do you start?

Thank you for your answers and help
cheers, CC

 

[chickab00m]

It really depends on the industry you're going after. Generally, I would recommend that you continue to pile lots of high quality content on your website. Hourly, Daily, Weekly. Tons of it. Think of a good magazine: when you're about to pay $10 to take home a stapled stack of paper, you definitely pay attention to a few key things. Content. Branding. Quality.

If you are killing it at those three main points above, and still not getting traffic, then it's time to start thinking about product-market-fit. This is the beautiful intersection of your target audience/market & their threshold for how good a product or service needs to be to buy it. If you have SOME traffic and nothing is converting, it's time to focus on this part of your marketing strategy.

If customers are converting/buying, you have quality content, and STILL no customers...then you have either a PR problem or you desperately need to explore the world of networking. Assuming your site isn't plagued with terrible reviews or a competitor with his heart set on destroying you, then you should really consider making some partnerships. For some, this is paying a blogger dominating the SERPs for your top keywords for guest posting and banner ad opportunities. Preferably this blogger is already working with competitors and is happy to offer advertising opportunities. More networking online includes finding similar advertising opportunities with niche-specific influencers on IG + FB.

If investing in online relationships that can help spread the word about your service is not an option, then you seriously need to consider pay-per-click style advertising. In other words, it's time to invest in Google Adwords, Facebook Ads, Instagram Ads, etc. These may cost more money than the strategies above, but the rapid engagement to your sales content will allow you to quickly adjust your content and strategies so you're reaching that 'product-market-fit' situation that we discussed earlier much quicker than general trial and error strategies.

Hope this helps! Get creative, there all hundreds of methods beyond these. But, if you're doing all of the above, you will start to see an increase in your overall website traffic.

 

[TrendWatchersAlerts]

I had this issue too. I got eager clients that wanted to be apart of my service but when they saw no one was in my membership site, they immediately asked for a refund.

How did i solve this?

I rallied a dedicated group of 100 people within my market and gave them free access ON THE SAME DAY. While they were filling my community chats with content and feedback, I was able to start bringing paying customers into the loop with retention.

 

[Deleted member 657006]

you open the forum free and advise them you will be charging when popular then switch to charging when busy.

or

you can get free users with restricted links/areas like here, need to upgrade to access a restricted area.

 

[Deleted member 657006]

I think you need a niche in something that in the news or internet and buzzing .

use google trends soon find something that works.

slap some selling products or afflicates to it soon make money .

add a membership on it for gossip .

 

[plato]

Let peeps know from the start that it will become a paid membership. Just the first batch of 150? (whatever number you will choose) will get free lifetime access.
You could even wind it up by letting the free members know they have to be active posting otherwise the free membership come to an end ..

 

[TrendWatchersAlerts]

Let peeps know from the start that it will become a paid membership. Just the first batch of 150? (whatever number you will choose) will get free lifetime access.
You could even wind it up by letting the free members know they have to be active posting otherwise the free membership come to an end ..

Thats what I did. Just got my first paid member a few days ago for $19month