Safe to say Forums don’t make Money!
Posted on June 19, 2007 by
Adie 
Forums 
34 Comments
Forums are great places to chat, have heated debate’s and learn lots of information from. The main point of posting in forums (from a marketing/business point of view) is to get people to visit your website.
Procrastination sets in when you visit forums. If you must visit them, get in and get out, close the browser or tab once you’ve got what you need. You’ll end up wasting even more time consuming sometimes useless information that will take your mind away from what you were mean’t to be achieving for the day.
For a Marketer using forums is a great way to get FREE traffic but I would rather pay someone to leave informative posts which would have my signature/URL at the bottom of it. This leaves me to produce good content for my website. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy Marketing and organising a Marketing Campaign but I would rather organise it rather than spend time actually leaving comments for FREE traffic!
The point of this post was to get across the fact that forums don’t make money and I think its fairly safe to say they don’t. When I say don’t I mean not a lot. Hardly enough to live on anyway, they are hard to monetize, they take up lots of time to manage/moderate until you get to stage, way down the road where you can pay a forum moderator to run it for you. This means paying them a wage out of your already small profit.
One good way to run a forum would be to build one up around your content/website not for monetization but for the high Traffic levels your users will generate for you. Eventually getting enough advertising on the site to pay someone to run it for you. You’ll now have the free time to concentrate on your other projects while your forum brings in some great targeted traffic for your website.
This is how I would look to do it anyway….
Do you have a forum that makes a lot of money, by this I mean enough to leave your day job? lets hear from you, prove me wrong.
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Don’t Digital Point forums make about $10,000 a month?
No one except Shawn Hogan (the owner) knows exactly how much, but it is certainly very high and definitely enough to live on.
Um, ever hear of Lee Dodd? Guess you didn’t hear the Net Income interview with Shoemoney where Lee talks about making money with forums. In fact, he’s made a living off of forums. Might want to check out LeeDodd.com.
From what I’ve seen of Lee’s networks his forums are a small percent of his revenue. I think he knows a ton about forums, but you have to take his entire network into consideration when looking at his income. He has a ton of arcade and other MFA sites which I’m sure were much bigger contributers to his famous YPN deposit SS than his forums.
Most forums don’t make a lot of money because they are hard to get off the ground. You need a lot of traffic and a lot of members. It also depends on the niche.
That said, my forum http://www.webmaster-talk.com makes enough money for me to live off of. It would not be enough for a lavish lifestyle but enough to pay the mortgage and all other bills. I do have additional revenue coming in from several other projects.
Tim, I couldn’t agree with you more about getting the forums off the ground. you can check out my online community dedicated to quality, six sigma, and project management.
http://www.templatestaff.com
I know a few people who have forums that earn them enough to live off of. However, it’s definitely fair to say they spend much much more time running their forum than others I know who run content sites, blogs, etc.
You can make money from any site. Period. The only variable is the amount of hours and money you have to put in - forums take a lot of both in almost all cases.
Tyler Cruz makes on average of $275 a day from his sites. He says the major player in this income is his forum PokerForum.org
Plus you can earn loads from premium membership forums. Places like webhostingtalk.com & even seoblackhat forums i am guessing earn loads.
I thought Digital Point did real well for itself. I could never run a forum … too much work and too many idiots
To say that forums don’t make money is a somewhat ignorant statement in my opinion. It’s true that when it comes to traditional CPM/CPA ads that are served in the thousands on every page, forums aren’t ideal, mostly because they have an extremely high return rate for each visitor.
Of course, that doesn’t mean that there’s no way of capitalizing on loyal, returning visitor however. And your statement that you need to pay for moderators leads me to believe that you’ve never actually run a decently sized forum to be honest. In the past I’ve run small, medium and large sized forums, and I have never once had trouble finding dedicated members who are willing to help out with the moderation without any monetary compensation.
That being said, I most certainly agree that forums are by no means an easy way to make money online, and that they require far more effor than other possibilities online before they actually start generating revenue.
I’ve never run a forum, but having spoken to a few forum owners and been an active member of one for many years. My understanding is they’re simply, time consuming monsters.
The income return on time investment is awful when compared with other options online.
As I said, I would rather have someone running a forum for me than having to spend the time and effort keeping it running myself. Simply because I would rather use my creativity and time on other projects.
Maybe…I just don’t have the patience for a forum :)
hi
i am a new forum admin and i think with forum you can get alot of page loads ans so the alot of money only time can prove me wrong and you!!:)
You build community of users on your forum, right? So you have to play the “guru”, in order to have a forum community that buys stuff recommended by you, joins your programs, uses your tools, and spreads it all outside. Am I wrong, is there any better way to monetize internet forums? ]:->
Wow Ive never disagreed with a blog post so much
That’s why he asked to be proved wrong, Do you have a forum or know a forum that makes on par or substantially more than say a blog, content site or similar internet property?
offtopic.com
gaiaonline.com
hondaswap.com
facethejury.com
nexopia.com
christianforums.com
pbnation.com
just a few ;)
Hi Adie,
Forums do make money, but the question behind the question is: Is it a good ROI in terms of time and money.
Vijay
one more thing, time spent on working on your forum can be minimal, you need to enlist good moderators, and a good number of them, they will keep it alive and running smooth.
I know more forums that are more profitable then i know blogs that are profitable.
once its running with sufficient moderators it’s self sustainable and will build on its own, a blog’s constraint is that you still need to write articles yourself or it will die. sure you can bring in lots of guest posters, but we visitied the blog to learn and read about your insights to start with, not these guest posters who post their own URLs, i’ll end up reading their blogs not yours.
Aide,
First off, don’t get discouraged with readers comments about how you should run your blog and everything else that they are saying. Yes I agree that the posts are not similar to what readers were used to, but that happens when a new owner comes onboard. Your posts are targetting more of a beginner internet webmaster rather than what Matt was doing.
Second, yes forums do make money if done correctly. Tyler Cruz does make money off forums like one said either, however as that person also mentioned it’s a poker forum. That ‘forum’ is much more than a forum and is plastered with affiliate links for casinos which pay very well per sign up as most know. Lee Dodd is a forum owner, but his forums are very large and as Matt stated, he owns many other sites as well.
If forums are ran correctly, they’ll make money and are not too time consuming. You have moderators that would do most of the work but doing it b/c they enjoy the community. You then have sponsors paying for banners and links on the site which will give you your income. Yes everyone knows they make less money per pageview than nearly all other type of sites.
/rant.
Seems like this post has really heated things up. Although in a previous post I commented that the site has really gone downhill since Matt sold it, but Kyle’s post illustrated to the point of what the site is aboutn now at that it is really geared to beginning marketers. Where as Matt’s posts we full of case studies and in depth internet marketing concepts, the New Guy has a limited frame of reference.
My advice would be to do your own thing. I really enjoyed the Case Study Tyler Cruz did on getting into Affiliate Marketing. Maybe do youw own case study but I would stay clear of such posts like this where one tries to take a stance or opinion on an area where they do not have much experience in.
Or
Unless this post was meant to stir up some activity, then you are off to a good start.
Two words: Digital Point.
The thing about creating a forum, is you either need to have a very vague niche, or an extremely targeted one. If you think about making a forum about Subject A, think about how many other forums there are out there, and why would people leave their forums to come to yours? If you could implement some way of explaining how your forum has added features, or additional information for them, then you would be great. You would be right when you said it takes a lot of time and a lot of effort.
Jeremy
I run a forum that makes mid $x,xxx a month. I have friends who also earn close to that from forums.
I think this is one of the most interesting discussions I have seen for a long while. I have wondering if forums can make money too. Most of the ones I have been involved with are there to support there main product or service.
i would have to disagree with this post. You can make good money from forums - forums are no different to any other website. If you have a lot of traffic then you can make money from a forum - the hard part is developing the forum in the first place. I could definately live off the earnings i make from just my forums (eg. didnt have earnings from non forum websites).
im actually a bit surprised with this post - im not sure how you came to this conclusion. If you put in as much work with a forum as you did with any other website your sure to make money, you cant simply upload a script and expect it to be a success.
I’m looking for something that integrates with my Joomla! forums. They’ve got great tools for starting an online community (like mine at http://www.templatestaff.com ), however, very few modules integrate with them. I’d love to see a digital point one. I’m using the google adsense one.
Could you give us an example of your own experience with Forums?