Best way to 'transplant' a FB group to a Xenforo?

[asymmetricinfo]

Hi guys... I know this is strictly not a pre-sales question but I'm wondering if anyone has any expertise / experience 'migrating' a FB group to a self hosted xenforo instance?

Note that I'm not asking about the technical side of it - as far as I know there's no way to do a bulk export of FB group posts / comments (at least not legally, anyway).

I'm more curious about tips / tactics / strategies people have used to entice their FB group members away from FB and on to their forum... Is it possible? And for those who have done it successfully, do you typically also keep the FB group running in parallel?

 

[Dragonfruit]

I never managed FB groups, so I don't know if this is possible. What I would like to do is keep the FB group or convert it to a page. Just way to keep posting FB updates. If you keep the groups, see if there's a way to post content updates like pages while preventing people from opening thread discussions. Any content news should be reported on both the board and all social media platforms. But do things to encourage people to use the board. Such as linking people to polls, board events (including any giveaways), and showcasing the board's functionality.

 

[Mr Lucky]

I suppose you could always ask Mark Zuckerberg to lend you the database for a while

Seriously I think the best thing is to post and message the people in that group and encourage them to join your forum. I think this is going to be difficult. Also keeping your FB group is competing and diluting the forum.

You just have to somehow persuade them that the forum format is better for serious discussionthat is organised and well archived. I see people here asking how to make the forum more like Facebook - I think that is a huge red herring. Instead play on the strengths of the forum stucture.

 

[Startingup]

This is hard I think, I am trying to do it at the moment too. Do you have a private forum? At the moment ours is public but we are considering changing it.

 

[RandallC]

I would put up a Poll and offer some reasons why you want to get off the platform.

Example Given:
Due to the change in how fb is allowing up to promote content and develop our group I am investing time and effort into other options before google closes our group down. They are censoring and not allowing our group to expand. The best solution is to get off of Facebook to another platform before we are deleted.

Poll: Would you join a new private forum to develop our group more?
Yes
No
.

 

[briansol]

Show your members the benefits

- better search, better threading, still can use your fb ID, PWA app lets you track posts the same way as before, etc etc

 

[Digital Doctor]

The best way is to convince your members it is a benefit to them.

 

[asymmetricinfo]

I've been thinking about this... My forum isn't live yet, so I can't say which of the following (if any) will work, but here's my list of ideas:

- Making oAuth signup / login SUPER obvious... Like on the vertical scope forums (e.g. https://www.halloweenforum.com/), this little popup appears in the bottom right on the homepage:

And there's also a similar 'Join the discussion' on all thread pages too with big continue with fb / continue with google buttons.

- Creating a 'lead magnet'... Like an eBook. I'm using polls on my FB group to ask my members what kind of subject matter they're most interested in, and my plan is to then create high quality PDF content based on those responses and then stick it on the forum but require users to sign up to download it. Will promote this lead magnet everywhere I can on the FB group.

- Create a bunch of high quality content as articles on the forum, and post excerpts of them on the FB group.

-Put some small competitions on the forum (e.g. a $50 voucher for most informative post of the month) and tell FB group members they're eligible to win only if they post on the forum.

- Give people who join from the FB group a special badge (hoping something like https://xenforo.com/community/resources/addonflare-xf2-awards-system.6974/ will let me do that)

That's all I got so far... Any suggestions other ideas are welcome

 

[Fullmoon]

There’s some great suggestions here. Thank you.

 

[TheGroove]

I have a FB page with a little over 160,000 likes and have had a hard time converting those people into actual forum members. However, you can certainly use it to drive traffic to your site by sharing links from posts (that include an image) from your site to your FB page or group. If you're using Google Analytics you can watch it spike in real time.

 

[asymmetricinfo]

@TheGroove thanks for the reply... how much traffic are you able to drive to your forum on average per FB post?

 

[TheGroove]

@TheGroove thanks for the reply... how much traffic are you able to drive to your forum on average per FB post?

Just watching the count after I share the post it can be anywhere from 150 to 300 guests for about an hour or so.

 

[Wildcat Media]

I've spent the last three years trying to convince a client that they need to get their band's followers back to the forum we've had for 20 years, which is now dead. Yet they say the FB group is active and healthy. There are visitors like me who will never join FB, and now anyone who won't belong to that trainwreck are shunned from participating.

Good luck convincing members to go elsewhere. They don't want to leave their dopamine-filled cocoon of FB to discuss anything elsewhere. It's the AOL of the 2010s--nobody wants to leave it. Nobody wants to have to sign up for more than one account, no matter how easy it is.

 

[TheGroove]

I've spent the last three years trying to convince a client that they need to get their band's followers back to the forum we've had for 20 years, which is now dead. Yet they say the FB group is active and healthy. There are visitors like me who will never join FB, and now anyone who won't belong to that trainwreck are shunned from participating.

Good luck convincing members to go elsewhere. They don't want to leave their dopamine-filled cocoon of FB to discuss anything elsewhere. It's the AOL of the 2010s--nobody wants to leave it. Nobody wants to have to sign up for more than one account, no matter how easy it is.

The landscape has definitely changed, everyone has gone to a social media platform but there are still plenty who prefer a nice threaded conversation, it's just a matter of appealing to them.