getting noticed: how do you advertise?

[NyxDarklore 92]

Advertising is one of those administrative tasks that you either love or hate (I don’t know that I’ve met anyone for whom there is a middle ground). It’s a necessary evil, something that needs to be done to get the word about your site out into the open, and everyone goes about it in different ways.

 

So the questions I pose to you are simple: how do you go about advertising your site to the masses? and how do your methods change when your site is brand new vs. a few months after its launch vs. a few years down the road?

 

Advertising for me has always been something of a necessary evil, as I mentioned above. I absolutely detest it but I am also aware that it is an important part of running a site. Personally, I’ve found no difference between allowing site-to-site advertising and not allowing it except in the sense that there is less traffic looking for an advertising forum. I tend to employ affiliates more often than not and directly targeting new people via site requests where I can address whether we meet the requirements that they are looking for.
 

[Arceus 1,082]

I've had very little luck over the years from drive-by advertising. And it turns out, I hate it anyway, and so do search engines. For my current genre, having a good SEO and appearing in search engines as highly ranked as possible is extremely important because the writers in my fandom often have no idea that they're kind of role-players. I need them to find us on accident, and usually that'll be through Google.

 

So, I don't have drive-by advertising boards. I rarely ever do because they're a chore and I hate them and they don't actually work for me anyway. I've gotten, in the 15 years I've been running RPs, two players from those. Two. Most of my advertising is through word of mouth, resource sites, Tumblr, Instagram, and Reddit. Occasionally I've responded to LFG posts but it's kind of rare that one of those fits my sites anyway, so I can't say I'm particularly prolific.

[Muse 121]

Resource sites like this one and others have been my best sources of new players, and the only advertising I willingly pay for is TopRPSites. It's always been good to me, so I will continue to toss some coffee money in that direction. I agree that good SEO and a well-designed site also get random search traffic, which has probably led to a player or two for us.

 

Other than that, folks invite their friends and word of mouth seems to be really successful—we have no illusions of grandeur and aren't interested in becoming a huge, bustling site. We like it kind of intimate and small, but fresh brains to plot with and new character faces do make me happy!

 

I tend to ask new players how they found us and what made them want to write on our forum, and I generally keep mental track of those influences in order to know where to put my time and efforts.

[Morrigan 1,826]

Site to site advertising can actually tank SEO (as an FYI). The more links to your site on low grade sites in advertising forums reads to google like spam and spam sites. Google likes spam about as much as we do. It will actually lower your rank because you have links to sites that are considered spammy (lots of low grade links aka advertising forums). There are people that don't believe in SEO but we live in the day of google and siri and people de-facto search for things where it can be easily found.

• Google
• Resource sites
• tumblr
• Reddit

These are places that people go to find things and likely your best bets to get people outside of directly advertising to someone in a looking for RP section.

 

The best thing that I ever heard about advertising forums was this:

Quote

Advertising forums attract other advertisers, not other players interested in finding a new site.

 

I've found that this is pretty true overall. Advertising, in general is only used by advertisers and most advertisers aren't interested in joining another site, they are visiting your site to drop their advertisement and leave. Yes it looks like an influx of potentials (aka guests) but its false information since those guests aren't likely to actually join.

[mythus 3]

I HATE advertising. Really. I do. Annnnd, I suck at it.

 

I do use such sites like this, and I do put my name out there, but I hate it. I much rather just RP on my site and be magically found. 

[ThriftStoreTeeth 78]

Given most of my actual players have come from resource sites or simple word-of-mouth, that's where I tend to focus. Resource sites are dead easy too. Add your site to their directory if they have one, slap a banner in your sig, and post away. Say good stuff and be helpful, and people will find you. 

 

After that, its generally pretty diminishing returns. I have had some luck with people coming over from affiliates, though you don't want to go too overboard with those for SEO reasons. Tumblr seems to generate a lot of lurkers and drive-by registrations but not a ton that stick around. Reddit, I've personally never tried but I imagine it could be either a Tumblr or a resource site situation, depending on how active you are and where you're posting.

 

The absolute bane of my existence is site-to-site ads. They're not only a SEO nightmare like others have mentioned, but they eat up so much time that could be effectively spent elsewhere. I could be shitposting in my Discord server, or cooking up something new for my members, but nope. Instead, I'm mindlessly copy/pasting stuff. It ain't for me.

[Flahme 44]

I advertise, when I remember to do so.

 

Resource sites

Tumblr

Reddit

 

I have a poll on my site to tell me where you came from. Most so far are word of mouth.

[Yume 99]

Most of the advertising I do is resource sites, occasionally tumblrs. I used to do a lot of drive by advertising but man it's just. Painful. and ineffective. Majority of members I got when I was running sites a lot were from directories anyway

[ClutchRoadagain 4]

Yeah, I primarily rely on telling people I have a roleplay and they should join it. I'm just lucky my friends like to roleplay as much as I do.

[MorriganLFae 12]

Me and the other founder of our group are getting our feet wet with advertising, now that we have a solo platform.  It is nice to see some of the things we are already doing are being suggested as successful ones for others. 🙂

[Stars 0]

Advertising is such a pain in my bum!! I've just revamped my RPG and it's got to that point where I know I'm going to have to start putting the word out. So far though, as others have mentioned, it seems people pop by to advertise their own forum and then leave. Resource sites like these and search engines definitely seem to be the best, along with general word of mouth, and those I already know from other roleplaying forums. I'm also rubbish at graphics and things like that, so mine never look particularly appealing. xD 

[August. 1]

Lately I do Tumblr a few times a week and hit up other forums every weekend.  

[Tyra Ravencrone 1]

I remember years ago when I ran a large yahoo group I detested my Friday nights having to spend 2 hours on yahoo/aim trying to get people to join and I felt like a pest having to do it but I at least was honest and to the point of what I was advertising. Sometimes I got 5-20 people if I was lucky and honestly I was fine with that. Now I'm in the process of getting ready to go live with my own and I'm already thinking of things to do besides the buttons. I've honestly never used tumbler even for my RL side business. I've seen some helpful tips in here so I'll be putting those to use.

I do know though having been looking for sites to join for the RP I want; some of the sites should make it a point to clean 'dead pages' every so often from the buttons. I know every two months I will do an activity check on people I allow my static slots.

[Huskerdust 625]

I don’t know man. I need help. My fandom is popular but apparently it’s niche when it comes to rping it on forums because I’ve seen one other site in this fandom and it’s only based on it with human characters. I’ve tried my old fandom haunts but it’s not working this time. 

[Prophetess 137]

When I started my first site I blitzed everything and I didn't get much returns from site to site. It was just a full waste of my time. On that same site I recently did away with all site to site advertising and keeping only affiliates. That seems to work well but I've talked about how I handle those before. With the new site that I'm working on, I didn't make the same mistakes of the past. I've lived and learned. So this time around I keep it to directories and Tumblr. I have a great core group right now and they are talking us up. Word of mouth though will always be the best means of advertising. I also share that with one of the other sites I work with. If someone doesn't fit for either of my sites and are looking for something more like they have, I'll send them over there and vice versa. It's a great system that works. I don't think I'll be blitzing this time outside of the opening buzz. After that I'll just stay with what has worked. Word of mouth, LFG's, directories, and Tumblr (but truth be told I don't get much traffic from Tumblr as I do the others).