is growing a board that hard?
- Thread starter talk2d
- Start date
Mike Edge
Well-known member
I just like my job because I get to play with fun stuff... like new server hardware that just went in.
https://forums.digitalpoint.com/threads/new-server-hardware-for-the-geeks.2654797/
8 new servers (each server has 32 CPU cores, 256GB RAM, really, really, really fast and reliable hard drives [6 of them]).
I can't lie.. I'm super jelly! Congrats on your massive upgrade!
Forsaken
Well-known member
You'll get more out of actually growing your active members rather than using post exchanged type service.
ThunderBird2
Member
yes, you are correct. I think, It takes between 6 months - 1 years to have more active members, depending. If in case, some forums are drying with very few members and continue to decline, just use post exchanges type service?
Digital Doctor
Well-known member
Are you an expert in the topic of your forum ?
Forsaken
Well-known member
Post exchanges might work for more mainstream subjects (gaming, technology, general forums, etc) because the subjects are well known, but for vaguer subjects you're not as likely to get posts that are pertinent to your subject.
Not to mention that due to no vested interest in your community most post exchange posters don't really put much effort into what they post or to actually drive along conversations. It is better to work on quality content and to pull in members than to waste time with most post exchanges.
craigiri
Well-known member
Hah, just passed 100 members......on the new forum!
I'm investing a bit of money and time to grow the membership...a giveaway, some emails (to members on my other forums), etc...
It appears from the members who signed up and introduced themselves, that they will be valuable and ongoing community members.
I'm not sure what critical mass is - to me it's more about the numbers of readers than members - but I think we will get there within a couple months.
All in all, I think if we get lucky that the real startup phase will be 6 months (March to August).
I'm investing a bit of money and time to grow the membership...a giveaway, some emails (to members on my other forums), etc...
It appears from the members who signed up and introduced themselves, that they will be valuable and ongoing community members.
I'm not sure what critical mass is - to me it's more about the numbers of readers than members - but I think we will get there within a couple months.
All in all, I think if we get lucky that the real startup phase will be 6 months (March to August).
TheBigK
Well-known member
DigitalPoint is currently throwing an error for me. So can't check the thread. But if I'm reading it right, does DP 'really' need 8 servers each with 32 CPU cores, 256 GB RAM?
I'm wondering whether it's the total number of posts/threads or simultaneous online users that requires that kind of setup?
Mike Edge
Well-known member
Deepmartini
Well-known member
People only value what they pay for. Forums are good but you also need PAID content. Membership sites are a good example, people come for the content but they stay for the community. There really is no difference between a forum and a CMS, it's all content just presented differently.
You need to re-frame your site. It's not just a forum, it's a private community with premium content. Calling it just a forum cheapens it. You're a special "club" of people.
You need to re-frame your site. It's not just a forum, it's a private community with premium content. Calling it just a forum cheapens it. You're a special "club" of people.
digitalpoint
Well-known member
Had site down for a little bit to migrate a few forum tables to ndbcluster storage engine.
None of the forum really... We also have some fairly big things running on the same cluster.
These are the 3 big resource hogs:
As serving platform that is serving up ads for every page view of sites using it. https://advertising.digitalpoint.com/
Geotargeting and logging to database the geographical location of every visitor on every page view of every site using this tool (there are probably about 250,000 sites using it): https://tools.digitalpoint.com/geovisitors
The world's largest search historical search engine position tracker (used by about 100,000 users): https://tools.digitalpoint.com/tracker
It took 4 years to get this "hobby" to the point where it would break even, now I clear $1-2K annually after expenses. I started my first forum (still around) 61 months ago.
I've never been able to get much out of Amazon except towards Christmas.
InfoLinks helps the bottom line a bit but if you introduce it into a forum it will ruffle a few feathers. Sometimes it's astonishing how people who don't pay the bills think they own the place.
AdSense is the best deal out there, but it's harder to get accepted now than it it used to be.
The key is content. An "ideal" forum has content that will attract members through search engines, and those members in turn will create more content to fuel the engines.
My best moneymaker generates traffic through search engines. There are few members, and very few active members who don't generate any real content. It's mostly myself blogging + Google traffic.
My #2 forum has several hundred members, including a hardcore group that's there every day, and they create much of the content.
#3 has a lot of passive members who drop in & post when they need something. Most traffic is from Google.
Most of my other forums are created for special purposes/niches and I don't expect them ever to to be very popular.I probably wouldn't have the time to deal with it if they were. And there were a couple non-starters than I never bothered to migrate from vBulletin.
I've never been able to get much out of Amazon except towards Christmas.
InfoLinks helps the bottom line a bit but if you introduce it into a forum it will ruffle a few feathers. Sometimes it's astonishing how people who don't pay the bills think they own the place.
AdSense is the best deal out there, but it's harder to get accepted now than it it used to be.
The key is content. An "ideal" forum has content that will attract members through search engines, and those members in turn will create more content to fuel the engines.
My best moneymaker generates traffic through search engines. There are few members, and very few active members who don't generate any real content. It's mostly myself blogging + Google traffic.
My #2 forum has several hundred members, including a hardcore group that's there every day, and they create much of the content.
#3 has a lot of passive members who drop in & post when they need something. Most traffic is from Google.
Most of my other forums are created for special purposes/niches and I don't expect them ever to to be very popular.I probably wouldn't have the time to deal with it if they were. And there were a couple non-starters than I never bothered to migrate from vBulletin.
