Ever Created Your Own Forum?
- Thread starter Dan Da Man
- Start date
ramen noodles
Registered Member
- Jun 2, 2011
- 92
- 21
What's everyone's opinion about the Simple Machines forums? They're also free and look incredible.
ibmethatswhoib
Elite Member
- Feb 17, 2011
- 1,567
- 1,171
I was thinking about starting one too, I think this forum has an awesome layout where all the post are on the main page and your section are to the left. I always wondered how they do that? I don't really see any other forums that have that.
Artful Dodger
Newbie
- Oct 29, 2011
- 33
- 4
I have a couple of times, here's my advice.
Don't go into it thinking it's going to be easy to start and get traffic like a blog or something.
It's extremely difficult and requires hours upon hours of work on your part.
Create accounts, make posts, have discussions with yourself, ask and answer questions, basically, run the forum yourself and make it seem like it's a booming community.
People don't want to sign up and post on a dead forum, they sign up because they want to conversate with the other members.
Basically, it's hard and you're gonna need help, lots of it.
Don't go into it thinking it's going to be easy to start and get traffic like a blog or something.
It's extremely difficult and requires hours upon hours of work on your part.
Create accounts, make posts, have discussions with yourself, ask and answer questions, basically, run the forum yourself and make it seem like it's a booming community.
People don't want to sign up and post on a dead forum, they sign up because they want to conversate with the other members.
Basically, it's hard and you're gonna need help, lots of it.
SlimProxies
Supreme Member
- Oct 4, 2011
- 1,423
- 1,324
I used to have a warez forum. I used a nulled version of vBulletin, as it's the most complete platform.
It wasn't successful cause my forum didn't have anything new.
I'd say create a forum, but have something new to introduce no one else has
It wasn't successful cause my forum didn't have anything new.
I'd say create a forum, but have something new to introduce no one else has
Abstroose
Elite Member
- Nov 20, 2008
- 2,181
- 3,634
I had a forum a few years back. I was a moderator on a popular Hip Hop forum and one day the server crashed. A few days later we found that the owner hadn't made a single backup in three years, so I put up a new forum and invited all the active members from the old forum along (the ones I had contact with via msn, email).
Activity was great at first. The problem was having an incentive for members to join. My forum was too general. After about a year, I had something like 15 active members with 750-1200 posts each.. but no new members. I spent about $1000 hiring forum posters at DP, but to no avail. Eventually, about about 18 months, members became less active.. and the when there were no new posts for other members to reply to, they became less active. Just a downward spiral from there. Marketing a forum is hard - marketing a general forum is pretty much impossible.
Activity was great at first. The problem was having an incentive for members to join. My forum was too general. After about a year, I had something like 15 active members with 750-1200 posts each.. but no new members. I spent about $1000 hiring forum posters at DP, but to no avail. Eventually, about about 18 months, members became less active.. and the when there were no new posts for other members to reply to, they became less active. Just a downward spiral from there. Marketing a forum is hard - marketing a general forum is pretty much impossible.
Subsonic
Regular Member
- Mar 17, 2011
- 367
- 334
I once had a SMF and it worked out well. I downloaded a nice theme and tweaked it a little to my liking so the forum itself looked really good. I would definitely recommend it but phpBB is still better
BigMarcusStud
Senior Member
- Aug 8, 2011
- 1,174
- 244
How about bbpress? I think you can download it for free from your host?
I'm also looking to put up a forum but I have zero knowledge of doing it. I've put up sites before but via Wordpress which is basically just a few clicks and customization from my host.
I see phpbb and bbpress in Fantastico. Are they any good? I'm particularly inclined to go with bbpress since it's made by Wordpress as well so it probably works the same.
Basically, I want to have a Wordpress blog where I can post blog posts. Then there's going to be a link for the forum under the same domain name.
Can this be done using bbpress? Has anyone of you used bbpress?
I'm also looking to put up a forum but I have zero knowledge of doing it. I've put up sites before but via Wordpress which is basically just a few clicks and customization from my host.
I see phpbb and bbpress in Fantastico. Are they any good? I'm particularly inclined to go with bbpress since it's made by Wordpress as well so it probably works the same.
Basically, I want to have a Wordpress blog where I can post blog posts. Then there's going to be a link for the forum under the same domain name.
Can this be done using bbpress? Has anyone of you used bbpress?
Last edited:
ash1ey
Regular Member
- Jul 21, 2006
- 427
- 216
I too have just started a forum and agree with the comments regarding the difficult in starting up. Your niche is extremely important as is making sure you add lots of content, fake members to start posting and general soft promotion (forum sigs) in similar forums.
Please keep this thread active I would love to hear more from other people who have run successful forums!
Please keep this thread active
I would love to hear more from other people who have run successful forums!
genosse
Junior Member
- Apr 3, 2011
- 115
- 78
I once had a SMF and it worked out well. I downloaded a nice theme and tweaked it a little to my liking so the forum itself looked really good. I would definitely recommend it but phpBB is still better
I have a SMF forum setup right now, and it's working pretty well. It seems to be pretty extensible and customizable. I had some issues on the outset with PHPBB, so I switched over to SMF.
We'll see how it does with growing traffic...
The struggle with the forum so far has been getting people to come in and talk.
Mine began with a facebook page w/ ~7K fans. I made the forum in the same niche, and have had some mediocre luck in moving the fans over to the forum.
Trouble is with Facebookers, is that they would rather hold their discussions on FB than the forum. Need an incentive to bring them over.
Monetized with CPA banners and Adsense.
- Sep 23, 2009
- 6,076
- 1,708
I havent started any forum yet but thinking of starting off....
I do hav lot of website but no forum......
I do hav lot of website but no forum......
roamer
Power Member
- Dec 2, 2008
- 500
- 481
I setup a forum a few years back. My brother used to run a successful web hosting service back in the day. There was a blog attached to the main website (not WP, can't remember the name but it was the most popular solution at the time, paid and all) users started commenting and creating a small community right there on the blog, so I suggested installing a forum to my brother.
Lo and behold, the users started using the forums, happy to have a community of their own. It was very nice, with web design sections, html tutorials, general How-Tos - a lot of users had their sites hosted elsewhere, but signed up for the info they found at our forum, and we didn't restrict registration (that proved profitable, as LOTS of users became clients later on).
Those were the times when Plesk was *THE* control panel, as far as I remember (was like 13-14yo at the time). A few years later came the datacenter boom, and unlimited (scammy) web hosting services started popping up everywhere. My bro sold his company to one of the bigger players (still strong today) and moved on to other things. The forums were fused with the new owner's and I stopped frequenting them.
I learned that forums are great when you have an enthusiastic potential community (maybe a niche blog audience, who knows). Just be aware that it takes a lot of combined effort from the owner and the mods to keep things running smoothly - black hats off to mods and admins here, I can only imagine how much dedication and love it takes to run this forum.
tl;dr: Forums are great and profitable, and if you pick the niche/topic right they almost jump start themselves.
Lo and behold, the users started using the forums, happy to have a community of their own. It was very nice, with web design sections, html tutorials, general How-Tos - a lot of users had their sites hosted elsewhere, but signed up for the info they found at our forum, and we didn't restrict registration (that proved profitable, as LOTS of users became clients later on).
Those were the times when Plesk was *THE* control panel, as far as I remember (was like 13-14yo at the time). A few years later came the datacenter boom, and unlimited (scammy) web hosting services started popping up everywhere. My bro sold his company to one of the bigger players (still strong today) and moved on to other things. The forums were fused with the new owner's and I stopped frequenting them.
I learned that forums are great when you have an enthusiastic potential community (maybe a niche blog audience, who knows). Just be aware that it takes a lot of combined effort from the owner and the mods to keep things running smoothly - black hats off to mods and admins here, I can only imagine how much dedication and love it takes to run this forum.
tl;dr: Forums are great and profitable, and if you pick the niche/topic right they almost jump start themselves.
download
Supreme Member
- May 4, 2010
- 1,272
- 715
Yeah, I started a really stupid "science debate forum" when I was like 12 years old or something... it's pretty much dead now and I haven't gotten many ideas on how to monetize... Didn't even get a domain for it lol.
Anyone have any ideas?
http://s4.zetaboards.com/science if you're interested.
Anyone have any ideas?
http://s4.zetaboards.com/science if you're interested.
jamunkala
Regular Member
- Aug 14, 2010
- 284
- 55
Making a blog and earn is like selling candies to kids - you make 1000 blog posts and you earn at least 10 - 15$ per day
You make a vbulletin forum, make 100,000 posts spends 200$ every month on server, always keep moderating forum even in sleep - watching what moderators are doing - running this sql query and that and earning 5$ per day
Whoever above said forums make more money than blogs hasn't actually understood how to monetize blogs
///////
Vbulletin is best forum script, full of features but hard on servers
other scripts are not professional and require yourself to know basic html at least and phpbb even require you to know php to even add a few addons to your forum.
///////////
Forums are very hard to get going, those who have done it were either lucky or had nothing else to do other than running a forum, I suggest you make 100 autoblogs and go to sleep rather than even think about making a forum, its pain in the ass..
BTW : My New forum http://www.blapage.com/forum
You make a vbulletin forum, make 100,000 posts spends 200$ every month on server, always keep moderating forum even in sleep - watching what moderators are doing - running this sql query and that and earning 5$ per day
Whoever above said forums make more money than blogs hasn't actually understood how to monetize blogs
///////
Vbulletin is best forum script, full of features but hard on servers
other scripts are not professional and require yourself to know basic html at least and phpbb even require you to know php to even add a few addons to your forum.
///////////
Forums are very hard to get going, those who have done it were either lucky or had nothing else to do other than running a forum, I suggest you make 100 autoblogs and go to sleep rather than even think about making a forum, its pain in the ass..
BTW : My New forum http://www.blapage.com/forum
Here's an idea.. instead of starting your own community, why not find already established forums that aren't monetized, contact the admin with your monetization plans, ask for 30-40% of the profits generated, and continue to find prospects.
Essentially applying the basic principal, why buy the cow if you can just get the milk for free?
Just my two cents.
Essentially applying the basic principal, why buy the cow if you can just get the milk for free?
Just my two cents.
Madruga
Senior Member
- Mar 16, 2011
- 1,003
- 1,628
Hehe.. I did, but I'm not sure if I will ever create a forum again, because I spent so many hours for tweaks and so many hours to promote it. It did went big, it was a drugs forum (I'm not a junkie though, lol) and when it started to appear on tv about all the crazy things from it (national).. I had to shut it down..due to... long story.
Anyway, it's nice to have a forum, but I think that a kid would be rather more easy than creating a forum. Thing about them, is that the forums can survive with the help of its members; of course, sometimes some of them may die, but in other cases, it can go up and up.
But as someone else said above me, this was like a 15 years old thing and it was popular mostly just back then.
Anyway, it's nice to have a forum, but I think that a kid would be rather more easy than creating a forum. Thing about them, is that the forums can survive with the help of its members; of course, sometimes some of them may die, but in other cases, it can go up and up.
But as someone else said above me, this was like a 15 years old thing and it was popular mostly just back then.