9 Steps To Growing Your Business Using Forum Marketing

by Joshua Dorkin

9 Steps To Successfully Market to a Forum Community

 
In a previous post The Direct and Indirect Approaches to Forum Marketing we talked about the two approaches to forum marketing. I’d like to share the 9 steps you will want to follow to forum marketing success; this is basically a primer on indirect forum marketing (the only approach I fully endorse).

1. Find a forum in the niche you want to market to
2. Check to be sure the site allows you to create a forum signature with a link to your business
3. Set up an account
4. Create a forum signature that includes the following information: your name, website/business name, web address, contact info (if any), description of the website/business (DO NOT USE A SALES PITCH – e.g. The Best Car Parts Shop Around – that stuff is useless). Be descriptive!
5. Find the forum introductions section (most good forums will have one) and tell people about yourself. Talk about your business, but don’t just drop a sales pitch. Let people know what your interests are in the topic beyond your business.
6. PARTICIPATE! Become an active member of the forums. Help others on the site. Get involved in the debate. POST, POST, POST! In time, the members will see you as an expert in the topic. With more posts, your site/business will have more exposure, and you will see results.
7. If the forum has an area for members to advertise in, use it. (if not, don’t post ads on the site; just use your forum signature and your knowledge to do the selling for you)
8. Volunteer to become a moderator on the site (forum administrators will often be willing to trade advertising for good moderators). In addition to the opportunity of getting more exposure, moderators are typically given more respect and looked at with even more authority then other members. With this comes more clicks and more business!
9. Find other forums in the same area of interest and repeat steps 1-8.

Not only have I used these techniques, but I see others use them every day on my site! It is a proven formula. Give it a try and I know you won’t be disappointed!