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Should I add a discussion board to my Web site?

Dave, I'd like to expand my Web site so that I can get more traffic and produce more pages, so I've been thinking about adding a discussion board. Seems like it's pretty easy with third-party sites. But I'm not sure. What's your opinion about adding a discussion board?

Dave's Answer:

Unless you have a strong readership and busy online community that doesn't already have a discussion venue, I think you might make a mistake here. To have a good discussion forum, I think that you need at least 100 regular visitors to the forums, of which at least half need to be frequent contributors. Really, you want at least 100 contributors, in my opinion, because they're going to run the gamut from frequent posted to lurker with one posting a year. Otherwise things just languish and look dead.

If you have a half-dozen people who track what you're saying and occasionally add their two cents, you get some nice comments on a weblog and look popular. If you go to a discussion forum where there are two discussion threads and a typical message has '1' viewing and '0' responses, it might reflect the same amount of posting from the same number of visitors, but it looks far, far worse and is much less likely to cause someone to bookmark the site and/or recommend it to friends.

Others have different perspectives on this topic, but having gone down that road more than once, I predict that many of the new forums people create today will be shut down for lack of activity within six months.

So should you add a discussion board to your site? I suggest not. There are other ways to add and manage content, ways that leave you less worried about whether your visitors are writing entries or not.

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Comments

What about other uses for a forum? I use mine to store some favorite links (mine is a personal web site, not business) and to jot down a note to self every now and then. I don't advertise it as a forum and haven't removed it as it is serving a purpose... the purpose that I wanted it to serve when I installed it.

Any thoughts on looking at the "why" before looking at the "should I?"

Posted by: Doug at December 17, 2004 4:26 PM

That's a novel use of a discussion forum, Doug, but I can't help wondering if you wouldn't find something more freeform like a Wiki a better fit for your task? It's like buying a chainsaw because you need a doorstop, somehow. Not necessarily a bad idea, but certainly not the optimal use for the tool. :-)

Posted by: Dave Taylor at December 17, 2004 4:59 PM

My experience, with discussion boards, is limited but, apparently, quite different, from Dave's. When a small board I'd been on for about 5 years shut down, in Sept., 2003, I set up a "free board" so about a dozen of us could keep in touch. By Feb., of this year, we had approximately 125 members and moved to a paid host. Our membership is restricted, the board unmoderated, hosting is covered by member contributions, accounts that don't post at least once in 60 days are inactivated yet the board is quite active, averaging about 1,300 posts a month. IMNSHO, if you have a few people who are interested in using the board, you ought to set it up. If it's not used, you can close it.

Posted by: Ripped at December 19, 2004 9:27 AM

By all means, I agree with "Ripped" that if you think you have a community that can help keep a discussion board active and lively, go for it. It's easy to pull the plug.

Posted by: Dave Taylor at December 19, 2004 6:11 PM

As you have said Dave, not having enough visitors is hard for a forum. If not enough people post, all the visitors see are the occasional spam messages that pop up here and there, etc...

I had a hard time with my message forum in the beginning, because instantly spammers logged on. Now security is better, and the forum grows with more participants as time goes on.

I still have to work hard to post new threads though.

Posted by: Christian at April 1, 2007 4:47 PM

Dave,

Just coming into a new position as a regional manager for aircraft maintenance. My staff and I receive alot of discussion over the phones, I don't have a big enough staff to answer some redunant, known, events that I feel could be covered by discussion forums. These discussion gear from deficiency reviews to lean thinking processes...looking at enhancing our website to have a discussion forum...any advice...would this be the right tool for this kind of activity. Have about 3589 maintainers out there with a 76% membership to our web...but its a dull webpage...which I am trying to improve...thoughts?

Mic

Posted by: Mic at May 3, 2007 6:36 PM

Hi dave, i am going to create a website. i also want a discussion board in it. In the discusion board people will ask questions and i will answer them. but the problem is i do not know how set a discussion board in a website. i have no idea, can u help me? suppose i have a website, what's the first step i should take to establish a discussion board.

Posted by: khan at January 6, 2008 10:54 PM

Here's where to start:

http://www.google.com/search?q=hosted+discussion+message+board

:-)

Posted by: Dave Taylor at January 7, 2008 2:17 PM

I have a lot to say, but ...

I have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but most of all I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a chai!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!