I am having problems getting people to sign up and post on mine..... How did you guys get your forum going?

I made links to them off my main sites. "Free" is a good word to get people to look. Also mentioned them on other forums I was on. Make sure you have your meta tags done well, so that the forum will appear in the search engines.

One key. You have to advertise it as a forum someone 'wants' to visit. It could be the best done forum in history, yet there has to be a reason for people to be compelled to visit. IMO

I manage several forums in CompuServe and there is a good sized staff that does nothing but forum promotions. We keep coming up with "seeder" messages that they then post on a main entry page and directs people to individual forums.

Maybe you can find the equivalent of our entry page.

Another way is to find forums similar to yours and make arrangements to promote their forums if they promote yours; doubles the amount of eyeballs.

You need to promote on similar sites, but of course with their permission.
Meta tags, as mentioned, are also important.

We need to find something on your board that is not easily found some else! Maybe someone has a suggestion or maybe it will come to you. It takes thought , work and time. Maybe MUCH TIME. Bill

Thanks everyone...... Ill try to find more websites like this one to promote it..... I spent 1000 dollars on google ads and it did nothing

You have to post, post post. You have to start topics and provide experienced replies. It takes time too.

Shouldn't have to pay anything for web promotion and SEO. Sorry to hear you had to spend that kind of money

Getting people to visit a site can be very difficult, even if you have unique and interesting content.

I did the backend database design on a site that has many thousands of old, unique, interesting photos on it but the site stats are dismal. It shows up well in google, etc, but perhaps just isn't something people are looking for.

Peter