User Engagement Do you find it difficult to encourage your community members to provide high-quality engagement?

[Shortie]

High-quality engagement is important as a community leader and owner. As many of us always say, content is Queen/King when it comes to a website of any kind.

With a forum, we not only rely on our own content but we also rely on the content from our community members too and sometimes, that content is not always as high-quality as you want it to be.

As a community leader, do you find it difficult to get your community members to post high-quality content? What methods do you choose to use to try and encourage higher-quality content?

 

[Nomad]

You see social media users have some sort of loyalty towards the platform they are active on. This is not evident on forums. Forums users never stay too long in the same community, they are not too active for a long time. Forum users hop from one site to other sites. This is why it is really difficulty to build engagements on forums.

 

[Tracy]

This is why it is really difficulty to build engagements on forums

I would beg to disagree. On a few niche forums I am active on there are users still there from 4-5 years ago posting regularly and decent content.
Again, it will depend on the niche involved and the participants interest in the niche. If they can make connections on a site, they will tend to stay there unless something major goes on that drives users away.
Heck, I run an astrophotography/astronomy site.. but I'm still fairly active on my another site in the same niche.

Now, if we are talking about general life discussion sites (generally referred to as chit-chat sites) then I can see that happening.

 

[Dismal_Bliss]

As a community leader, do you find it difficult to get your community members to post high-quality content?

Not really. My active members are there because they want to be there and want to contribute something of value. My inactive members are there just to read content that they can't see publicly.

My lowest quality content usually comes from bundles or exchanges with someone who really isn't interested in my niche(s), and it's especially bad when they use A.I. - it' sticks out like a sore thumb, lol

 

[Tracy]

and it's especially bad when they use A.I. - it' sticks out like a sore thumb, lol

Yeah, it's fairly easy to figure out posts/content that has used AI and did a cut/paste.
AI can be used successfully for content generation.
What you basically have to do is obtain the AI provided text, then go through and reword it in your way of "speaking" instead of the way an AI engine gives it to you. Frequently that will be changing up sentence structure and word content while keeping the "meat" of the information present. It's more work, and frequently you have pretty much re-written the entire content, but it's more "realistic human" than using the AI generated text itself. For many, it is more work than they want to do.

 

[Nomad]

it will depend on the niche involved and the participants interest in the niche

That's the point. I have been using Forum Promotion since 2017. I see a lot of people active there but I find one thing in common, most active users are actually website owners. Likewise, on AJ as well, active users are also site owners. People remain active when the site serves the purpose. However, forums in general have very few organic activities.

 

[Tracy]

However, forums in general have very few organic activities.

Exactamundo.
For sites that server a niche purpose, the activity trends higher for those users of it.
For general chit-chat/entertainment sites, those users tend to come and go. It's the nature of the beast and even effects the social media biggies. Look at FB and how it went from being the cat's meow to nearer the cats hindquarters on use by younger generations now.

Think of what most of those type sites (social media/tik-tok, etc) have in common.
Vacuous posts/comments/content. The type of people that trend towards those environments are very "flighty" and will quickly go to the next best thing when it comes out.
And that's why those sites in a forum format are struggling. The users can get better service for their needs by other sites that are more conducive to their use patterns.
Sites that serve a more technical purpose have a tendency to have a more loyal membership.

 

[Shawn Gossman]

I don't because I don't require it.

It's your job to provide that kind of content not theirs.

If you want to get people to your community, blog, newsletter, or whatever - YOU have to provide quality and value.

Their job is to consume the content, refer others to consume it, and keep coming back for more.

You'll have to keep providing more quality and value, too. It's required this day and age.

Build a community and loyal friends rather than trying to build a community of you trying to change the way people create.

As I've mentioned in another post, look at other marketing assets that don't require constant quality content from every contributor.. Most forums don't do well in search but they can do well in other promotional means - focus on those outlets.