MyBB Community Forums

I have a nice little site - and a heck of a lot of visitors. Most of the visitors just dl the free content and disappear.

That is ok by me, I don't want a load of members on the database that are there just to join and grab the content and not post - that is not a member, it is a guest with a username, so I allow guests to download and to comment in the downloads areas.

However, the members I do have are a pretty silent bunch and I have been looking at ways to get them to post. I thought that maybe the visibility of new posts was poor - i.e. - the members did not know there had been a post they could reply to.

So far, to make posts more "visible" I have installed two plugins and made many small template changes and made my own "recent posts" page. >> http://www.leefish.nl/mybb/newposts.php

I see an increase in the existing members posting, and a little increase in membership, but still not many posts.

What actions have other forum owners taken to increase posting activity ? Especially threads. (This is a VERY weak area for leefish).

Looking forward to hearing some good ideas.

Give guests something, but give members a lot more. Do it in 3 ways:
Guests = a couple downloads
Members = a couple and a bit more
Members with 100+ posts = all

People are lazy. They are very rarely create threads. They like to reply. You as admin must start 2 new threads every day.

Solidus had a great idea, It would work also.

There's no way people are gonna make 100 posts to get access to content though. And if they do, they will be bad posts.

The only way to get people to talk is to make them want to talk. Forums are based entirely around the human desire to communicate with one another. However, because your site revolves around downloads and not conversations, there is really not a lot to say other than "thanks!" I think you just may need to accept that there isn't much to be said about this subject.

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(2012-05-14, 12:36 AM)Maj Wrote: [ -> ]People are lazy. They are very rarely create threads. They like to reply. You as admin must start 2 new threads every day.

2 threads? That's a lot. I think my forum sees one new thread a week. But personally I like to things confined to existing threads if possible ...

(2012-05-14, 01:32 AM)brad-t Wrote: [ -> ]2 threads? That's a lot. I think my forum sees one new thread a week. But personally I like to things confined to existing threads if possible ...

I was going to say - your forum is different in that way. You have one thread for each subject pretty much which can be seen as a good or bad thing, it's preference. But the most common approach is different threads, so 2 new threads a day isn't a lot at all. We currently get ~ 55 new threads a day.

(2012-05-14, 01:32 AM)brad-t Wrote: [ -> ]2 threads? That's a lot. I think my forum sees one new thread a week. But personally I like to things confined to existing threads if possible ...

Well... if you need more activity and growth on fresh or inactive board i think you must do it.

I have around 200+ new threads daily.

Brad, that is OK with your site as it has completely different subject. I know of a medical site where its the same case, it all depends on what niche you run and as per your forum, it looks fine, I believe.

(2012-05-14, 02:10 AM)Maj Wrote: [ -> ]

(2012-05-14, 01:32 AM)brad-t Wrote: [ -> ]2 threads? That's a lot. I think my forum sees one new thread a week. But personally I like to things confined to existing threads if possible ...

Well... if you need more activity and growth on fresh or inactive board i think you must do it.

I think the quantity of threads isn't so helpful. What's important is to create threads that can continue for many pages. A page full of single-page threads does not really look good IMO. Most forum lurkers will look at the first page of threads only.

Quantity=/= Quality

If your posts don't have the quality people are looking for, no matter how many threads you make a day it will be futile. You should rather focus on getting something that will grab the attention of users rather than making the forum look a little fuller with no quality in your posts. By this I mean something you make and not a copy-paste article.