extreme webmaster evernerve

In the second part of this article, you have seen how to monetize your educational website. In this final part, you will see how to build a community around it.

Learn from my mistakes

When I launched my educational website, I finished every how-to with the statement that said something like “If you have any questions about this lesson, feel free to contact me.” You don’t want to do that. You are going to be flooded with emails.

At first, I replied to every email I received from my website visitors. Even when my website was not so big and well-known, the amount of email that I began to receive was considerable. I invested a lot of time to answer to every question properly, so that my readers could see that I care. The problem is that they didn’t care. Once someone got their answer, I never heard from them again.

What’s worse, a lot of emails were written very impolitely, in the lines of “How can I implement X so that I obtain Y”. You wouldn’t believe how people treat you when you offer free stuff (that’s also the reason why you should consider making an ebook and sell it or create a subscription service once your website gets a lot of traffic - people respect you if you slap a price on something).

A forum is the answer

Rememeber this well: No matter how small your educational website is at the beginning, launch a forum immediately. And instead of having a “contact me” blurb at the end of each lesson, place a link to your forum there. Tell people that all the questions should be addressed in the forums only.

At first, you will have only a few members. Their number will grow slowly but steadily over time. What’s important is that you answer to every single question that was posted on your forums. To be able to build a community around your website, you must show that you care. This takes patience and perseverance.

Even the longest voyage stars with the first step

Check, moderate and post on your forum on a daily basis. This is a must while yaour forum is still in its infancy. You will also notice that people usually want answers quickly. Which is understandable: Have you ever posted something in a forum and waited for the answer for days or weeks? You know how frustrating that can be.

You are the law on your forum

Also, it is very important to set the rules for your forum immediately. These should include the following (the following is not an exhaustive list):

• Forbidden topics or what is considered as inappropriate or completely inacceptable on your forums. In fact, you’ll see this on nearly every forum on the Web. Tell people from the start that stuff like racism, sexism, piracy, porn and the like are grounds for banning.
• Respect for others. Make your forum members understand that they are participating in a community whose aim is to help others and foster creativity and the exchange of ideas. You must state that there will be zero tolerance for insults and ridiculization.
• Advertising. Make it clear from the start that no advertising will be allowed, in any form, including signatures. You will be the only person who will advertise on your forum - remember, it is there to expand your website and bring you more profits, all the while helping people to learn more.

What to do when the forum gets going

After some months, you will have a few hundred members. You will notice that:

1. Most of your forum members are one-time posters, who are seeking an answer to a particular problem, and that’s it. Once the obtain it, they are gone. Treat them nicely like any other members. They help to build your forums, which in turn means more content for your website, which in turn means more relevance in search engines and more traffic for you.
2. Members who post from time to time. These tend to be intermediate to advanced users of the application your website is about, and come back to post when they get stuck.
3. Regular posters. Mostly, these are the people who use the application on a daily basis and need answers frequently, whether they are clueless newbies or advanced users.

There will be a few people in this last group who just love to post and answer other people’s questions. They are the ones who should be recruited as moderators. When you spot one of these, make sure to answer and comment on their posts. You must poke and probe around a little to see if a certain individual is cut to be a moderator.

These individuals tend to be nice persons, because they like to share their knowledge and help others. Write them a nice email where you explain (in a serious but loving tone) that you see that they are involved in the community, blah blah and that you are asking them to consider being a moderator on your forum.

They will inevitably accept and there you go - you have less work to do now. They will clean their section of the forum from spam, watch out for members who don’t abide by the rules, alert you if something bad happens, etc. This is great.

After a certain period of time, share some of your secrets of the trade with them, here and there, so that they see that you value them. And if you launch your own e-product, make sure to give them a copy. After that, they will be faithful to you and become trusted members of your team. If your forum ever gets hundreds of thousands of members, you will certainly make a lot of money from it. Consider paying your moderators for the job they are doing, and there you have your own team of professionals caring about your website!

Once things get going you will notice that you won’t have to answer the posts as regularly as before. At a certain point, your forum will be on autopilot. Once you reach that level, all you have to do is care about the technical aspects of your forum and post season’s greetings .

Some technical considerations

There are many great free forum software packages out there. Get informed about them. Learn what options each package offers. The most popular open-source, free forum software is phpBB. Most hosting providers have it included in their control panel, and installation is usually a one-click thing. Recently, SMF, has also gained in popularity. Choose your forum system wisely.

If your forum becomes hugely popular, you must seriously consider switching to a commercial forum software. These are far more stable when it comes to dealing with hundreds of thousands of members and offer professional support. Their team will transfer your existing forum to the new system for free in most cases. The most popular commercial forums are vBulletin and Invision Power Board.

Protect your forum from spam right from the start

You should think about protecting your forum from spam posts and bot members (automatically created members who serve only to promote spam) before you launch it. One of the best ways to do it is to install a plugin that prevents automated creation of member accounts. In other words, install a captcha. Nearly every free forum sofware will have a community/support website where you will have the opportunity to download anti-spam plugins for free.

Of course, there will be actual human members who will register at your forum just to push their spam. You will have to do some cleaning manually, this is inevitable.

Install your forum in a proper folder

You have certainly noticed that most educational websites have their forum placed in the folder called “forum”, like this:

www.mywebsite.com/forum/

Since this has become the norm, there is no reason that you shouldn’t do it. This will also help you get supplemental results in Google once your website becomes popular, grows and starts to branch out into clearly defined sections. See the image below for an easy explanation of this.

Earning money from your community/forum

A forum is a great place to earn more money. But, some specific rules apply here. Remember this: AdSense ads convert horribly on a forum. On the other hand, targeted ads and affiliate ads associated with your niche convert great. On a forum, a professionally done affiliate ad will reap profits and bring you far more money than a contextual ad ever will.

Forums are also great for promoting your own stuff. If you have an e-product, just slap a banner with it on your forum and members will flock to it. Why? Because they see you as an authoritative expert in your niche and will be more inclined to buy your product. They trust you!

You can also post forum-wide announcements concerning your product and everyone will see it. Once you have a public, the possibilities for promoting products and services are endless.

Summary

If you decided to create an educational website, you will inevitably have to create a community around it. Here’s a rundown of the things you should do:

1. Never ever answer any how-to/tutorial related questions by email. Don’t even offer this possibility to your website visitors.
2. Launch a forum together with your website. This is where things should be discussed and where you’ll offer support.
3. Prepare youself before launching the forum: Make sure to protect it from spam and make sure to set clear rules for your forum members.
4. Participate in threads and discussions regularly, until you gain a considerable following which will allow you to pick moderators and share the forum workload with them.
5. Monetize your forum by placing carefully selected ads targeted to your niche on every page and/or promote your e-product on it.

Well people, this concludes my article on earning money from educational websites! I enjoyed sharing my knowledge in this field with you and will continue to do so. Ride on!

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