TommyCarey
Level X3
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I recently posted something about if I should do a forum or a community discussion for my new website and it got me thinking a lot about the content after we get going. Now as everyone knows the content is the hardest part since it has to be unique and well written. Setting up a forum or community discussion doesn't mean people will flock to it just to put their $0.02 in so they get a pat on the back. You'll need to get the people in there and make them want to stay. If you can't do that, you're dead in the water before you even started 
If you're running your own forum, the easiest way to get people to come in and talk is if they see others talking already. If someone is asking similar questions to what they want to ask, they will chime in and comment if they think there's a need to. Ok, but what if no one is posting content or asking questions, you ask? Well why can't you do that to get the ball rolling?
Post your own content and questions to get the original posts on there for people to talk about. Most forum members would rather comment than post a thread of their own and that's because when you post a thread it's like all the digital eyes are on you lol
Since you're the owner/administrator you'll be seen as a higher authority, so you'll want to both post and comment. Post your own topics and questions as well as answer whatever you can for other people.
And what a lot of people forget is that since you're the owner, you can has has many profiles as you want lmao Go make a few dozen profiles and talk between these profiles to show user engagement and an "active" forum. I know some forum owners who have 500+ profiles and they used all of them at the beginning of the forum. They would register, post, comment, like posts, upvote and all that good stuff. Their forums would get bigger and bigger because of the user engagement and eventually they would sell the forum for a pretty big amount.
You can also pay people to post and comment. Usually this is pretty cheap too, so that's pretty awesome You can pay people like $10 per 100 decent posts that aren't "Nice Post!" and this will help lessen the burden of you having to post everything yourself
All you have to do is think outside of the box and it gets a lot easier
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Cristian
I say "evolve" because I think old school forums like vBulletin are going to slowly die, even the popular ones! Just look at how popular such forums were in the past! Now most of them are in ruin, with a handful of exceptions that are still just a shadow of their formal glory!
Platforms like vBulletin were created with the idea that users from organic traffic will naturally want to register and be a part of the community. But that's not happening in today's world, few people will join a forum and start a discussion just "because" they're a fan of that niche. Nobody has time to hang out on forums like in they did 1999-2005 and most of today's kids don't even understand forums.
Paying people to post and comment will drive some traffic, also organic traffic because forums are ranked pretty good by search engines. But those paid posters will just post as far as they're getting...well, paid! As soon as they won't be paid anymore they'll just scatter into the wind.
I'm not saying you won't be able to develop a community or rank well or turn a profit around. I'm just saying at one point you won't be paying posters anymore and the forum will die. Seen this a couple of times and its pretty sad! I think old fashioned forums are pretty much dead. Sure for websites like SC that already have a lot of authority, forum posts can drive a lot of traffic. But even SC's forum was closed and evolved into the Community Discussion. I say "evolve" because I think old school forums like vBulletin are going to slowly die, even the popular ones! Just look at how popular such forums were in the past! Now most of them are in ruin, with a handful of exceptions that are still just a shadow of their formal glory! Platforms like vBulletin were created with the idea that users from organic traffic will naturally want to register and be a part of the community. But that's not happening in today's world, few people will join a forum and start a discussion just "because" they're a fan of that niche. Nobody has time to hang out on forums like in they did 1999-2005 and most of today's kids don't even understand forums. Paying people to post and comment will drive some traffic, also organic traffic because forums are ranked pretty good by search engines. But those paid posters will just post as far as they're getting...well, paid! As soon as they won't be paid anymore they'll just scatter into the wind. I'm not saying you won't be able to develop a community or rank well or turn a profit around. I'm just saying at one point you won't be paying posters anymore and the forum will die. Seen this a couple of times and its pretty sad!
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