So you worked all night. Getting the right background, filling it with tons of avatars. Creating lots of boards and making a killer logo. But all that does not matter if you are the only member. And getting members is just the half of it. Getting them to post is another.

What are the best ways to get rpers to your site? And get them involed.

Advertise, Advertise, Advertise and more Advertising XD.

Also fill up your forum with topics, also in the OOC forums as a lot of admins seem to forget that the OOC is quite an important forum too. Where you can't post topics really, see if you can pin a topic with a description, explanation or some guidelines on how to use that forum. Make an official announcement in your news forum that you officially opened (fills that one up too). What also helps is to create a multiple accounts for yourself at first. That way you can RP with yourself (seems weird but it's actually loads of fun), so that the RP forums aren't completly empty either.

And be sure your layout isn't huge, if you start out with a forum make them as compact as possible. As you get more topics, you can always move more boards to the index page.

There might be some useful documentations too here on RPG-D and have a read through the other topics in this forum, they're quite useful.

Good luck.

Good advice I'll actually take that into account myself.

Yeah, very nice advice. Putting up ads is probably the best way to do that though. Afilliation FTW!

I've been trying to get my members to participate more in the RPG and it's somewhat working. But yeah, that multiple account thing sounds good, i might try it.

Telling your friends is not an option. Normally, they register, tell you they like your forum, post a couple of times and forget about it XD At least that happened to me once. If you're gonna tell your friends, make sure they're really into the RPing AND into forum-posting; if they're not, they'll easily pass to something else, no matter how much they lurve you XD.

Advertise in places like this, enter your site into topsites, make Google advertise you, affiliate if possible... you can do almost anything, just make sure it's allowed in the place you want to do it or you'll look like a total jerk.

I don't know. I've tried all of the above and nothing seems to get me members. I have 1 active member on my forum which happens to be me :( and I have made sure my sight is really well thought out and the newer version is laid out so that newcomers only see a smaller top layer, and all the rest is hidden so as not to confuse them. I have advertized on so many sites i've lost count and still 0 hits.

Korumaine-
I just now went to your board to check it out and see if I'd like to apply. Good idea making the index page layout simple but I'd hazard to say it's too simple. I haven't a clue what I'd be getting into or how to join just on first glance, and I think that might be part of your problem initially. You might try reading around here about enhancing what my co-admin calls the site's "curb appeal," making sure that visitors know who you are and what they can do on your site right away. She's been working diligently over the last few weeks using information found on this site and though we'll never likely be "done," you can have a look (click my banner below) and see what she's done.

Personally to me advertising doesn’t seem to be all to awesome when getting members. Unless it’s tons and tons of it. And then you still might not get anything (other then guest and bots). People make it sound easy when they just say advertise :(

At one of the older forums I owned (it completely bombed, with 12 members in six months, none of them active) I went to other forums and posted there until I became some of the members' friend, then asked them to join the forum. From the way I just stated it, it sounds deceitful, but no one got hurt, no one was deceived, and, frankly, I had a good time doing it. This was before I started to roleplay, so it might be more or less effective roleplaying.

Now that I look at it, it really didn't do me any good. In principal it should work, though, even if it still sounds deceitful.

Which one? is it /rpforums/ or just /forum ?

this may seem odd but we moved recently and im afraid i left a few old links

That being said I will check it out thanks for the info. What if i made some buttons like "Register Now To Get Involved!" or something up top? or is that too flashy?

i clicked on your banner up there (for some reason they aren't all linked, they should be) and got to this addy http://www.ror-rpg.com/rpforums/index.php
You could make flashy buttons, but I suggest a header up top which just link to your story and how people can get involved. When I click into a site of any kind it's 'cause I'm interested, but if I have to do too much digging to get any real information, I'm going to get bored. Did you look at our board? We've got our canon event summary linked dead center at the top of the header. It's almost hard not to know what's going on. That's important :)

Ok thats the right one. :)

Yeah I want some sort of box thing like that with announcements etc but I don't know how and no mods have been released for th enew version of my system yet. Ill try and at least put a link up top

Looks a whole lot better now. Good start. Just try to think about if you were brand new and didn't know anything, what would be the first thing you'd like to know about this world? Sorry, I'm sucks at fantasy writing, or I'd happily come try to help :)

If it doesn't work out in the end, you could always try to find a good roleplaying site, work hard, become friends with the admins, and then get a high position on their forum. >:D

hmm a good roleplaying site....like pandora's ascension perhaps? XP

*raises hand*

Done that. Twice. Hooray for me!

Haha I've got to try that now. Ive always wanted to get involved with a site at the very beginning (not my own :p) and rise in the ranks so to speak.

Thanks so much for the advise, I just opened a site and I have only 20 members so far. Well actually people have multiple accounts so not really. I really want it to succeed so I will defenetly do this. :)

lol 20 is better than none ;)
good luck!
abput advertising, does anyone advertise on RPG collection? I know that Pandora's Ascension is on there but does it attract users?

EDIT: btw angel-girl i added a marquee to the top that tells you to register and where to go to get started/make a character :)

Actually, I do! *Raises hand*

I promote my RPGs on RPG Collection =)

cool how has it worked out for you?

Yep, I advertise on RPG Collection too. Also with my old RPG's, I always put them on there too. I also put RPG-D there and they have put up our button too, I think it's great that boards with same themes support one another ^_^.

It looks worlds better Korumaine! Well done :)

Thanks! :D I actually updated it again (for the final time hopefully) to have a links and news section. I'm crazy like that. I think if I saw that on my first visit i would definitely join.

RPG Collection is very good =)

I posted on RPG Collection and they put me in the non-fantasy human rpg part. why?

I wish advertising worked better for me. So far, it seems that the only major amounts of people I attract go inactive within a few days or less. I only have a few members that actually do anything, and some of them are starting to lessen their appearances due to the lack of activity. I see all these really active successful places out there and just keep wondering what they're doing differently. After so long of trying to get things to work with very little success, it really starts to get tedious to do anything. I try to recruit members to help advertise, but don't think that's working so well... (ouch)

It takes awhile to get a place up and going. How long have you been doing this, Misty?

I have a forum that has been open for two days and I have been advertising, advertising, advertising. I'm not really one to comment on whether my efforts have proven worthy, but hey...two people joined today.

(tongue) Its ahrd to get people to join since alot of peopel have different taste. Though it' best to still try and advertise, makeing the plot more interesting then it really is might help (blush)

Try to roleplay with your members and plot with everyone. I cannot stress this enough. A lot of owners are like "I don't have time to rp with everyone" or something along those lines. Even if you DON'T rp with them, still plot with them so they feel included. That's why I joined Terra because everyone plotted with everyone and no one was left in the dark.

Advertise and post topics to get them started up. If they still don't post, probably put a suggestions forum, to see why they're idle.

As already said Advertising is the key, and I've found word of mouth helps too. People that have friends that RP can and will refer your site on if they enjoy it. Advertising is only as good as your advert, so be sure to get to the point without rambling, give links to useful information and have something that grabs a reader's attention. That last part is not always easy, so when you have some members (if it is a new rp) maybe try asking your them why they joined, how they heard about the rpg and what caught their attention.

I personally disagree with ShinLi's suggestion to make multiple accounts for yourself. It does make the board less empty but I have always been put off by RPGs that are filled with few members yet have tonnes of characters. This is personal preference, so take it with a pinch of salt if you will, but this is a good example of how varied Rpers can be. The rule I always use for my RPG is that I have created it a certain way, it is aimed for a certain style of Rpers, so try and promote that if you can.

Affiliates and link exchanges are another good way to promote your RPG. Also be varied with where and how you advertise. A lot of owners who have message board RPGs only advertise on advertising forums such as this one or RPGC or the advertising section of other boards. There are Yahoo groups, live journal & greatest journal communities, button exchanges, website directories... and so many more places to promote your site. If it's alright with a Mod I can post a link to the advertising Guide I wrote up at The Distant Fantasies Network, it's not listed on RPG-Directory yet due to me being a new member (tongue)

I also agree with summerdanez, as a Moderator I always like to have a lot of player communication going on, and I try to plot with as many people as I can. Even if it's just a passing response to someone's post, it can still help and can even develop into a fantastic plot sometimes. However, with my RPG this does work both ways; players need to be willing to interact.

*delayed reply to Mako due to project overload*

I've been advertising at many places for, oh, about 8 months. Only lately has any of the advertising done anything at all. I even stuck up little adds on other web-games that I'm in that allow such things and convinced a few other members to do the same with other games they are in (so long as it's allowed). It's getting frustrating...

Uck...I've had my RP up for a while now. Everywhere I have advertized, ppl have been like...d00d...no...f*ck you! >< It's irritating!

Make sure people know that as an Admin, you're open to questions and are willing to work out problems. I try and make this as obvious as can be on my board so people aren't afraid to PM me with plot ideas. And even if you don't like their idea, don't just reject it or something but maybe try and find an alternative. For example, someone wanted to change a Canon pairing at my site and I was all right with it as long as the person being changed was replaced with another Canon character. When they couldn't find one, I helped to look for one on the HPL until they were happy. It doesn't take too much time to just try and answer questions and solve problems.

As ShinLi said in the very beginning, talking OOC helps tons, too. Participate in the games and the spam topics, in the C-Box if you have one, etc. It helps if the people at the board know who you are.