My Favorite Forums

Last week I joined two new web forums, so I thought I’d take a moment to share my favorite web forums, why I use them, and why you might want to join them as well.

First, and this applies to all of the below forums, you can add hyperlinks to the sites you want to promote in your signatures.  This is a great way to pull in some extra traffic immediately when posting, and to a lesser degree over time. The downside is it takes time and energy to post useful questions, responses, and anything in general.  The more useful and authoritative your posts, the more traffic you can expect to receive from readers clicking the links in your signature.

Second, by using consistent usernames across all forums, especially ones that apply to your niche, you can build authority by helping to solve other people’s problems.

Digital Points

Digital Points forum covers all your typical web topics from making money with Google AdSense and affiliates to copywriting, picking domain names, and programming.  And I don’t use it for any of those topics!  I found out about Digital Points through the eBook by Working Nomad, and began using it to sell text links.

Every few weeks, I’ll search the text link sales subforum for keyword “travel” and send private messages to interested buyers.  I’ve made a few sales through the forum, and deem it a worthy resource.  Actually, a big selling point is that accessing the forum is FREE.  I’ve seen others where you have to pay monthly for access, and I’m not going to go there.

Problogger

Like I said, I have no desire to pay a monthly fee for access to a forum, but there is always an exception to the rule.  That exception is the new forum at Darren Rowse’s Problogger.  I’ve been reading Darren’s blog for a few years now (well, not while I was traveling the world for 20 months, but both before and after) and learned a lot.  I trust him and therefore I was sold after watching his video pitch, even at a cost of $1.95 per month.

I was pleasantly surprised when I logged in for the first time.  People seemed friendly and helpful, and lively conversations were occurring already.  I’m sure I will be visiting it on/off for the foreseeable future, and I’ll keep you posted on the benefits and what I’m learning.

Working Nomad

I signed up for the Working Nomad forum back in 2007, but never posted until a few days ago.  It is a smaller community than the others, however I like the fact that it is tied to my niche – travel.  I can’t report much yet, however I can say that I intend to visit a few times a week and participate in the dialogue now that I have some moneymaking experience under my belt with websites.

BootsnAll

BootsnAll is the travel forum I used when I needed help planning my trip around the world.  I prefer it over Lonely Planet’s Thorntree, but I can’t exactly say why.  I just think the quality of posts is higher, though LP has a bigger reach, I think.  For example, there’s not a lot of messages about travel in Tibet on BootsnAll, while when I was seeking daily updates on my chances of visiting last March from China, I accessed useful info on Thorntree.

So there you have it, 4 forums where I feel my time is best spent.

Do you have a preferred forum for learning how to make money online or building authority in your niche?

Related posts:

1. New Link Sales Through Digital Point’s Forum

Tags: bootsnall, forums, lonely planet, problogger, working nomad