How to get a community started

[ferrazf]

Hi,

I recently started a site, which I will try and make a community out of it, based around the forums. But since the site has been up for less than a week, it's dead.

What would be a good way to get a forum going? It's almost like a vicious cycle, there's no one in the forums, so no one goes there, and if there are very few people, they will get bored, leave and you're back to zero.  I could post a thousand interesting or controversial posts, but it all leads back to that vicious cycle. What's the best thing to do? Create multiple dummy accounts and post under them?

I propose having a group of people who also have slow forums, and get them to post in each other's forums, to get some topics going, while at the same time going around posting links so others get involved, eventually building a community.

Any ideas? How did you do it?

Thanks

[yankeesdude]

Just advertise on your site in signatures. That's what alot of people do.

[waggles]

Yeah. You could also submit it to search engines, but that won't do too much.

[akulion]

Also make sure u have somethng to offer people on your site.

A lot of people make the mistake of opening up a site as a forum and then just expect people to start joining.

Ask urself: Would I join a site like mine with just an empty forum and a few things like arcade etc which one can find on a 1000 sites.

Also unique design helps

have a site subject / theme...meaning it should be ABOUT something, jack of all trades dont do too well usually...and as for a 'hangout site' believe me those are in the 100000's

ask ur existing friends and family to join and pitch in to help pick up on activity

thats all i can think of right now

[knat]

I dont want to say some wise words about.. well yes i do lol but i will make it short and then provide you with some links that
will feed you with more information.

Content is king - Its a fact and we all know it !

With that said i think it is important that the Admin/designer/team behind a site really love and feel for that site. The more you care about your site the more succesful it will be. When i started creating my own site i thought about what my goals should be. At first i was thinking that my goal should be to have 1000 members and 100 new post every day. But when i started to create the site i found out that my goal was acutally to have great fun creating/maintaining it. It has become my Game. My hobby. My baby.. you get the picture. Your members will feel this passion.

So the keywords is Content & Passion = Better chance of succes to reach your goals

I recommend that you visit www.theadminzone.com to read alot about how other admins look at this.

Also visit the topic: http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=113829.0

Good luck in the future to you and your baby 

Cheers

Knat


Edit: broken link/wrong url