One of the best free methods of gaining highly responsive subscribers and web site visitors is to participate in forums and discussion boards. Why?...

People who frequently visit forums are usually very highly motivated and interested in that particular niche. 

So, if you can get visitors to the discussion board to subscribe to your publication or download your report, you will be able to build a very highly targeted and responsive email list or have web site visitors that potentially could become customers. 

So how do you do this? 

First, You should only participate in highly trafficable and popular forums so that you can leverage your exposure. The easiest way to find the most popular discussion boards is to simply perform a search for "your niche" + discussion board in the search engine of your choice and check out the results. 

For example, if your niche is internet marketing, do a search for “internet marketing discussion board.” Next, you need to determine the forums traffic by simply checking out its Alexa traffic ranking at http://www.alexa.com . The lower the ranking, the higher the traffic it is receiving. You also need to check out how many posts are posted in the forum each day. 

If items aren't posted on an irregular basis, such as only one or two every few days, then it would be best to find another forum. You need to leverage your time by only participating in forums that have multiple posts every day. Second, Find the 3 most popular forums related to your niche and then simply post any questions you have or respond with answers to posts from other users. 

You must make sure that you don’t blatantly spam the forum, otherwise you will get banned very quickly. The KEY to this technique is to place your signature file (or "resource box") at the end of your message every time you make a post. Your signature (sig) file should include the URL of your capture page to entice forum visitors to visit this page and join your list. 

An alternative is to include an email link so that people can subscribe directly to your newsletter. By spending one hour per day participating in forums you can drive hundreds of highly targeted, potential subscribers to your capture page every week. 

This has the potential to increase your list with thousands of highly targeted and responsive subscribers every year. The downside to this strategy was that it was often very difficult and confusing to keep track of all your postings to online forums. But with the release of new software, the whole process can be automated and it is now simpler than ever to apply this strategy. 

There is now no excuse why you can’t easily participate in online forums to increase free targeted traffic to your site and increase your subscriber list. It's an easy way to implement these strategies that will allow you to begin laying the foundations for your successful business.

Build Your Own Community

If the main purpose of your site is to sell products or services, encouraging your visitors to interact with one another can have a powerful impact. Building a community around your site will create a bond with your visitors. Your site becomes an active neighborhood where people will likely have a more personal connection with it. This can make them more willing to purchase from you as it sets you apart from your competition.

Having a discussion board (forum) on your site, visitors can post comments and provide free content for you. Your visitors can follow topics that interest them where they'll keep coming back to check responses. This can increase your traffic significantly giving your visitors repeated exposure to your own products or services.

Various companies offer support using forums. Senior customers can support new customers, thereby reducing your phone call support dramatically. While your site can remain an e-commerce entity, you can add articles, and how to columns to encourage repeat visitors a place to share their tips and other shared interests. They'll want to share their stories and experiences with one another. 

The greatest thing about building your own community is that people will come back to a well run forum. They form relationships with other visitors and the content is always fresh. Not only will this content be free, it will be an updated source that will appeal to your audience.

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