Most webmasters who want to make a new forum often struggle in deciding the forum’s actual topic. As a matter of fact, what I see people do very frequently is make a forum about a very general subject with the hope of being able to attract a wide array of people. While this seems like a perfect idea, thousands of such forums exist – so unless you have a site with plenty or traffic or you are willing to spend much time and money to make your forum succeed, this is not for you.

A careful analysis of a forum’s topic is the crux to success. Making money from forums is a reality, but it is very important that you go to where the money is by choosing good keywords that will bring both traffic and revenue.

In order to choose a good forum niche, you must think about what you enjoy. A forum is a community and it is much harder to pretend being an authority in a forum that in a website because you will be required to answer questions and write long and good posts. So bear in mind that the topic you choose must be something you like – regardless of what it is.

Deciding a niche for your forum will be hard, but I am here to help. I have therefore written a list of steps for you to think about the best possible niche for your forum.

1. What do you enjoy? Make a list of the things you like the most (the more the better)
2. Is what you enjoy profitable? Think about products that may be sold based on the list you previously made. For example, if you like jewelry you may make a forum about it as it might bring some good revenue. You may check the overture bidding tool to aid you in this. Cross the items in your list which are not profitable.
3. Is there much competition? Make a Google search for “[keyword] + forums” in quotes to see how many competitors you would have. If you have too many, keep looking.
4. How much traffic? I personally use wordtracker.com to see how many people search for a given phrase – use it too! If not many people search it, you might consider something else.
5. Repeat until you find the right one.

So for example, good niches may include metal detectors, jewelry, etc. Make sure that whatever you choose is something you are familiar with, and more importantly – it’s something which will pay for your hard work.

The bottom note is that you must always try to do something new - something that people are not doing. Niche forums are very powerful because of this and also because they make a real community with a specific purpose which is very important if you wish to succeed. After you have chosen good keywords, you must work as hard as you can to make your forum as active as possible, but that will be discussed in a future article.

© AdminFusion.com 2005-2006

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