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What helps make a forum link stick?
burkhardt5
Posts: 216
Joined: 26 Jun 09
Trust:
26 Sep 12 1:59 pm

What helps make a forum link stick?

Hey all

Ever since my main site dropped from the #1 spot in Google and was replaced by a lame Amazon page for it's main keyword phrases and went from 60+ visits per day to less than 10 per day due to the penguin update, I have been looking into non search engine traffic.

Forums seem to be a fantastic source of targeted traffic but my posts keep on getting deleted.

I usually register for the site and then post a relevant comment on a thread, which sticks. Then I will re-visit the site over a few weeks looking for threads that a link to my site would be beneficial. These posts are latter deleted.

I think that the site owners may not like the fact that I offer something for sale but still I think that the link would be helpfull to the thread readers and I include the link in a relevant comment.

Can anyone give some tip's on what I can do or not do to help these links stick?

Thanks
Never Give Up!!!
Paul
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Paul J. Burkhardt
 
esolutions
Posts: 475
Joined: 28 Apr 09
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26 Sep 12 4:03 pm

 Hi Paul,

If you only have one or two posts on a forum with one of them being a link to your site, no wonder they are getting deleted. Some forums have a zero link tolerance no matter how many posts you have while on others you can add your link IF you are an active, valuable member AND the link is relevant information and not just a BUY MY STUFF type of ad.

Try adding value, it will mean involvement in less forums, but more effective engagement. Also, instead of trying to place your link in the post, you can use your signature for that and leave the posts to pure value.
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jimcoe
Posts: 259
Joined: 13 Feb 12
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26 Sep 12 5:16 pm

 Great advice, esolutions!

One online marketing forum I belong to requires 250 posts before you can link to your product or service in a post. But you can add 1 link to your profile when you join, and 1 to your signature.

And you'll no doubt notice that here at Affilorama we're allowed a link in out signature, more than 1 in our profile and we have this cool 5 star "Trust" rating to indicate our member voted value to the community.

We even have that "Premium" symbol to indicate that we value this community enough to pay a monthly fee for access to more tools and features.

_jim coe
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contenticonz
Posts: 20
Joined: 05 Aug 12
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27 Sep 12 3:58 am

 Great advice.

To add to that, you want to start by adding 15 to 30 post of quality, relevant, valuable, informative, content before you even ever consider adding your signature link. So making 7 to 10 post a day for three days should about do it.

Now if your website's content was anything like your forum posts--then I can understand why Google's Penguin update affected you.

In fact concerning your website, if there is no quality content on your site available, then Google sees that by the number of visitors that hit the back button immediately upon landing on your site, which causes your bounce rate percentage to increase, which leads to red flags.

Similarly the same thing can be said about your forum posts--no forum is going to delete quality, valuable, informative, content even with a signature link, but if there is no value there, why keep it up?

Quality Content Is King....
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cecille.l
Posts: 6369
Joined: 25 Feb 11
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27 Sep 12 9:40 am

 When I was starting with forum posting, my account got banned from one forum. Like you I thought I was posting good responses to the questions and I was linking to information on my site as well as to other sites. As it turns out, that particular forum does not like posts to contain external links. So I got banned despite the fact that I was giving value to other members.

Lesson learned: always read the fine print on forums. It's actually a lesson you can apply towards everything: always read the fine print.

I eventually got my account back and I am still participating on that forum. I've stopped putting any links on my posts and made do with just that one link to my site on my forum signature. It's given me some traffic, but what I really liked about forum posting is the opportunity to make yourself and your site known. Once the members see you are sincere in helping out, they trust you more and trust you enough to go to your site. And eventually, purchase through your link.

Have a good day!
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Cecille

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mark schaaf
Posts: 365
Joined: 04 Oct 10
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15 Oct 12 6:35 pm

 I agree with Cecille I too was banned from one of my favorite forums but was for an even stupider reason. The forum I was on many people asked pretty much the same question which was asking people about a good restaurant in different cities in Italy. I went on each post and just said that I don't like to give tips on places to eat because so many people have such different tastes that I would hate to tell someone to go to restaurant A because I loved it and they hated it so I explained on each post how to use Google maps to find restaurants near there hotel and that most of the time the places they are looking at on google maps will have a web site listed next to the map that way they could see the menu and decide for your self which place might be the right place for me.

Well this site didn't like this at all and deleted all my comments and said I was bad because my signature goes to my site was being used to much. Maybe if I had done this over a week time period it would have been fine but since it was one day they didn't like it.

So sometimes it could be just how many posts you do in a day. Now I only do no more then 2 posts a day on any forums I go on with the exception of this site because I am not here to promote anything I am here to help when I can and ask questions when I am not sure of what I need to do.
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Mark
 

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