Do forum statistics matter ?

[Cedric]

We often obsess over the statistics of our forums. We track the number of registered users, the total number of posts and threads, and other metrics that give us a sense of how active and engaged our community is.

But does all of this really matter? Do the statistics of a forum actually reflect its success or value?

Forum statistics can be an important metric for webmasters. A high number of registered users, for example, might indicate that your forum has a broad reach and is attracting a diverse range of people. A high number of posts and threads might indicate that your community is active and engaging.

On the other hand, statistics can also be misleading. A large number of registered users doesn't necessarily mean that your forum is active or engaging. Many of those users may have registered once but never returned. Similarly, a high number of posts and threads doesn't necessarily mean that your community is valuable or interesting. Many of those posts may be low-quality or spammy. Forums can have merged databases to make it seem like they're big, but they're more or less dead archives.

So, what do you think? Do the statistics of a forum really matter? Or is it more important to focus on the quality of the community, even if that means sacrificing some of the quantitative metrics that we typically use to measure success? Let's start a discussion and share our thoughts!

 

[Shortie]

I am a firm believer that statistics don't always reflect how good a forum is or performs. They could have really great statistics but the forum may not be full of good-quality content that you can engage with. All too often statistics can be deceiving I feel.

I believe that high-quality content, informative content and content that gets people interacting on the forum matters more than statistics, if you have all that, the statistics are a bonus

 

[Arantor]

I think there's two ways to look at this.

From an administrative point of view, having some idea of the trend is important - the current numbers don't really matter. What does matter, in my experience, are the numbers of posts over rolling periods to get a sense of whether the overall rate of posting is trending up or down, and in particular if the trend downwards is ongoing, that can be a signal for making some change. There's also value in knowing if the rate of active members per month is moving up or down and again, if trending towards that suggests some change might be needed.

From a user perspective, showing the numbers other than 'total posts, total members' is often a bad idea. Especially the older platforms that show things like 'most online ever was x, on xyz date' - unless that date was recent and that the number goes up and up regularly over time, it only indicates the forum may have peaked. I know forums that have their 'most online ever was x' date from 10 years ago.

 

[Cedric]

I think there's two ways to look at this.

From an administrative point of view, having some idea of the trend is important - the current numbers don't really matter. What does matter, in my experience, are the numbers of posts over rolling periods to get a sense of whether the overall rate of posting is trending up or down, and in particular if the trend downwards is ongoing, that can be a signal for making some change. There's also value in knowing if the rate of active members per month is moving up or down and again, if trending towards that suggests some change might be needed.

From a user perspective, showing the numbers other than 'total posts, total members' is often a bad idea. Especially the older platforms that show things like 'most online ever was x, on xyz date' - unless that date was recent and that the number goes up and up regularly over time, it only indicates the forum may have peaked. I know forums that have their 'most online ever was x' date from 10 years ago.

Yeah, I've seen that as well on forums and gives me the idea that the forum has gone inactive even though in some cases that might not be the issue. Most cases do though. I have a few additional statistics like posts per day, new members, daily active users that I can see for Admin Junkies (only limited to me) which usually is around the same numbers. Some days less, other days could be way more. But I feel these numbers should not be visible for members/guests since they might drive away traffic when we have a slow day. In most of those slow days, I'll try to create much content as I can to pump them up and usually our members here follow the content at that time too. So again, we're at the point of content is key and consistency is most importantly for a thriving community.

 

[Cory]

It probably isn't as significant as we make it out to be, but most administrators love to see their statistics fly high. If you do the default action that most forums do where the number of threads and posts in a forum are displayed on the board index, then I think that makes statistics even more insignificant. If people see lots of content being posted in the forums, then that may be more likely to entice them to join than the overall member or post count of the board.

I have 1300+ members on my forum, but in terms of activity compared to the number of members I have on my forum is next to none, so it can be deceiving to view the member count of the board thinking the forum is really active because of that count. The post count can also be somewhat deceiving depending on how long your board has been open. If it's been open for years on end, then a high post count still doesn't necessarily mean the board is super active, but it has just accumulated over the years.

I don't think it's as significant as a lot of us make it out to be, but it's beneficiary to possibly enticing members to be more likely to join.

 

[Ravenfreak]

I always say, quality over quantity and I think most of us here can agree on that. If your forum has lots of one liner posts, and most of your posts are coming from forum games then to me I feel that the community isn't thriving, even if the post count continues to rise. Of course you could always combat this with preventing forum games to increase your members' post count.

 

[rtimm]

They matter to me as the guy that pays the bills for our site.
They matter to some of our members.
They don't matter to most of our members.
We are in the process of moving our community to XenForo. We will not be using the user ranking ladder system. It proves to be more of a distration than it is worth. The folks for which statistics matter also seem to care about those 'ranks' and will try and game the system to move up. We try to keep a low-drama atmosphere and do value quality content over quantity. The 'gaming' posts don't add to the quality.

 

[Tracy]

Am I getting a lot of posts currently on my site?
Nope.
Am I getting a lot of hits on some articles and such that I have.
Yep (in fact, one article ended up with a person joining simply apparently to say thanks).
So, for ME, my purpose of the site is served... people are getting data from it that hopefully helps them.

 

[DigNap15]

Yes of course they matter.
I study mine daily to get an idea of whenther my forum is growing or dying
I think that some members also watch them.
And also some potential members may look at them to get an idea of how busy or useful the forum would be to them

 

[Ken]

Yes, ALL stats matter no matter which forum you go to.

 

[Uncrowned]

They do matter to get a feel for how things are going and try to plan what you should be doing. The biggest problem is relating number stats to real-world effects as that can be as clear as mud at best and should not be the only factor used when making changes. Steady increases in everything are great and steady decreases in everything are bad, but most of the time you will get a mix. Are your articles growing, but are forum posts decreasing? Well, that may be healthy growth, it may be a sign of organic SEO working out, but it may also be a sign that you need to encourage people to register to comment and such. At the same time, it may be your goal to grow your articles and everything is perfect. Or it may be a horrible sign if you are focused on growing the forum in your marketing. The same goes for posts vs registrations, topics vs replies, and basically everything else.

Stats are great but need to be handled with a grain of salt and also related to your main goals and the health of the site.

 

[Xilia]

Google Analytics can absolutely help get a deeper insight into your board. It can help see where members are coming from, what pages in particular are attractive to members and guests, new guests vs returning guests, etc.

 

[Heatman]

Yes, ALL stats matter no matter which forum you go to.

This is also how I see it. Why wouldn't the statistics of your own community matter to you? It's what shows how you're making progress in your forum, even if you're not yet making money from it, it's good to know what's happening all round. It can actually show you where to target more in growing your community.

 

[Reverie]

I also liked to keep an eye on how many members had less than 5-10 posts. My goal was to reach them somehow to continue their activity. Some forums have lets say 500 members but a good 100 of those members probably have less than 5 posts, if not 0. Then another 100 probably have less than 20 posts. I strived to engage members and try to make it friendly enough for them to return. I think staying aware of the statistics tell you as a forum owner what is working and what isn't working.

 

[Cedric]

I also liked to keep an eye on how many members had less than 5-10 posts. My goal was to reach them somehow to continue their activity. Some forums have lets say 500 members but a good 100 of those members probably have less than 5 posts, if not 0. Then another 100 probably have less than 20 posts. I strived to engage members and try to make it friendly enough for them to return. I think staying aware of the statistics tell you as a forum owner what is working and what isn't working.

How did you do that Rachael? I know XenForo has add ons for emailing inactive (set per 14 or 30 days), but I haven't seen much improvement for that so far.

 

[Reverie]

How did you do that Rachael? I know XenForo has add ons for emailing inactive (set per 14 or 30 days), but I haven't seen much improvement for that so far.

I would email them directly individually with the email they registered with - or if I knew them from other forums, I would reach out to them. I would go to forums I knew some vast population were coming from and post around and it was kind of be a reminder without even messaging them.

 

[Ken]

This is also how I see it. Why wouldn't the statistics of your own community matter to you? It's what shows how you're making progress in your forum, even if you're not yet making money from it, it's good to know what's happening all round. It can actually show you where to target more in growing your community.

I like to update them once every 5 days to a week pending on how fast I'm regaining the stats since last September's shut down.

 

[Heatman]

I like to update them once every 5 days to a week pending on how fast I'm regaining the stats since last September's shut down.

Depending on how active and level of contents that you're getting on your forum is what should determine how often you should update your forum's statistics. If you get enough, you should do it often in order not to have so much data collation to do. Some forum owners update theirs every month.

 

[joelr]

There are different kinds of statistics.

The right stats, when measured for specific community objectives, are powerful.

The wrong stats, when measured because you don't know what you're doing and don't know what else to measure, are misleading and can actually hurt you.

What Is The Engagement Trap (And What To Do About It)?

The engagement trap is a race to community activity for the sake of activity. It's usually measured by simple aggregate numbers like the total number of posts, topics, likes, or members. You don't want members to chat. You want members to learn, to advocate, to innovate, to educate, to support, t...

invisioncommunity.com

 

[Cedric]

There are different kinds of statistics.

The right stats, when measured for specific community objectives, are powerful.

The wrong stats, when measured because you don't know what you're doing and don't know what else to measure, are misleading and can actually hurt you.

What Is The Engagement Trap (And What To Do About It)?

The engagement trap is a race to community activity for the sake of activity. It's usually measured by simple aggregate numbers like the total number of posts, topics, likes, or members. You don't want members to chat. You want members to learn, to advocate, to innovate, to educate, to support, t...

invisioncommunity.com

Very nice article. I have never bragged about any posting statistic except for an occasional milestone. But I see promotion topics being updated daily/weekly with posts statistics that really no one cares about. (Sorry to be blunt to anyone who does this) While it’s nice to see forums growing - try to bump an advertisement topic with informational content, not statistics because majority will ignore your post. If you use the time to feature topics or news, than that’s a whole different story.