When it comes to forum promotion, many people may simply think "isn't it just about posting threads?" This is indeed true! In fact, forum promotion seems simple but can be quite challenging. There is a key core issue that directly determines the success or failure of forum promotion: how to post precisely and effectively guide potential customers to visit the website. It's incorrect to think that writing an article and repeatedly copying and pasting it will suffice; this is a very mistaken idea.
How can one successfully carry out forum promotion? To do forum promotion well, many details need to be experienced and summarized during the application process. China Nuowang, a global e-commerce expert, has combined years of promotional practice insights and summarized several key core issues that directly determine the success or failure of forum promotion, hoping to help small and medium-sized enterprises in the迷茫stage of online marketing.
1. Analyze Promotion Needs: Before implementing forum promotion, one must first understand clearly what product needs to be promoted, where its advantages lie, and who the target user groups are. Have competitors carried out similar promotions? If so, what were the results? Are there any aspects worth learning from? This is what is known as knowing oneself and one's enemy, ensuring victory in every battle. Next, collect and screen suitable media platforms for promotion.
2. Find and Collect Target Forums: Choose target forums with a large number of active users and a precise user base. Although forum promotion doesn't cost money, it shouldn't be done indiscriminately by posting threads and promotional information everywhere. This point should be particularly noted. More target forums aren't necessarily better; one should consider the human and material resources of their own company and act accordingly. Too many forums can make it difficult to carry out effective promotion.
Different industries and products correspond to different target customer groups gathered on various forums, mainly categorized into the following types for reference:
Webmaster and Technical Forums: A5 Webmaster Network, Lowo Forum, Chinaz Forum, Wala Forum, Webmaster China Forum, MoonSEO Forum, SEOwhy, 51la Forum, Grassroots Webmaster Forum, etc.
Comprehensive B2B Forums: Alibaba, Taobao,慧聪网, Made-in-China, Global Hardware Network, China Suppliers, Global Sources, China Manufacturing Trading Network, China Food Trading Network, Pacific Gateway Network, Global Chemical Network, Dhgate, China Product Procurement Network, China Free Information Publishing Network, Trade Window Network, etc.
Vertical Industry Portal Forums: Each industry has its own specialized portal sites, such as building materials, chemicals, clothing, etc. These can be found directly through a Baidu search. The key is to find popular forums with relatively high Alexa rankings.
Large Portal Site Section Forums: Sina, NetEase, Sohu, Tencent, TOM, Yahoo, Phoenix News, etc. These portal site forums have very complex classifications. Before posting, analyze which section your product is suitable for and then post targeted promotions. It's important to note that these slightly larger portal site moderators manage very strictly. Be careful when posting, don't post obvious advertisements, otherwise the deletion rate will be very high.
3. Register Accounts, Familiarize with Forums: For each target forum, register multiple accounts using different IPs, and it's best if the account names are in Chinese and distinctive. The avatar inside the forum can be used for promotion; you can specifically look for cute or unique pictures online, then add the company name and website URL. If you have a good thread, the avatar's exposure rate will be high. Additionally, remember that when entering a new forum, don't rush to post. First, familiarize yourself with the rules of each section. If you don't follow the requirements when posting, even if it's not an advertisement, it will still be deleted.
4. Prepare Post Content Materials: When responsible for forum promotion, first understand what topics netizens are most concerned about currently. For example, during the Japanese earthquake, you could write about the latest developments in nuclear leakage. Such news would attract attention at the time. If you can't judge the current hottest topic, the simplest method is to refer to the rankings provided by Baidu, Google, Yahoo, etc. At any time, what's popular can be found there.
Additionally, learn to create catchy titles. Many times, your materials are great, but there are few replies, why? The problem lies in the title. You can add auxiliary descriptive words like "exclusive," "latest," "super clear," "inside story," etc., to the original title. The content of the posts should ideally be about celebrities, hot topics, controversies, resonance, touching stories, etc., balancing the product selling points with user needs. However, the content must not deviate from facts, attempting to deceive clicks, which could result in serious consequences such as the moderator blocking the website domain or company keywords.
5. Implement Promotion
After posting on the website, if no one tops the thread or leaves comments, it will quickly sink without a trace. You can arrange for each promotion staff member to register 10-20 or more accounts on the same forum, with one main account named after keywords, and the others acting as sock puppets. After the main account posts, different sock puppet accounts can reply at regular intervals, ensuring the post remains on the front page. Here, the sock puppet replies can guide users to discuss the product, while appropriately designing some controversies and conflicts, attracting more user participation.
In fact, the biggest problem with posting is that the post gets deleted! How to ensure the post isn't deleted? There's a technique for writing post content: write real reviews from the consumer's perspective. That is, spread the brand or product's strengths, positive image, corporate strength, service quality, etc., through the real experiences of general users or third parties. When writing the above third-party soft articles, the tone should be as colloquial and easy to understand as possible, and the title should be lifelike. Even if there are some typos in the posted content, they can be ignored, making netizens believe it's real!
The above only touches on a small part of forum promotion. To achieve better results, professional personnel need to write a large number of high-quality original soft articles, then daily post and maintain these articles on various high-traffic forums. In fact, the best operation method for forum promotion is to first widely distribute articles in large quantities, then frequently screen them within a few days of posting by checking "domain: article title" on Baidu. Identify which websites receive higher click rates and comment numbers for the soft article posts, then manually focus on maintaining those highly viewed posts, promptly replying to and answering user comments, striving to turn them into hot threads. Only then can your soft article posts achieve the best exposure.
Promotion is happening all the time, and miracles are everywhere! In short, forum promotion requires persistence; execution is the most important, and persistence is a necessary condition for success. As long as the methods are used properly and persisted, success will certainly be achieved.
This article is originally created by China Nuowang www.nuo.cn. If reprinted, please retain the copyright.