Growth Should you continue to add content or step back at one point?

[Cedric]

As a community leader, one of the biggest questions you’ll face is whether you should always be adding new content to your forum or if there comes a time when you should step back and let members drive the discussions.

Some forums thrive because their owners stay actively involved - starting discussions, responding to members, and keeping the community engaged. Others seem to fade away when the owner stops posting, leaving members without much direction. Sometimes, you see forums thrive even when the owner is not involved.

So, what do you think? Should forum owners continue adding new content daily, even when their forum has grown? Or is there a point where the community should take the lead?

 

[Matthew]

As a community leader, one of the biggest questions you’ll face is whether you should always be adding new content to your forum or if there comes a time when you should step back and let members drive the discussions.

Some forums thrive because their owners stay actively involved - starting discussions, responding to members, and keeping the community engaged. Others seem to fade away when the owner stops posting, leaving members without much direction. Sometimes, you see forums thrive even when the owner is not involved.

So, what do you think? Should forum owners continue adding new content daily, even when their forum has grown? Or is there a point where the community should take the lead?

I think a base level of participation is always warranted. There should hopefully come a time where membership moves the conversation forward. However, management/owners should always be available and have some level of community involvement. Even if this is logging in and posting occasionally, this shows that the owner is invested in the services. Over time, depending on size, this structure can move to less frequent postings but the shift should occur to where a strong leadership team or staff team continue the engagement with the owner providing more presence to the staff team.

 

[Bawse]

I always add content to my forum EVERYDAY. If new discussions I start aren't getting replies, I stop creating threads until we get some responses, and I try to reply to more posts.

 

[CTS]

Although I want to and enjoy adding content, sometimes I have to break away just to keep myself fresh. And sometimes life gets in my way.