For the online marketer, forum marketing is one of the simplest and most effective investments of time and attention available. Any marketer, in any niche, can participate in this form of online marketing. Just remember that some niches will have more than other forums devoted to them-though most will have a few high traffic forums to choose from.
You've probably heard that some Internet marketers skip this method of marketing altogether. The fact remains that Internet marketers can use this to meet many of their goals.
Of course there are some pages that are vitally important to take note of before beginning your marketing. One of which is the TOS or 'terms of service' page. The longer you're able to remain an active member, the greater your profit potential will be. If you violate their TOS, then you can be banned for a short while or for life. Also, forum moderators generally don't care if you've read them or not. If you violate a TOS, then they assume you've read them and violated it anyway. This is how they feel about it-and they have reason to feel this way. You must comply with the site's TOS if you want to use it for your forum marketing efforts. There are several golden rules with forum marketing, and one of them is to give value and be helpful. But consider that when you provide value, you'll be helping someone or more than one person. There might be plenty of reasons that others will be resentful towards you. It could be because you are too much of an authority in a certain niche. But it is based upon how you act in the forums. Yes, you might know a lot about your subject, but don't come off as a know it all. If people get bad vibes about you, then it will have a negative impact on your reputation. You can be the smartest person in the world and it will not matter if others do not want to hear what you have to say.
Don't even think about networking on a forum until you know who the 'top dog' on the forum is, so to speak. There may be a few contenders for top spot. The membership numbers will also influence this. Forums with long histories and large memberships will have more influence bringers than smaller forums. It isn't always easy to guess, from the outside, who will have the most influence. It's usually easy to recognize the people who are 'leaders' on the forum as they see here are the ones others are trying to get the attention of. These are the people you want to work to build a relationship with.
So, understand that social marketing and forum marketing are somewhat alike. And it's no surprise that forum marketing is a form of social link marketing. They are very closely connected to relationship marketing, which is why you should learn as much as you can about it.