What type of content will help your forum grow?

[joelr]

I am sorry because I have not made myself explicitly clear on my intentions. This thread was to understand what type of content works well on forums, not as a get rich quick scheme but as a deeper understanding of how engaging a particular way presents itself both with the forum and also with Google.

That makes sense. How you approach forums is different than how you approach your blog / articles. In a blog / article, you want to come across as authoritative, an expert, instructional, etc. In a forum, it's all about sparking thoughtful conversation and then moderating that conversation.

Forums is all about conversation, or using conversation to arrive at a consensus. You can try the following strategies to spark conversation:
- Ask a provocative / very wrong answer to incite users
- Ask emotionally-charged questions (what was your biggest frustration / what were you most embarrassed)
- Ask scenario-based questions
- Ask human-based questions (eg. the user is at the center of some drama, what would you do)

Hope this helps