Women Forum - kickstart?

[WomenXtra]

Hi All,

I am currently working on my new WomenXtra website and was wondering how do I go about promoting the forum on line to get people to post there? I am struggling to get people to post - any tips how I can start it are very much appreciated.

I am hoping once the forum starts rolling, I can work on other areas of the site... for example (wedding products) (women products) and get people to advertise their products for free..

thanks
T

 

[dcraigdc]

Start off by getting friends and family to post there. Most people are reluctant to post if there are very few posts on a site because they don't feel they will get much advice.

Once you have this section sorted, as you say do various promotions for advertising or products to get people to come on board.

Forums also help forums. If you market your forum in the right way on another forum, you may get to the situation whereby newbie 1 says "I need advice on wedding products, and experience user 2 says "Go over to this forum, WomenXtra set it up a while ago and you will be able to find good advice there"

 

[cqueen]

What is it with women and their need to have 'their own' everything?

 

[Amber]

Friends and family are the way to go in the early days, I think, and it's really important to try and make sure that there are new posts everyday because, as you know, people won't touch a new forum with a bargepole!

There are also a few communities which offer post-exchanges, whereby you agree to make a certain number of posts on someone else's forum in return for them posting on yours. adminfusion.com does this, although I've never used it so I can't tell you how useful it will be.

I have a forum at my thefashionpolice.net domain and I've been posting on it myself, with a few of my friends and family. Yesterday our first ever "real" person signed up, so I'm just hoping more will follow!

 

[welshnoonoo]

I have the same scenario and was going to post the same question - so hey - why don't we do what Amber suggested, between ourselves and exchange posts on our forums??

Mine's a wedding forum that guys are welcome to post on cqueen!!!

Any thoughts anyone?

 

[Pebble Communications]

No offense, but can I ask you a question?
Are you honestly a woman or are you a man putting together what you think women want?

I dunno, it all looks too girly and ladylike for my tastes. All a bit superficial - it seems to assume all women are interested in is relationships and marriage. Ok, there is a career part, but without any content.

"covering a variety of areas of equal importance in a woman's life." only two areas covered - 'getting a man' is the majority of the site and then there is a little bit on careers. I wouldn't say this is 'a variety of areas' and I wouldn't agree that anyone's areas of interest are 'of equal importance' to them - we all have our priorities.

 

[Pebble Communications]

Oh, and the line

'Join the ladies community today!' just strikes me as a bit odd somehow.

 

[webit]

One tip:

Noura (seeing as she lists her website as www.womenxtra.co.uk on her profile) could have reached over the desk to ask you the question in her posting.

Change the username of remove the url from her profile.

BTW -I think if I was female I'd find the categories a bit patronising.

HTH

 

Hi Noura, I have to agree wth FionaB I'm afraid. I did have a nosey round the site a few days ago when you first posted, but didn't find anything on there to interest me.

I wonder if you should give a bit more thought to your target market?

Your domain name seems to suggest that your are targeting women in the 25 plus age group and yet the content - relationships, guy's, dating etc etc are topics that would be more likely to appeal to a younger age group, maybe even teenagers.... (I'm 34 and can't remember the last time I use the term 'guy' )

I'm sure that once people start posting on there, things will start to develop naturally, but I still think that your target marget is confused.

The site looks good though. My only suggestion is that you make the forum clearer to visitors from your home page. Apart from the listing of topics to the top-right, I couldn't see any obvious signs of a forum, infact if you hadn't mentioned it in your initial posting on here, I probably wouldn't have realised there was a forum there at all!

good luck!

 

[cqueen]

How about 'washing up' tips & advise?

 

[WomenXtra]

Great Great posts here - thank you all sooo much for all the constructive criticism. I totally agree with the categories chosen and they do need some major changes to them.

The aim of the site is to have a special area for (what women want) - by discussing products and services they think are worth using e.g certain shampoo? certain creams? bueaty related questions? etc etc.. but before I even made a start on creating those relevant pages, I thought I should create a small forum to get the community going.

I think i should have made a start the other way around. make a reason for women to visit the site. and hopefully if they found it so useful then they will consider joining the forums. Duh!!! silly me!
so wrapped up in other things, forgot the whole business strategy behind it!

thanks again all

by the way, I will join the 2 forums mentioned, they look cool

 

[Admiral Collections]

Hi

I have just had a look and the post regarding some woman having some guy flirting etc in the office and he has a girlfriend? Yes, and? It happens all the time, I wouldn't call that ground breaking news and I wouldn't feel obliged to post a comment in response as in my mind if the woman can't deal with it herself I think what she needs is some confidence building course not advice on a forum.

There needs to be a section that relates to real womens lives. Juggling a home and a career. Women in business, issues with employees, issues with men business related, basically something similar to on here without wondering if Nigel from Fast Fences is going to jump up and rip your comments to pieces. Then again he would probably log in as Nigella just to annoy us.


Nic :wink:

 

[Pebble Communications]

Take a look at the Lonely Planet Womens' thread for an idea of what women REALLY discuss when the chaps backs are turned. But don't look if you are easily shocked.

 

[Joyous]

Take a look at the Lonely Planet Womens' thread for an idea of what women REALLY discuss when the chaps backs are turned. But don't look if you are easily shocked.

I'm feeling brave. Do you have a URL for this?

 

[fastfences]

'getting a man' is the majority of the site and then there is a little bit on careers.

Hi all,

It is understandable the site sees fit to devote 'the majority of the site' to 'getting a man,' for to do this properley is very complex. Sure, a girl can 'get a man' in a bar or supermarket, but to get the right man needs a lot of research and strategy development.

Elementary issues such as what clothes to wear, lipstick colour, heels or pumps and even whether to wear a 'normal' or uplift bra, is all part of the preparation on searching out the right man in readiness for sinking in the claws. The claws, of course, first pierce the skin and then the wallet, but this is usually much later in the relationship - say about 3 days.

The other issues of whether to share the sensitivities of your man with with your closest friend is another trait that requires close examination, and equal intense study. Men know they are discussed with every toilet visit made by the girls, and the points of topic to be discussed should be amply identified on the site.

I could contribute further, but I think it's fair to say that a site devoted in the intricacies of getting a man is long overdue.

cheers, Nicola Barnes (borrowing Nigel's computer)

 

[winton50]

I wonder how much of a commotion it would cause if I announced that I am starting a men only website where we chaps can all have a laugh at how stupid women are?


just like they do about blokes in most of the ads on TV nowadays

 

[Jayne]

Don't worry Stuart, there are just as many stupid woman as stupid men!

I don't like the women only stuff much either and I am one! I don't like baby talk, or clothes/shopping talk and i've got better things to do, than listen to woman moaning about blokes! And i'm not into sharing my problems either.

I'm going to join Stuart's Mens only I think :lol:

Jayne

 

[Pebble Communications]

For those who don't object to swearing:

http://thorntree.lonelyplanet.com/categories.cfm?catid=41

This morning's topics include ok, some discussion on beauty/clothes and some relationship stuff etc, but also Tony Blair's confession that he asks god for advice, mobiles ringing at funerals, worst film ever, travel, food, Iraq, having an unexpected half-sibling, the most wicked place people have had sex, child molestation, photoshop, employee analysing their company's advertising, bank account recommendations and more...

 

[magic-merl]

Does Nigel know about this?

Sorry pompous to the end - thats me.

I think the advice given so far has been very constructive. Take the advice as it is meant and you will go far. My site has undergone many many updates in order to get those sales in and most of the advice comes from this site with a considerable degree of success.

Tip :

If you want a "no holds barred" analysis of your site - post it on the IT & Internet Forum. You will probably get hammered but this is what I did. Wind the "professionals" up a bit and they will give you very very useful information - they will look at your site from a professional standpoint and not a consumers so the help is often very different but just as useful.

 

[Ravenfire]

I think that part of the problem is that you have nothing to get people to the site other than the forums. It will just take a while to build up and unless you are able to add a little more content or somehow entice people to the site (say with a competition) it will just take a while to build up.

Good luck with your site

Toni

 

[ClaretKnight]

How do you entice women to a website? I share the same problem as you.

I've heard that women are becoming more empowered nowadays. Perhaps you need to treat them more like men somehow?

 

[Antonia @limeone.com]

It looks like a content issue to me, non of my friends or colleagues are bothered about relationships, they are either single and love it or partnered and getting on with it!

To be fair I thought it was aimed at young twenty somethings who were obsessed with getting a man, and I don't recall knowing that many of those either. If the site had some business topics, career, holiday stuff etc maybe more would join.

 

Hi John, you seem to offer a very specialised service, which I imagine is in demand (Im thinking along the lines of single business women looking for a escort to a function for example)

With the right SEO and marketing, I wouldn't have thought you would have too many problems.

Im a married women, so would just drag my long suffering husband along to these events, but if I weren't married, it might not necessarily occur to me to hire an escort. What about targeting womens networking events?

Good Luck


Claire

 

Oh, could I just also add that Im not sure about your Amazon adverts/affiliate scheme on the site. It seems to interfere with the professional feel to the site, especially as it is currently trying to sell me Slendertone proucts! LOL

Claire

 

[ClaretKnight]

Hi Claire

Thanks for the advice.

Getting clients is not easy. From my experience there are very few women, even without husbands, who are willing to pay for a man to take them out. Also, you very rarely get referrals. Because of the secretive and sensitive nature of the service, clients tend not to tell others.

I've thought about targeting women's networking events, but how? Set up a stall? Not sure how well that would go down with the sponsors. Or perhaps I could dress in drag and dish out my 'friend's' business cards?

Saying that, I'm going to my first exhibition at Earls Court tomorrow to test the water. I have to show my business card at the door. Fingers crossed they let me in.

I thought the Amazon affiliate scheme would give my site more of a professional look due to their popularity, however, it isn't working for me. I've had a total of zero sales though them in six months and will be removing their ads forthwith. Perhaps sites like mine are responsible for their poor company performance of late. Maybe they should pay me to remove them.

John