How profitable is it to run a forum?

justmeseo · Jun 30, 2020

Hi everyone,

I have a very good project coming up and I would like to build a popular forum for a specific niche not yet targeted, I have scanned the market and there is a hole not being filled at the moment, literally all I would like to understand from someone experienced in this field is, how profitable would it be to run a forum where everyone in it is guaranteed 100% people that will pay.

and how having a private forum with invitation registration only would be better than a open forum? if yes then why?

thank you all who participate in this topic very much.

uncutu · Jun 30, 2020

paid forums are as lucrative as your marketing skills are good.
i've seen it pulled off time and time again when the owner has has large social media following.
paid forums, in general, stay paid and don't allow free regs. how would you feel paying $99/mo for a forum just for regs to be free a month later.

Nut-Nights · Jun 30, 2020

Private forums are not that easy to build. Get an open forum and market it. Once you got members, introduce your paid membership and get blogs in your niche to post about it. If you got an active community, it's going to make you big $$$$ for sure.

justmeseo · Jun 30, 2020

uncutu said:
paid forums are as lucrative as your marketing skills are good.
i've seen it pulled off time and time again when the owner has has large social media following.
paid forums, in general, stay paid and don't allow free regs. how would you feel paying $99/mo for a forum just for regs to be free a month later.

Interesting thoughts, but I guess I didnt explain myself too well, althought I see your point about the paid forum registration, I think $99 is simply crazy and looney, by "everyone in there would paid" I meant, that they will not pay to register but they will pay to receive special insight or access to different sub-forums besides the free ones for a one time-fee of lets say £3.99

Second thing will be that most of the registrations, I would like to make it private, where only people within the forum can invite certain amount of people with a limited amount of invitation every 3 months.

thanks for your reply btw.

justmeseo · Jun 30, 2020

Nut-Nights said:
Private forums are not that easy to build. Get an open forum and market it. Once you got members, introduce your paid membership and get blogs in your niche to post about it. If you got an active community, it's going to make you big $$$$ for sure.

I was lieterally thinking about that bro, and for some reason I feel like more and more people advice me to follow that path, but what about getting people to paid, what do you think it drives them to pay to access a forum? or a better question is why people really pay for Jr VIP memberships, I know it brings perks, but what moves them to take the decision of upgrading in this forum or any other?

thanks for your reply btw.

BapeWars · Jun 30, 2020

I feel forums are a dying breed but the big dogs are making bank from them still. If your niche has good engagement, you can definitely squeeze some dollars out of it

justmeseo · Jun 30, 2020

BapeWars said:
I feel forums are a dying breed but the big dogs are making bank from them still. If your niche has good engagement, you can definitely squeeze some dollars out of it

Appreciated there BapeWars, totally a good point, and I agree, somehow I feel like people already lost the will on forums. thanks for your great point.

Nut-Nights · Jun 30, 2020

justmeseo said:
I was lieterally thinking about that bro, and for some reason I feel like more and more people advice me to follow that path, but what about getting people to paid, what do you think it drives them to pay to access a forum? or a better question is why people really pay for Jr VIP memberships, I know it brings perks, but what moves them to take the decision of upgrading in this forum or any other?

thanks for your reply btw.

Provide them with methods, shares, training which is not available in the public domain. or provide the resources which are paid for free of cost with your membership.

justmeseo · Jun 30, 2020

Nut-Nights said:
Provide them with methods, shares, training which is not available in the public domain. or provide the resources which are paid for free of cost with your membership.

nice, you are totally right, thats a good strategy, althought would you agree that paid things for free comes with great responsabilities? its usually true that nothing in this life is really free, would I have to deal with DMCA regulations in that sense? and what are the options out there to avoid such things?

Deleted member 15724 · Jun 30, 2020

BapeWars said:
I feel forums are a dying breed but the big dogs are making bank from them still. If your niche has good engagement, you can definitely squeeze some dollars out of it

Very true. I haven't seen a "new" forum take over in a long time. These days, FB Groups are more likely to succeed. I have seen a paid forum grow from a particular FB group, but with a large member base and extremely active community.

justmeseo · Jun 30, 2020

Deleted member 15724 said:
Very true. I haven't seen a "new" forum take over in a long time. These days, FB Groups are more likely to succeed. I have seen a paid forum grow from a particular FB group, but with a large member base and extremely active community.

Hey Deleted member 15724,

thanks for the comment there, absolutely you definetely brought something interesting to the table, and its in fact, that it seems that the only way to succeed in building a potential forum is by starting from a social media platform, perhaps with a small group and thereafter moving up.

thanks very much.

Jstrydor · Jun 30, 2020

justmeseo said:
Interesting thoughts, but I guess I didnt explain myself too well, althought I see your point about the paid forum registration, I think $99 is simply crazy and looney, by "everyone in there would paid" I meant, that they will not pay to register but they will pay to receive special insight or access to different sub-forums besides the free ones for a one time-fee of lets say £3.99

Second thing will be that most of the registrations, I would like to make it private, where only people within the forum can invite certain amount of people with a limited amount of invitation every 3 months.

thanks for your reply btw.

I agree! Only an idiot would pay $99 to be a part of an exclusive online forum!

yherrliche · Jun 30, 2020

Jstrydor said:
I agree! Only an idiot would pay $99 to be a part of an exclusive online forum!

Depends on the forum.

justmeseo · Jun 30, 2020

yherrliche said:
Depends on the forum.

Jstrydor said:
I agree! Only an idiot would pay $99 to be a part of an exclusive online forum!

It does seem a little obnoxious indeed, but he still made a good point, there are forums where there is such an excesive amount, just have a look at our dear friends at https://www.****************.info, they used to be selling a membership liscence of $120 to have access to all their tools.+

Batciom · Jun 30, 2020

If you are able to convince people that your forum is better and can offer more interesting knowledge you will be rich boi

Kommando · Jun 30, 2020

There are multiple ways to monetize a forum:
1. Membership fee.
2. Selling upgrades - either to access private subforums or marketplace (or both).
3. Advertisments.
4. Allowing a free marketplace and offering a paid middleman service.
5. Advertising your own services/methods/products.

It all really depends on your niche and yes, it can be very profitable, there are forums where the owner makes 5 digits a month from upgrades.

yherrliche · Jun 30, 2020

justmeseo said:
It does seem a little obnoxious indeed,

A lot of people pay $97 on BHW, some people pay $150-170 for private discord channels etc..
It just depends on the forum, if you have a private forum for compliance officers or for corporate lawyers in Paris, you'll make a fortune.

Jstrydor · Jun 30, 2020

justmeseo said:
It does seem a little obnoxious indeed, but he still made a good point, there are forums where there is such an excesive amount, just have a look at our dear friends at https://www.****************.info, they used to be selling a membership liscence of $120 to have access to all their tools.+

Im sorry I just dont see it happening

justmeseo · Jun 30, 2020

justmeseo said:
It does seem a little obnoxious indeed, but he still made a good point, there are forums where there is such an excesive amount, just have a look at our dear friends at https://www.****************.info, they used to be selling a membership liscence of $120 to have access to all their tools.+

I meant "black hat pro tools . info"...

justmeseo · Jun 30, 2020

Batciom said:
If you are able to convince people that your forum is better and can offer more interesting knowledge you will be rich boi

right but explain why though, its an interesting point but I dont see no base on that comment, if you could share your knowledge on why? then that will be amazing bro

How profitable is it to run a forum?

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