Member Avatar for harishankar

Do you think that word of mouth marketing is the best option for promoting new forums, particularly when it's a niche forum which doesn't cater to a general audience and you cannot easily promote through normal channels?

That is tell friends and relatives about the forum and try to spread the word around?

What are your suggestions?

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Dani AI

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Thread context: asked whether word‑of‑mouth (WOM) is the best way to launch a niche forum. Several replies here correctly note WOM’s power, but what’s missing is a practical, repeatable plan that turns sporadic mentions into a living community.

Start with a short founder phase (30–90 days) that treats WOM as one channel in a system. Map 10–15 places the niche already gathers (forums, mailing lists, meetups, Slack/Discord groups, newsletters). Recruit 6–10 founding contributors and give them clear roles: seed 20–40 high‑quality starter threads (FAQ, resource lists, 3 opinion/debate posts), welcome new members, and run the first event (AMA or challenge). Make first‑visit activation frictionless: a pinned “Start here” thread, a clear value statement and one obvious next step.

Turn advocates into predictable referrers rather than hoping for random mentions. Provide lightweight share assets (short blurbs, one‑line invites, a small banner or signature graphic), create simple recognition (founder badges, public thank‑yous), and offer a defined benefit for bringing peers (early moderator status, content co‑hosting). That converts enthusiastic mentions into repeatable invites without spamming other communities. This builds on points raised by and while avoiding scattershot promotion.

Protect growth by prioritizing retention and quality. Instrument signups with simple UTMs, track activation (first post/return within 7 days) and DAU/MAU, and fix the largest drop‑off in the funnel first. Active moderation, clear posting rules and quick replies reduce the negative WOM warned about. A practical objective for the founder phase: recruit ~8 champions, seed ~30 useful threads, host 2 events, and measure whether >25% of signups return in week one — then iterate on channels that produce returning users rather than raw signups.

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Member Avatar for Dani

I think that word of mouth marketing is definitely extremely important. However, it does not have to be limited to friends and family you know in real life. It can easily extend to viral marketing online. For example, mention your site in your blog, or encourage online contacts and associates to blog about your site. Submit and syndicate press releases about your site (there are a number of free [search]press release services[/search] out there).

Member Avatar for harishankar

I've asked a few bloggers I know to spread the word about my new project. I also posted a message in my blog about this. Hopefully they will respond :)

So far I havent' got a single member in 3 days of launch, but since it's kind of a niche forum, I cannot expect a general audience. I need my specific audience to find me first. ;)

Member Avatar for Dani

I would read some of the posts I have about how to start a new forum. I give away all the secrets I used to get DaniWeb off the ground.

Member Avatar for mddv

I aggree that Word of Mouth advertising is best for any business either online or offline. But remeber that people are more likely to talk about negative experiences than positive.

Member Avatar for cool_78

I think word of mouth advertising is a bit slow, I believe posting in forums and blogging about it is better

Member Avatar for nomax5

Plug – plug I found a forum to plug my new site as its word of mouth marketing related.

Okay my site makes email signature images that look just like business cards.
They link to your website obviously.

If I could use cscgal as an example, and lets say I make her a card for free (which I would btw)
A really nice looking card, white with the purple and yellow matching this site.
Daniweb logo on the top left, her photo top right
Details
Name and tag line
“The Queen of DaniWeb”
email
website etc.

That card could be used every time she sends or replies to an email.
It’s my guess that it would get clicked on far more than a regular hyperlink in a signature.

The trick is this:
Cscgal might have another website that we don’t know about, a website she’s trying to market, so she would use a different email card “beemailcard” to promote that site.

Anyways that’s the plan.

Member Avatar for nomax5

Did I write that? sheeesh it has an air if desperation about it, I don't know what I was on that day.

It was meant to be enthusiastic, I'm a big fan of WOMM because its so very cheap - little or now cost advertising you've got to love that.

Member Avatar for net4nuts

I would say that word of mouth marketing is good, but you will grow only when you are able to retain your existing visitors/customers. It is always cheaper to retain a customer/visitor then to find new customers. If you are able to retain existing ones, new ones will keep coming automatically

Member Avatar for selfhelpebooks

I would say the Internet is the best way to get across your site. Word of mouth sure helps, but you can't beat reaching a very large audience throughout the world!

Member Avatar for lajocar

Word of mouth is the best. Just look at Google. They did not pay millions on advertising. because of their good se tech people told other people

:)

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