Forum Ideas etc..

[Richieboy67]

I have posted similiar questions in the past and I have not gotten much help so I am going to try again and reqord this a bit...

Any helpful response would really be appreciated...

One of my sites is www.talkandmore.net --- The site is doing fairly well in regards to traffic and it is even doing decently with revenue right now. In the past things have gone sour but I made some changes and that aspect of the site is doing much better now....

The problem is the site is a forum site and the forums are just about dead. Barely anyone is posting anymore. A few months ago we had a major crash and we ended up losing many posts and I guess this ticked some members off but that was months ago.

I have tried changing the forums around and I have added many different features etc... We get tons of guests at the site. People come and shop or they do some research through all of the articles we have etc but then they leave.....

Can anyone please help me come up with some ideas to get people posting in the forums again. I really have to figure out a way to convert guests into members and then I have to get the guests to post......

Thanks ahead of time... I know I am going to get hundreds of useful replies!!! :hehe:

 

[peter phillips]

Now that you have changed the forums and added different features, I guess you should email the members who were active on your forum earlier and inform them that you have changed your forum and added new features. Also if possible start and run a contest to attract those members as well as new members. If you manage to get a decent amount of members back, the activity will rise steadily and that might prompt the guests to join too.

 

[khuldun]

The best way to get the old members back is to email them and tell them that as they were old emmbers and you would love to have them back, you will give away prizes if they came back. Also run another contest for new members which will make them join the forums and post.

 

[dongan]

Email announcement with promotions would help.

 

[thedeamone]

Hello,

You Should Try For Best Developer.........

-shrikant

 

[Richieboy67]

Thanks Shrikant. That was nice of you to say. I am sure there are not many if any that agree with you though....lol

Anyhow, I am working on a complete format change for that site. It is going to start with a new style and then I am going to have a completly new main page. Instead of making forums the main site feature the main feature is going to be a store instead. I figure I will have a few blocks with product images etc. I have not figured out yet if I am going to build a custom page or if I can maybe use VBAdvanced...

I am considering using vb advanced and maybe writing a new module or two to suit my needs.. I haven't decided yet....

Thats about it.....

Thanks

 

[Richieboy67]

I have made some big changes to the site. Please come and take a peek and tell me what you think. I have much more to do including seo to this new style. I have just started that and it usually takes me about 2 weeks to do a complete seo on a vb site. This includes meta tags for each forum individually... I am also going to be changing the look a little too but you will get the jist of it....

I am taking the direction of the site into more of a commerce selling site with forums and features. Products will be reviewed etc... I have some big plans and a ton of work to get this going the way my minds eye sees it...lol

It is not even close right now.... It is much different than it was though...

let me know what you think...