The best topic(s) to start a forun nowadays?
- Thread starter OverHere
- Start date
Moshe1010
Well-known member
Something that:
1. You are interested in
2. You have the knowledge and passion to put time in
Any general forums these days are a recipe for failure. I include specific gaming, movies, general idea(s) that are known to die in few months/years. Not sure why people keep opening forums about these things ,but I guess its their pleasure so be it.
1. You are interested in
2. You have the knowledge and passion to put time in
Any general forums these days are a recipe for failure. I include specific gaming, movies, general idea(s) that are known to die in few months/years. Not sure why people keep opening forums about these things ,but I guess its their pleasure so be it.
craigiri
Well-known member
What they said.
The smaller the niche, the better......
I blogged about starting a niche site......here:
http://www.craigsfire.com/starting-a-successful-web-site-series/
The smaller the niche, the better......
I blogged about starting a niche site......here:
http://www.craigsfire.com/starting-a-successful-web-site-series/
wedgar
Well-known member
Do you have any hobbies? Something that you have some expertise or knowledge on?
Do you have access to ways to market your forums to prospective members?
I am involved in a national organization that has several thousand local affiliates. My plans for my forum are to offer information and training forums to those affiliates.
Market for me will be using the national organization's website and emails to the local affiliate officers a little at a time.
All of the prior comments are on the mark.
Just don't expect it to take off overnight!
Good luck!
Do you have access to ways to market your forums to prospective members?
I am involved in a national organization that has several thousand local affiliates. My plans for my forum are to offer information and training forums to those affiliates.
Market for me will be using the national organization's website and emails to the local affiliate officers a little at a time.
All of the prior comments are on the mark.
Just don't expect it to take off overnight!
Good luck!
OverHere
Active member
Cool, but there only seem to be only a few forums out there that are actually making good money, like digitalpoint, warrior forum, not many others... By good money I mean at least $USD 15,000 a month.
Sure the forum should be a specific niche but general topic blogs like mashable (as opposed to forums) seem to be the ones raking in the $$$'s ...
TPerry
Well-known member
Then start a general topic blog like mashable. 
Forums are very hit and miss... if you are doing it strictly to make money from let me give you a suggestion. Take a big pile of money, pour some lighter fluid on it and pitch a match at it.... that's usually what you can consider (at least for the first few years) a forum to be the equivalent of. There is no "get rich quick" formula for a forum... it takes time and effort and money.
I'd also suggest - if you are doing it just to make money, then that will show up to the users. Most of the sites that take off are ones that started out as a "love" of their developer.... those that are in it for the "money" are easily figured out.
Forums are very hit and miss... if you are doing it strictly to make money from let me give you a suggestion. Take a big pile of money, pour some lighter fluid on it and pitch a match at it.... that's usually what you can consider (at least for the first few years) a forum to be the equivalent of. There is no "get rich quick" formula for a forum... it takes time and effort and money.
I'd also suggest - if you are doing it just to make money, then that will show up to the users. Most of the sites that take off are ones that started out as a "love" of their developer.... those that are in it for the "money" are easily figured out.
OverHere
Active member
Then start a general topic blog like mashable.
Forums are very hit and miss... if you are doing it strictly to make money from let me give you a suggestion. Take a big pile of money, pour some lighter fluid on it and pitch a match at it.... that's usually what you can consider (at least for the first few years) a forum to be the equivalent of. There is no "get rich quick" formula for a forum... it takes time and effort and money.
I'd also suggest - if you are doing it just to make money, then that will show up to the users. Most of the sites that take off are ones that started out as a "love" of their developer.... those that are in it for the "money" are easily figured out.
Yes, I agree with your last sentence - my forum is a general picture-initiated forum, from the point of love for pics... but, financial success of it is a must where no one will ever detect that until it has a membership base well into a few hundred thousand...
You gotta have financial ambition for your forum also, otherwise you may as work for a charity (you can do most kind of hobby-related work as a Volunteer in most places, so, why sit on a computer all day if you don't wanna get $ out of it?).
If you start a forum with personal passion on a subject you love sitting behind the pc all day creating something others enjoy as well is the best feeling you can get. No dollars can beat that feeling.
When money is the only goal believe me you can better put all that time and energy into a simple cleaning job and make loads of more money in the long run
OverHere
Active member
I agree that money can not be the only goal with a forum, but my point is that most people who start a forum are not millionaires and deep down they all haven the core intention of making at least some money out of the forum - where most intend to make more than a regular average job.If you start a forum with personal passion on a subject you love sitting behind the pc all day creating something others enjoy as well is the best feeling you can get. No dollars can beat that feeling.
When money is the only goal believe me you can better put all that time and energy into a simple cleaning job and make loads of more money in the long run
This is my opinion...
OverHere
Active member
if this was the case you wouldn't see a single ad on a single forum... no visitor to a forum likes ads on it.
There are plenty of forums that have no ads at all. If you have a passionate community that donates to help with the running costs ads aren't needed. If you just have a discussionboard with no extra's the running costs of a forum are really really low.
However if you offer other services that require more bandwidth, servers, hard- and software you might be forced to run ads to help you cover the monthly costs. That was our reason to start using Google Ad(non)sense.
But to answer your question on topic, these are the highest paying niches for Adsense. So starting a community around one of the topics should be good for a $-project. Expect some competition though
However if you offer other services that require more bandwidth, servers, hard- and software you might be forced to run ads to help you cover the monthly costs. That was our reason to start using Google Ad(non)sense.
But to answer your question on topic, these are the highest paying niches for Adsense. So starting a community around one of the topics should be good for a $-project. Expect some competition though
OverHere
Active member
There are plenty of forums that have no ads at all. If you have a passionate community that donates to help with the running costs ads aren't needed. If you just have a discussionboard with no extra's the running costs of a forum are really really low.
However if you offer other services that require more bandwidth, servers, hard- and software you might be forced to run ads to help you cover the monthly costs. That was our reason to start using Google Ad(non)sense.
But to answer your question on topic, these are the highest paying niches for Adsense. So starting a community around one of the topics should be good for a $-project. Expect some competition though
Yes, you are right... lets see how my forum goes... I certainly intend to net some decent $ from it... but, hey, everyone has their own unique ambitions...
OverHere
Active member
There are plenty of forums that have no ads at all. If you have a passionate community that donates to help with the running costs ads aren't needed. If you just have a discussionboard with no extra's the running costs of a forum are really really low.
However if you offer other services that require more bandwidth, servers, hard- and software you might be forced to run ads to help you cover the monthly costs. That was our reason to start using Google Ad(non)sense.
But to answer your question on topic, these are the highest paying niches for Adsense. So starting a community around one of the topics should be good for a $-project. Expect some competition though
By the way, for a growing general forum, apart from AdSense, what other revenue models are there to be utilised?
OverHere
Active member
A General Topics forum is still a safe bet, both for making money & general popularity: http://www.discussworldissues.com/forums/
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