Internet is all about communication between people. Those people
belong to some groups. People with similar interests form groups
where they are able to discuss about their area of interest, to
help each other and to learn more about other members. One of
the most used ways for communication between like-minded people
are web forums. How this can help to your business?
In order to have success on the Internet you have to have repeat
visits. In order to people visit your site on a regular basis
you have to constantly make your content fresh, to make regular
updates. You can post articles relevant to your business, you
can post the latest industry news and you can have a web forum.
One of the main advantages of web forums over before mentioned
techniques for having a "sticky" web site is that after some
time, web forums are "self going", at least in some way. In
other words, you won't have to spend your time in creating fresh
content - your forum members will do that instead of you! This
doesn't mean that you won't have to do anything. Depending on
the size of the forum, there are people called moderators who
take care that the discussion is going on the right way.
Companies have management, web forums have moderators. Some
popular web forums have more than 50,000 members, and anytime
you can find at least 200-300 people online. Corporate forums
don't have that many members but you will also need at least one
person who will be responsible for your forum.
Web forums are great because this is one of those ways that help
you to stay in touch with your visitors and customers. Visitors
need to complete the registration form so this way you will have
their names and email addresses. This way you can offer them to
subscribe to your email newsletter. Like in subscription forms
for email newsletters, don't require too much information from
your visitors. Every member of your forum will have an unique
username and a password.
Web forums are consisted of categories. So if you are in
Internet marketing business your forum can have categories like
Email Marketing, Search Engines, Domain Names, Web Hosting, Web
Services and etc. For the start, it is better to have fewer
categories that will be more general. Later you can make more
categories that will be more specific. Every category should
have a moderator who is usually very knowledgeable person about
that category who will start interesting discussions and,
therefore, engage other members to post their answers.
The most important thing in having a successful web forum is
quality of posts and then number of posts. Quality and only
after that quantity. When you start your forum, you will
probably have a low posting activity. That's why you will have
to "persuade" your forum members to be posters and not only
lurkers. This won't be so easy.
At first, in lack of discussion, maybe you will need to post
interesting news about your industry and to post smart tips that
you know that are of interest of you members. Later, with
increasing your forum membership base you will have more and
more posting activity. In order to build your membership base
you can ask your members to invite their friends to join the
forum. Also, you can offer a contest based on quality and number
of messages. For example, you can start with choosing the Member
of the Month. Winner will be chosen by other members based on
quality of his/her posts. It is great for increasing loyalty.
Another good thing for increasing your forum activity is to say,
for example, that people with more that 30 posts will get an
e-book and members with more than 100 posts discount on your
products. Usually web forum software categorize members in
groups so new members with less than 10 posts can be in Newbies
group, with less than 100 posts in Juniors category and with
more than 100 posts Addicts. Forum software usually offers a so
called Avatars feature so your members will be able to place an
image below their username. There they can place their photos,
too. Also, quality web forums software offers that members rate
posts.
Web forums are great supplement for articles and email
newsletters, for getting a better feedback. For example, when
you post an article on your web site or in your email
newsletter, at the end of your article you can make a link to a
discussion about that article and topic on your web forum. Also,
you can include subjects of your most popular threads on your
main page.
Having a corporate web forum is a value-added service to your
visitors. If you build a quality web forum they will appreciate
it very much because you are the one who provides them with
source for gaining new knowledge. Also, with web forums you are
building ongoing relationship with your members. Some of them
are your clients and many of them can be your clients. It is up
to you. With providing great answers in your forums you will
increase your credibility that can persuade your members to buy
your services. People buy from companies they trust.
Web forums are very useful for companies in one more way. For
example, if you are a software company, you can (and you should)
make several categories in your forum for your products and
services. There, your members will be able to ask about your
software, to give tips for maximizing its possibilities, to give
suggestions for future upgrades... So this way, many of your
forum members will serve as your technical stuff. Did I say free
of charge?
Quality web forum makes the web site very "sticky". People are
coming back to read new messages, to check if they have private
messages, to post new messages... They will be notified each
time someone replies in thread they watch, if they chose that
option.
Actually, the only disadvantage of web forums is the amount of
time to get it up and running, to have an ongoing conversation
and good members activity. Later you will have to spend your
time for moderation, in order to make sure that members post
appropriate messages, that they are not spamming and that the
discussion is on the right track. However, good news that your
reward will be higher profit, as well. There are quality free
and fee based web forum software. Recommendation for free forum
software goes to Simple Machines -
http://www.simplemachines.org
and for fee-based forum software for vBulletin
http://www.vbulletin.com
About the author:
Dejan Bizinger is a Contributing Editor for Infacta. Infacta is
email messaging services company providing powerful, yet
easy-to-use award-winning Group Mail, software for sending
highly-personalized email messages and Group Metrics, software
for email tracking. For more information visit:
http://www.infacta.com
