Here is the second part of “Forum Posting”. Here are my top 6 recommended tips and pointers when doing a forum posting project.
1) Be Knowledgeable.
Like I said, it is a good thing to know what you are writing about. If you picked a job on a topic you have no idea about, do a little research.
2) Do not use chat speak.
“lol whutup I just joind welcum me plz” is not usually acceptable. First of all, it’s unprofessional. It also makes you seem illiterate. Write as you would talk, or better yet, write as if it were a term paper. Proper spelling and grammar looks good, and the person who hired you would respect you and probably come back to you again for your services if they needed you later!
3) Don’t spam.
Try avoiding as much as possible to complete your task within ten minutes. If you do let’s say 5 posts in 30 seconds, you are going too fast. Even if your posts are quality, take your time and wait a minute or two in between posts. Don’t rush it.
4) Quality Posts are a MUST
Most webmasters specify the minimum amount of words needed in posts. Usually between 15-25 words per post is needed for them to be quality posts. Another factor is what you put into your posts. “I agree with this” or “Yeah that’s a cool idea” or not quality posts, they don’t add any input. If you are replying to a topic, it is usually your input, your opinion.
5) Get it done on time
If your employer has asked of you to complete your posts in a certain time frame, make sure to do so. Stay on task, and finish it before, or on time. Some projects take a few days, some take a week.
6) Keep in touch
It’s a must to keep in touch to whoever employed you while you are working on your posting project, especially if it is long term. Tell them when you are finished, almost finished, or just beginning. The first thing you should tell them is what your username is on their forum, so they can keep track of you. Another example of when to contact them is if you stopped posting for a few days. Maybe you lost internet connection, or had a real life emergency. Maybe you lost the URL to the forum. Talk to them ASAP and make sure you have clarified your delay.
Point No. 4 for ‘Quality Posts are a MUST’ says that certain webmasters consider 15-25 words per post as quality posts. However, IMO, I think the word limit criterion is actually a ‘quantity factor’ rather than a ‘quality factor’. Quality factor can include the relevance of your answer to the topic, the worth of your post, whether you are just agreeing or disagreeing to some ones post or actually contributing in the discussion with valid reasoning or analysis.
I’ve posted a list of forums that allow links in the signatures with the nofollow attribute removed. I don’t encourage people to sign up to them all and start spamming, but if there are some of interest and you think you can contribute then they are also a good way to build some backlinks.
Thanks a lot for that list! I’ll check ‘em out.