Have you ever used paid posters?

As an owner of a new forum, I'm thinking about how to get members to join my forum. Nobody wants to join an empty community. Have you used paid posters before? Was it worth it?

My forum is about food blogging, so I'm not sure if that would work with me. Food bloggers usually have a blog, facebook page, and twitter account which most people fake posting would not have, unless they are a food blogger.

 

I myself am a freelance poster and I have used paid posters myself before. I find them useful and others do too since I get a nice amount of requests.

 

I've only used Postloop and other post exchanges services. Paid posters would work great if you also use PostLoop or post exchanges on top of buying posts. That way, you can build the foundation of your community and grow from there.

 

I've never used paid posters.

Still, for your own site, have you thought about asking established food bloggers or others interested in the subject to post articles or something? Or to give the site a mention on their blog? That'd help ten times more than any amount of paid for content.

 

Yeah cm30, I'm definitely going to do that. My wife is a food blogger so she has a network of food blogger friends on Facebook and Twitter.

One thing that struck me is that most food bloggers aren't familiar with posting on a forum. There will be a bit of a learning curve for them to start posting.

I'm thinking about having a contest to encourage people to join. Someone had a good idea on here to give members a "raffle entry" per post. I'll probably try that.

 

I've always ran $100 posting contests to get the ball running. Do you have any funds available? Blogging and posting on a forum is quite similar, so all you'd need to do is walk them through it, which should be pretty easy. You could also giveaway an Amazon gift card or something. A raffle is nice as well.

Remember though, before you do anything, make sure your community has a few, if not a lot of topics for users to post on. I always figure its a good idea to seed your forum with content before advertising it. Especially with doing post exchanges, postLoop or hiring paid posters.

 

Yep, I started a $100 gift card contest to Williams-Sonoma, a high end cookware company. I'm definitely not going to hire paid posters.

I'm happy with the results of week one so far, 18 people have joined and I've been getting new posts daily. We are pushing hard on the facebook page to get people to come over to the site. Its been working well so far, we already have 166 likes on facebook.

What's funny is I don't believe that anyone has come over for the contest yet.

 

I haven't done it myself, but I work as a paid poster. And hey, lookie there....I actually happen to be a food blogger, so you should hit me up if you're still considering paying for some content to help boost things along. Even if not, you should at least list the blog or social network links....I'm always looking to broaden my network.

 

I've used postloop before and I've been very happy with the results. The thing I like about @Ryan 's site is that you can somewhat control the quality of post that you get. I've also done post exchanges but not in a few years, postloop is what I would use if trying to help a community these days.

PS.. There is a link in my signature if you want to sign up under us.

 

Just checked out postloop, looks pretty interesting.

@Jessi, thanks for the offer, but I'm getting enough interest so far so I want to see how it plays out. The site is FoodBlogLife.com, you should stop by and say hello .

Do I need a certain amount of posts to create a signature? I couldn't find the option to add it, maybe I'm missing something.

 

You have to be in the "active" group which is 20-25 messages, one like and a member for one week.

 

Ah, fair enough. I'll be there soon

 

Mush, glad to see that you're getting enough interest! It can be hard in the beginning, but you seem to be doing fine.

 

I never paid anyone to post on my forum, only post exchanges with a mixed result. Some exchangers were good, and others made low quality posts.

I've been paid to post on forums multiple times in the past though, and I'd consider doing it again. It helps get a little bit of extra money in my spare time.

 

Ask a few of your friends to help.

 

I myself have used paid posters recently in my community, with proper advertising, my forum took off like a rocket ship! But after a LOT of renovations and down-time from the renovations, we lost a lot of members and I had to use paid members to help cover the loss of regular active members.

 

I never paid for posters, my forum is a little technical, I don't think it would be a good idea to pay for posters in my case.

 

Yes I have and own a paid posting marketplace myself. Some forums can really benefit from some 'blood' in them, so I see no harm in this, especially if the posts are useful and well done.

 

My forum is about radio controlled cars, quite hard to find people to post on this subject. I prefer to have less messages but more quality messages. But yes, I'd like to have 50000 active members

 

Well if it was because of the renovations and downtime, you could still potentially bring a bunch of those people back, couldn't you? After all, if they were active before, they may be interested to know that you have a new look and are back up and running now. Send them a mass email inviting them back!