Forum Marketing - Part 2

Go to your favorite search engine and in the search box type in your key words followed by the word ‘forums’. Hit search. You will be amazed at how many hits you get for your niche. And each of those forums could be a high traffic goldmine for any readers you’re hoping to attract. And each forum is your chance to impress, find ideas AND, best of all, generate traffic to your site.

Finding forums to frequent

Forums that have high traffic are great places to hang out, and work with people, and discuss the niche you're in. Typing 'forum'+'your niche or primary keyword' into a search engine will of course give you the best results, but you might also want to hang out on any forums you already have access to, and ask people where they like to hang out.

Traffic generation for forums

Forum traffic generation is simply a case of posting and interacting on forums. If you can do that, and do it well, you will see a marked increase in traffic.

But you’ve got to pay attention to the sites rules - if they have any, stick to them, like glue. Be aware of any rules about siglines, and information on how to post, where to post and when to post. You’ll find that, in the long run, you’ll make more friends, readers, and interested other parties that way.

Discussions, siglines, and trolling

Discussions, when they get going on forums are great - unlike blogs, the ONLY reasons for forums is interaction. Most forum programs are not Google friendly, and not only that, anyone with posting priviledges can start a conversation. Posting articles on forums is a good way to open discussions, but might not always be appreciated - people go to forums, after all, to discuss, not share opinions.

And you might find on that note, that people disagree with you - or that you might disagree with them. Its perfectly fine to disagree with people - as long as you’re respectful

Whether they are or not.

There’s another type of forum poster. They are called ‘trolls’ and make most people miserable when they encounter them. They are argumentative, and in many ways, more destructive than spammers - as they don’t care that people are actually civil to one another - instead, all they care about is causing a fuss.

So, as long as you’re not a troll, people will read your answers with interest.

The dos and don’ts of posting to a forum for advertising.

There are several dos and don'ts when posting to forums, and if you follow them, you'll find that you'll make friends, influence people, and of course, generate tonnes of traffic, all at once.

1. Do use a sigline – always use a sigline within the remit of the forums themselves. If you're allowed to use your sigline to promote, then do so. Make sure you're using relevant urls, and keep the information current.
   
   
2. Write replies that aren't aggressive, but ARE challenging – a knack in writing information on forums, is to give people more information, and challenge them to understand and follow through on the information that you're providing, without causing reasonable people to argue. There IS a difference between reasonable forum occupants (99.99% of them) and trolls.
   
   
3. Answer questions honestly, and without promotion that is unnecessary. If you've gotten to the point where you're transient questions constantly, its easy to slip into the habit of answering 'almost related questions' with the same information that you'd use to promote your expertise – which, in turn, can have you seen as a spammer.
   
   
4. Don't give away the farm – unless you're sure that the information is freely available elsewhere, remember that you want people to visit your site – having said that, giving people a short 'teaser' answer and then telling them to come to your site might also gain you a reputation for being a bit of a miser. So you have to find a middle ground. You can't answer every question and still expect to get business.
   
   
5. Write what you know, and back it up – if you can't back up anything that people are questioning you'll probably find that people challenge you, whether they have just cause or not (see trolls) so if you're providing information that needs documentation or backed up, make sure you CAN back it up.
   
   
6. Don't waste your time – if a forum is dissolving into pointless spamming, arguing 'etc' – walk away. You can always check back at intervals and see if things are better later, but it is a waste of your time to promote on a forum that isn't cared for.
   
   
7. Don't be a troll – trolling, or the act of specifically picking fights and arguments with others is something you should avoid, under any circumstances. If someone tries to harass you, or are looking to get a rise out of you on a forum, remember that its better to ignore and start a new thread than fire off with both barrels.