How To Use Online Forums To Promote Your Website

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Forums can be a great tool for promoting your website’s link to a niche group of interested people.

However, most people do not do it right.

With a focus on promoting links, most webmasters simply spam forums and never contribute anything useful or worthwhile. Not only will this not get anyone to click, you will likely end up getting banned from the forum and your links will be removed.

Quality vs. Quantity

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Whenever you are logging into a forum, remind yourself of the magic mantra:

Give more; take less.

Remember to contribute more in value than you are getting from placing a link there. This builds a great deal of trust with the members of the forum, making them more likely to check out your site.

It may seem counterintuitive, but the member who appears the most selfless is the one who will get the most benefit. This is because you are giving a lot of value to other members, and you are giving a signal to the moderators of the forum that you are not there to spam.

Because of that, an occasional link to your website inside of a relevant discussion will not only be condoned, but you will also be thanked for providing such “valuable” information.

  • Read: Why I Joined Internet Marketing Forums And Why You Should Too

PM With Influentials

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Seek out those members who appear to be influencers in your niche. These are the members who can help you make a leap to the next level.

Make it a point to contribute to all discussions that they contribute to, PM them with your point of view and questions, and get to know the individual on a personal level.

After a few value-filled messages, you can request for a backlink or a review of your website. They’ll likely accept and be happy to help.

Flame Bait

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One of the most popular ways of inserting a link is within a forum signature.

Everyone knows that this can bring in traffic, but why aren’t a lot of people clicking? It is because we have not provoked them enough to get curious and check us out.

The best way to fix this is through flame baiting.

Here’s the technique: Every niche has its own controversial topics that can invoke heated discussions and passionate debaters. Periodically start a topic on one of these controversial topics and let the flame grow.

So many people debating back and forth will get curious onlookers to click on your link and check out your site.

5 Secrets to Promote Your Site Via Forum

1. Finding a good Forum

Not all forums are created equal.  Some are small highly targeted affairs while others are large forums with very broad topics.  Some forums are pro-business and welcome a little self-promotion (Warrior Forums is a good example) while other forums are communistic affairs that boot anyone who even breaths about their business online.

You will be making a serious commitment to any forum you plan to use for promotion, so shop like you would for a long term girlfriend/boyfriend.  Each forum develops a personality of its own so you and the forum better match up in style, interests, and approach to life.  If there is not a good match you will be frustrated and the promotion will fail.

Search “niche +forum” to identify possible candidates to join.

2. Make your profile shine

Choose an appropriate non-offensive but memorable user name and fill out your profile with some reasonable detail.  Do not include AIM and Yahoo profile links – only spammers do that.  Do include a link to your main website if there is a spot for it.  Look around at how much detail some of the forum thought leaders put in for a guide.

3. Use Your Signature

If the forum allows signatures definitely put an anchored link into your signature.  Be sure you understand the forum policies on signatures first though so you do not make enemies with the management.  If in doubt, ask first by private message.

4. Start and Respond to Topics

Regularly visit the forum, starting good topics and making intelligent comments.  Where it fits well into the conversation drop in the occasional anchored link to your blog, but make sure you are not offensive or off topic.

Don’t always link to your stuff, link to other interesting resources too.  Score big points by posting appropriate links to the blogs of the forum thought leaders and up and coming members.  Others might even reciprocate (but NEVER ask them too).

If you blog, occasionally you can write a killer post with a little controversy.  Post a summary and link to the forum as a new thread, asking others what they think.  Say something like “If I got this wrong please let me know“.  Participate in the resulting discussion, but not too much since your comments can end the discussion if everyone thinks you have your answer now.  This technique can be very effective to bring in traffic to your blog posts.

5. Be Engaging to Engage Others

Forget using a forum to promote yourself unless you are prepared to come to the forum regularly and contribute.  As a regular poster you will develop trust and make friends who will engage with you in your business, blog or websites.  As a rare poster you will be considered a lousy drive-by spammer worthy only of being banned.

Also read:

These are just a few ways to promote your website via forums. But these simple techniques are sure to get you valuable visitors.

Do you have any tips to share on promoting via forums? Let me hear your thoughts in the comments below.

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Authored By
Anand Srinivasan is the founder of KnewThis.com - a website for affiliate webmasters to earn unlimited backlinks to their site. Learn more about how it works by clicking here

51 thoughts on “How To Use Online Forums To Promote Your Website”

  1. Rhodelyn B.

    Wonderful post. I have read it from the top to the bottom. It is beneficial mostly for us who are new bloggers. I have now an idea in which way I can not spam the site and now knows that it is more important to give more and take less. I checked to notify me by email of new posts because I found your posts beneficial. I love reading your posts. Keep it up!

  2. gabriel

    Wonderful article, I was looking for something like this, congratulations this will help me a lot.

  3. Abi

    Very true, forums helps build authority and drives traffic as well..Nice article written but I also find that knewthis.com is not working

  4. Davinder

    Hi Anand

    I tried opening knewthis.com. Its not opening. Want to know more about it.

  5. Bithiri Sathi

    A very interesting news about forum submission.
    Thank You very. keep going nice article.

  6. Jimmy & Tina

    Whenever I do a search and trying to learn more about managing our website I always find myself here! Thank you ShoudMeLoud for all the great information you bring to your readers! I will be adding forums to my list of things to do and appreciate the information

  7. John Newman

    Some great tips there on forum promotion. The same could be applied for comments. I must say that the people who regularly comment do add excellent insight. But the people who pop in every once in a while typically would only add a quick statement like “Good article. A+!”

  8. Siddique Khan

    You give good knowledge about how to use Forums for the promotion of our website .
    You have share good tips , These tips will help me a lot .

  9. Vikash Kumar

    I like your points. you really care about your Target market you have to win their trust, that means targeted visitors who believe you

  10. medicalbulkbuy

    I have created many Backlinks for my website but it shows less no in alexa. Can you please tell me what can i do to get high quality backlinks???

  11. pankaj

    Hello harsh,
    Can you please tell me that building authenticity/points or being active in the forum will help to get a quality backlink or not.
    thanks

  12. George Unkyno

    what about the link you can put in you forum account profile?thats helps right?

  13. Suresh

    I have created many backlinks for my website but in Semrush its showing very less no. What can be the reason can any one help me? And How I can make good quality of backlinks?

  14. Avenger

    Really very useful article thanks for posting folks. I added many backlinks but in alexa it shows only 2 links can you please help me on that folk. Thank you in advance

    1. Harsh Agrawal

      @Avenger
      Alexa is not the right way to check backlinks, as they update often. If you looking for free backlink checker, look at OpenLinkProfiler or check out this post where I have listed few more.

  15. Yousuf

    The problem I see in most newbie bloggers is that they are looking for results quick and they can’t hold too long before promoting their websites, which is seen by others (and actually is) spam. It’s both eviction from the forum as well as bad reputation

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