What's more important: members or posts?

[Realinfo]

see when a guest come by some search engine then that guest is in mood to search more thing and some time when He see ads related to what he was searching He click on those ads............... while regular members know that these are ads and avoid to click it................

[chrishicks]

I think it's best to have a decent balance between posts and posters. I currently have 147 members but most never post a single thing. I see them reading all the different topics every day but they never post in any of them. I have tried grabbing their attention in different ways to provoke some conversation but it's like they are forum shy. Then I have the other members that won't create a new topic but will reply to some of the already posted ones. My board just recently passed 10,000 posts which was pretty much done by 3-4 people. I hate how my forum looks because 95% of all the topics where started by me. I think I would die of a heart attack if I actually gained 3-4 more posters who are active community users.

[Uhura!]

I think it's best to have a decent balance between posts and posters.

True!

I currently have 147 members but most never post a single thing. I see them reading all the different topics every day but they never post in any of them.

I have some liek that too.

I have tried grabbing their attention in different ways to provoke some conversation but it's like they are forum shy. Then I have the other members that won't create a new topic but will reply to some of the already posted ones.

Yes!

Yesterday I asked the staff to post at least one thread when they log in.

Ladies,

I have a serious request.

Lately, for some reason, there have only been a few people starting threads. Please assist with this situation by starting at least one thread a day if you log in.

Some ideas about threads:

-Check the news & post about the latest political controvery in the Vox Populi Room (There's always something.)
-Share something wacky your kidlet or SO did / said recently in Progeny, Descendents,& Offspring Room
-Check our Mall for something with a ridiculously low price & post about it in Our Shopping Mall room
-Share something crazy you saw while you were out on errands or while you were at work in the Small Talk Room or, if appropriate, The Hot Spot.
-Post something erotic or funny in the Discourse on Intercourse Room

We want folks to feel comfortable starting threads. That will not happen if only a few people are the first to speak up.

Thanks for yoru help.
Julie

My board just recently passed 10,000 posts which was pretty much done by 3-4 people. I hate how my forum looks because 95% of all the topics where started by me.

I am with you here.

[AlexIsaacs]

Meh out of the 295 members I have, around 50 post regularly, another 50 drop in from time to time and the rest either never come on or are on too scarcely to matter.

[Jade Elizabeth]

Every member matters, whether they come once, or ten times.

[neil h]

Quality, not quantity.

If your forum is a resource, then the quality and reliability of the info is what matters.
You can achieve this without a huge number of members; you can get this without a huge number of posts.
BS is worthless; so reward the genuine and discourage the B******ters.

[alex30]

VOTED!

[ArkServer]

i'd say in the long run both but posts are more important if you want to attract people.

[christina_angelo]

Hey,
i think the quality of members matters, not the quantity.

[aldo]

Both in my opinion. You don't want to have thousands upon thousands of posts on a forum and only a handful of members. It makes your forum look, well, spammy in a way. It might not always be true (You know, your forum has been online for a few years or more) though.

You also don't want thousands upon thousands of members with very few posts, that usually is a sign that most of the member base are spammers who have registered but done nothing.

But of course, usually only webmasters would really look at that stuff

Anyways, without posts, you usually don't have anything for Google and Bing and what not to index, so you won't have a good chance to turn up in results. Remember! Content is King! But you want to have good content to attract such things (Most of my traffic comes from people searching for "ASP on XAMPP" or "MSSQL on XAMPP", lol). But depending upon your site, good content differs

Not only that, members are what creates your content. Because that's where posts come from.

[SAFAD]

I Think Its Best To Have Exclussive Topics Better Than Members That Might Not Enter Again !!

[die4me]

I've seen lots of sites go years with only a handful of members. So quality members are the best.

[AlexIsaacs]

Both in my opinion. You don't want to have thousands upon thousands of posts on a forum and only a handful of members. It makes your forum look, well, spammy in a way. It might not always be true (You know, your forum has been online for a few years or more) though.

You also don't want thousands upon thousands of members with very few posts, that usually is a sign that most of the member base are spammers who have registered but done nothing.

But of course, usually only webmasters would really look at that stuff

Anyways, without posts, you usually don't have anything for Google and Bing and what not to index, so you won't have a good chance to turn up in results. Remember! Content is King! But you want to have good content to attract such things (Most of my traffic comes from people searching for "ASP on XAMPP" or "MSSQL on XAMPP", lol). But depending upon your site, good content differs

Not only that, members are what creates your content. Because that's where posts come from.

But what I'm getting at is whether or not I should prefer 200/300 people posting or 50/5,000 people.

Isn't it better to have everyone active and a smaller population rather than a few people active but a huge population?

Thanks for everyone's posts, I'll definitely be taking some things into consideration when I decide my focus for my site

[aldo]

Not necessarily. You could have 50 members, and 40 active (80% active), but you could also have 1,000 members, and 250 active members. (25% active)

Even though you have 80% active with that smaller community, you have more people active in the 25%.

[Jade Elizabeth]

Not necessarily. You could have 50 members, and 40 active (80% active), but you could also have 1,000 members, and 250 active members. (25% active)

Even though you have 80% active with that smaller community, you have more people active in the 25%.

I'd hazard to say it's the speed of the activity.

[Arantor]

It also depends firmly on the type of forum. This forum has a medium number of *very* active people - teamies, potential teamies and people that are strong followers of SMF amongst others - and many, many occasional users.

There's another forum I go to that has maybe 50 posts a day, but probably 30 of those will be me with the rest spread over probably 5-6 new members. But for that forum, the posts themselves far outweigh any importance of the growth of people, but it is a specific tech support forum.

[AlexIsaacs]

Not necessarily. You could have 50 members, and 40 active (80% active), but you could also have 1,000 members, and 250 active members. (25% active)

Even though you have 80% active with that smaller community, you have more people active in the 25%.

You missed the point.

The forum with 50 members would be much more active when it reaches 1,000 members but at the cost of length of time it takes to reach that number. The forum with 1,000 members likely just invested in lots of ad campaigns but the % of people posting will likely keep going do wn or stay the same, which isn't very impressive but this forum will have thousands of members in its stats.

[SoLoGHoST]

In my opinion,

I belive neither members nor posts really are set apart in "Which one matters more" because both are important, members on one hand are what keeps the forum alive, and posts are generally what keep them coming back and joining, but I guess if I have to choose one I would choose posts I would rather have a good amount of quality posts than a gob of members.

-[Hurricane]

ditto!

[Jade Elizabeth]

Not necessarily. You could have 50 members, and 40 active (80% active), but you could also have 1,000 members, and 250 active members. (25% active)

Even though you have 80% active with that smaller community, you have more people active in the 25%.

You missed the point.

The forum with 50 members would be much more active when it reaches 1,000 members but at the cost of length of time it takes to reach that number. The forum with 1,000 members likely just invested in lots of ad campaigns but the % of people posting will likely keep going do wn or stay the same, which isn't very impressive but this forum will have thousands of members in its stats.

Not necessarily. Never assume when it comes to forums.

[die4me]

When you get to many members people seem to compete for post more and more spam happens.
Some members even become territorial and either ignore or are plain rude to any new members that post or join the site.
Also i think groups make this even worse when one person in the group gets into a debate with someone outside the group other members of that group go into attack mode on this member.
Usually the group wins and chases away that member and other members eventually making the site go into a slow death(staff members will usually side with the group too thinking they are more important).