Advertisng help
 

I need some ideas on how to advertise a southern discussion forum, locally in my hometown, and abroad in states like Mississippi, Tennessee, Georgia, and alabama Please help lol
Thanks

use the craigslist.com
a local newspaper ad
radio ad
stickers
flyers
phamplets

Ive given thought to those, Im thinking about getting it put on the rear window of my truck, but that and pamphlets, and stickers and fliers are all too local

Submit to free directories, especially ones related to your site/forum.

Something I've found quite useful for my music forums was making a myspace profile... I do a quick design, advertising the site on the profile, and directing people to the forum... searching for my target audience (eg. people into rock, under 20s etc) and then adding as many as I can.

When they accept the add (or even if they dont) they will see the site url (which i set as my display name).

Anyway, this works with other social networking sites too. Just don't spam. And to be honest, not sure if it works with anything other than music and arts... I've not tried anything else.

Good luck though.

I actually have set up a myspace, and Ive added several Country Music stars, because there fans will be most likely to go to the site. If had several friend request from other people, but no new members from it. But thanks for the suggestion I appreciate all the help I can get! I'm going to try to ad some people now tho!

Any more help would be greatly appreciated!

go with social bookmarking, blogging, ebooks, software.

What about promotional giveaways? Fuzzy Dice are always cool :)

Here are some tips:

Submit to general, regional and niche directories that has majority of its traffic in the US - they will also help you in link building
Offline advertising - TV, Radio, Print ads, flyers, banners, T-shirts, etc.
Participate in forums related to your site and whose majority of the members are from US as well
Advertise on popular local sites
Opt for SEO - build targeted backlinks to help in your SERP ranking and draw direct targeted traffic as well in the long run.

Those are just the things that popped in my head. Hope they help ;)

I have a promotional giveaway, http://dixietalk.com/showthread.php?p=829
tell me if you think thats ok.
Also, Ive made shirts and tried most the stuff you mentioned, but the SEO is a problem, I have godaddy as a host and the .htaccess files never work on the site... please help if you can!

local classified, local newspaper, campus newspaper (works better if it is a small town), local radio station, etc

for statewide, you need to do SEO

Just did the TFSEO which is a small form of SEO for free from vbulletin.org

Any other Ideas?

Originally Posted by weblord

use the craigslist.com a local newspaper ad radio ad stickers flyers phamplets

but if you want it free, do forum postings (with signature), classified ads postings and social bookmarking.

forum sig is the best among what you've mentioned

Originally Posted by LailaScott

but if you want it free, do forum postings (with signature), classified ads postings and social bookmarking.

There are lots of thread discussing SEO tips and techniques.Just look at them and you will learn something good

Any more help would be :D

I have done very well posting advertisements in the correct forums on apsense and adlandpro and orkut which are large online communities with advertising forums. You can also post affilliate links there. Good Luck!

Why not exchange links with Mississippi, Tennessee, Georgia, and alabama forums and do contests. I'd use Squidoo and Hubpages to increase an online presence.