your thoughts on my competition?

Hi there

I have been toying with the idea to run a competition to attract new members to my forum. Seems like a shame to have a shiney new forum sitting there with no one on it after all :)

So the idea (borrowed from one I saw on another forum - I have no idea if it worked for them or not):

What do you think? Suggestions or comments appreciated.

Horrid idea. If you would have dropped that link, I would have considered signing up just for the $25. You're going to get spammer galore. I would never suggest doing that.

Dropped the link? What link?

IshWig is saying that HAD the link been posted (which it hasn't, as doing so violates our forum rules), he would have signed up just for the money.

Ah okay. He could have gone and signed up etc but wouldn't have been paid any money. In my original post I said I was toying with the idea - as in thinking about running it - not that I was actually running it :)

Ah okay. He could have gone and signed up etc but wouldn't have been paid any money. In my original post I said I was toying with the idea - as in thinking about running it - not that I was actually running it :)

Oh, I thought you ment someone else was already running this, and you were contiplating running it yourself.

I saw it listed as a possible way to attract visitors. So I was curious on people's thoughts on it potential effectiveness

You're really better off attracting people by the quality of your content, and what kinds of content you're offering. If you've got people there motivated just to get to 250 posts, then you're going to have a bunch of people leave once the contest is over, or if they get to bored spamming to get the $25.

Besides, every thread would end up being something like, "I'M going to get the $25!" "Nuh-uh! I'm going to get it!"

Big no no, all it will encourage is spam, people posting one word replies and just pointless trash to be honest. it will not build a community in anyway as once the prize has gone so will the user. You need to try and build something that will attract members on its own, and only do prizes to mainly encourage them to stay, keeping current members happy is harder than attracting new ones.

Thanks for the advice :)

*scrap idea of offering money*

I'm actually getting contant from the game publish now (the forum is a fan site for a game), so I'll use that content as the means to attract visitors.

I think implemented correctly that an idea along these lines could work.

I tend to agree that offering a prize money of $25 will show your desperation to attract people to your site. It is very bad for a webmaster to show desperation with such offers and constant requests to post content on your site.

More than anything else, it will only attract the spammers. Your genuine posters may get put off by your site all the more.

So I say, wait for your site to grow. Then give them genuine contests like quizzes and games. That will really attract a lot more positive posters and also add an extra edge to your website and give people another reason to visit it often.

This may seem quite obvious, but couldnt you just use the $250 that would have gone to winniners on advertising?

I too am using a similar tactic. Instead of offering money, winner receives 125mb of webspace with a free e-mail account and ftp unlimited bandwidth.
I guess it should be deleted too, right?

I tried this on my community but with referals.....i ended up with about 40 new members who didn't even have an interest in my website lol, bad bad idea. Provide quality content, that is all thats needed.

I have seen contest like this work on some forums, membership on the forums also grew significantly. The prize money wasn't anything close to $250 either, the toal prize amount was $75 I think.. And the new members are still there and still continue to post regularly, the forum went from having a PR of 3 to 5 now. It really depends on the forum.

Hello everyone :D

I thought I would jump here and offer some results on how the contest/incentive quoted in the first post in this thread went. The contest was mine, the first post in this thread is a cut and paste of a post I made at Sitepoint.

Without being long winded, the 250 for $25 performed exactly as I had expected. I was after long term members or "quality" posts, I was looking for activity on a newer forum while I was going to be busy with other projects for a few weeks. Rather than have this newer forum "die" while I was away I made this offer to keep the activity level up.

Worked like a charm.

It's not a right for every forum but for some topics, and in some situations, it's a great tool at the disposal of the forum owner who has a little $.

BTW, I received more posts and members in 1 week, and spent less, than I did using Adwords for over 3 months.

I've seen a much better version of the idea used.

One site gave away a t-shirt (with the sites logo and url naturally) for the BEST post of the week.

Another site gave away a prize ($25 think) for the SCOOP of the month. If you were the first to break news related to the site's subject matter you were eligible and whoever broke the biggest news of the month got the cash. They kept a running list of "scoops" that were up for the prize.

nathanaus:
Whatever the objective, I see no problem rewarding people for doing what you desire of them. You get paid at work I hope, You get good grades by doing your assignments, why not be rewareded in a forum?
Clever idea.

Jared.
Testing the link policy of daniweb.
www.heresalinktonowhere.com