Incentives to Post

rewards for regular posts

[camweh]

My forum has a reasonable amount of traffic but I'd like to increase it - I'd like to reward those who have posted regularly. I'd also like to provide an incentive for others to post more by perhaps rewarding them after a certain number of posts. Here's what I was thinking:

I have plenty of web space and could make a few templates and offer a page or even two pages dedicated to that person. Something along the lines of www.mysite.com/members/yourname I'd be willing to perhaps update each page at six month intervals and allow two photos. The subject matter would be up to them. Naturally each page would have a "home" button so any visitor to their page will have the option of browsing my site. These are just thoughts at the moment, would appreciate any comments.

[TheRookie]

Rewards after x posts encourages spammy posts, IMO. Quality over quantity, my friend.

Perhaps rewarding for members that you recognize contributing positively to the forum, rather than just reaching a set number of posts.

Or get a karma system going, so members can rate other members' posts. Then, when they reach a karma level, they can have access to their own page.

[camweh]

Perhaps rewarding for members that you recognize contributing positively to the forum, rather than just reaching a set number of posts.

Thanks Rookie,
That's along the lines I was thinking too. perhaps such things could be decided by the Administrator and Moderators. As I said, just thoughts at the moment. Thanks for your comments.

[CromeYellow]

Hi camweh

WE have a 'most valuable poster' award, with badge, that we assign to people are are super-helpful to others. They also get a private forum, which they use to let the mods know about stuff on the forum. Works nicely, on our forum at least.

Roger

[camweh]

Thanks Roger,

Sounds like something I'll consider too.

[rogerd]

It's far better to reward quality than quantity. I've found that just having member levels (like we do here at WebmasterWorld) seems to encourage some people to post. Occasionally, even this minor incentive causes members to make pointless posts for the sake of boosting their count.

[zulufox]

Occasionally, even this minor incentive causes members to make pointless posts for the sake of boosting their count.

I couldn't

[edited by: zulufox at 5:10 pm (utc) on May 25, 2005]

[zulufox]

Occasionally, even this minor incentive causes members to make pointless posts for the sake of boosting their count.

disagree

[edited by: zulufox at 5:10 pm (utc) on May 25, 2005]

[zulufox]

Occasionally, even this minor incentive causes members to make pointless posts for the sake of boosting their count.

more.

[rogerd]

Too bad Brett moved the threshold for the free t-shirt up to 20,000 posts, zulu. ;)

[Cybermancer]

I've seen a few different approaches to this sort of thing, including things like badges, special member groups, access to special areas of the forums, ability to use custom avatars, etc. It's funny sometimes what people will consider a 'reward'.

[rogerd]

The problem with rewards for posting (even tiny ones, like a higher member level designation) is that some members respond with a huge flurry of short posts - "me too" posts, "I disagree!", etc...

[linear]

That's where software that allows posts in certain boards to not contribute to your postcount is slick.

It seems to be increasingly popular to not display postcount on busier boards these days. I don't care for that approach--imperfect as it is, postcount is a useful metric if you wander into a new community and start conversations.

In previous days of adminning a busy vB board, the policy we set was a certain postcount would get you the privilege of settting your own title. It was a few hundred posts as I recall, and almost everyone who got close to the mark suddenly developed an uncontrollable urge to post. Lowering it to 75 posts or so produced a remarkable improvement in the signal to noise ratio.

[lorenzinho2]

< Something along the lines of www.mysite.com/members/yourname

Hi Camweh, I recommend that you provide some sort of a profile page for ALL users, regardless of number of posts. Profile / User pages go a long way towards creating a community feel, and letting your users invest themselves in your forum by sharing personal information about themselves.

Some ideas for incenting users:

- Ratings on a post by post basis (helpful not helpful) (gets at quality over quantity)
- Featured comments
- Featured posters / profiles
- Recognition of your super users through your newsletter or forum blog
- Tracking "most trusted users" - allow users to indicate which users they trust. This data could eventually be helpful for social networking type features.
- Tracking and posting Hall of Fame type posts (e.g. Best of Craigslist)
- Tracking and recognizing any other behavior that makes your forum better (profile creation, posts, feedback messages, other forms of content submission, etc.)

[Heartlander]

I've done more rewards type of things than you can shake a stick at.
Without Quality CONTENT, it just doesn't matter.
Folks have taken thousands of dollars worth of "goodies", never to be seen from again.

Give them content, make your site the #1 or #2 site they go to when they think of your topic...period. ; )