What makes you come back to a forum?

In other words - what keeps you coming back? Is it the community? The content? Or?

Personally, I'd go with the community because if it wasn't for the community, I have no clue where I'd be - probably on other forums.

 

I'd go with the community as well.
If it's a friendly forum with members that genuinely want to help out, I'll come back time and time again.
The higher quality the content is a plus as well but that can be overlooked and built later if the members are friends.

 

I believe friendly forums tend to pull more members in than the non-friendly ones. I know if I receive some help on a community I'll come back to it as well. And plus, I like reading articles and reviews - that's another turn on for me and makes me come back. If the staff members are nice as well, then I'll stick by it.

 

Mainly the community, I will help a lot of some forums because they have helped me in return, and the amount of content on some forums make me come back.

 

If users are rude, and not so helpful, I don't think I could have a place within that community. I love helping out, and I enjoy communities like that as well.

 

If people actually attempt to engage with me, I will usually come back

Also if people ask me, I try to come back as well

 

I'd go with two big Cs this time! Community and Content. A forum with great content is valued by me and attracts my attention to sign up, but the community is what makes me come back time and time again. Over time users get to know one another and it's like a small family. :p

 

The content and the community and maybe a little bit of paid to post feature. myLot is one of the biggest and most visited forum in the world for the reason that it has a lot of members and a lot of content and because they pay for posts even if its just little.

 

There are plenty of forums that host great content, ie the members in that forums shall be very knowledgeable in that field. But sometimes, we may find that the members are not polite and neither do they offer any help when we ask for it. But in other forums, we may see that the members are polite and are indeed ready to help us if we ask, but they may not be knowledgeable and probably shall be newbies. So I think its better to draw a line between the community and the content in the forum, and stick to such a forum.

 

Usually when the members are nicer, the community does better in the long run. True or false?

 

True. A lot of members leave once stuff gets out of hand and flaming runs rampant. Often times, an ex-member will start a competing forum of their own...

Personally, content is what gets me signed up on a forum. Good content is what keeps me there (for example, how to's, step-by-step articles, relevant info, correct info, copious amounts of content on things that interest me).

Community is what makes me active though. A friendly community encourages posting vs just lurking.

 

Also, design & aesthetics plays a big part too. A poorly designed layout with hard to use and hard to find content steers me (or anyone) away...

 

Always the community. I may stumble across a forum because of the content, but I'm only going to join in for the community. I could get the content anywhere else if I really wanted to.

 

Actually, I think the content now plays a bigger role than the community. I've already been to lots of forums that have literally the same content and I leave after a few posts because there is nothing new to talk about. I'm not really a fan of posting the same replies over and over again on different forums.

 

That's a good point. I don't like repeating myself either. At the same time, if a forum has a bunch of "new content," but nobody is discussing it, then I'm unlikely to come back either. I would just read and then leave. I want to be able to discuss things with people instead.

 

It's the Resources and Content is what makes me come back time and time again, but it's the Community that makes me engage and comment.

 

I prefer friendly community.

 

The community may run better, but if the forum is simply flooded with newbies, what's the point of discussing anything in the forum? Almost all the replies and posts to a thread that we make shall be "Thank You", "Good Post", or something similar. There shall not be any real activity within the forum, and I dont think I shall go for such forums, even if the members are nice.

 

The people/community. If there is an active community and they are friendly/helpful, I usually keep coming back. It also helps if there are members who have been on the forum for awhile rather than a bunch of newbies.

 

Activity and friendliness are the two things that make me come back to a community. Obviously there are other factors like the skin, time and interest in the topic but they are less important factors for me.