My forum has a lot of members that don't actively participate in discussions. They mostly come for our daily freeroll, and to check the leaderboard in our daily buy-ins hosted on a partnered poker site.

 

Any ideas how to get my members to you get members to engage more?

That is a good question. 90% of the users are lurkers. There’s a good article about that here:

 

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/do-you-know-whos-lurking-90-social-media-users-lurkers-joey-little

 

Have you tried engaging with them personally? Send them a PM, ask how they’re doing. Ask what they like and don’t like about your forum.

It's always been true that there are 90% lurkers in any given community. Not everyone wants to put their head above the parapet especially if they feel they have nothing to add (or worse, they have something to add but it's controversial)

 

Be careful with trying to force engagement with them though: it used to be a thing that people would offer up downloads or whatever, hidden behind a 'like this post to see the link' or 'reply to this post to see the content' which will absolutely create engagement - just it'll be trash engagement that doesn't convert into anything else useful.

 

There will always be transactionalists who turn up on a forum and don't want to integrate or become a productive member, but simply to ask one question/get one thing and go. And that's OK - a certain amount of footfall is normal and necessary. Especially as people like that do pass on the URL to other people at times.

 

The only strategy I've ever seen work to convert lurkers to usefully engaging, is to give them something to engage with. You may have to reach out and ask what that might be for some people, but be prepared for 'I only come for the free stuff' as an answer - some people aren't ever going to be there to convert.