Anyone created a forum to compliment a small local business or brick and mortar shop?

R0binHood

R0binHood

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Curious to hear if anyone has every created a forum for the customers of a local business as opposed to an online business and how it has worked out.

Everyone and their mother's business has a facebook page, but what about a real forum community.

Anyone done this successfully to get consistent traffic on the site and an increase in sales in person?

Would be interesting to hear what industries it could work in.
 
JadeBlade

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R0binHood said:
Curious to hear if anyone has every created a forum for the customers of a local business as opposed to an online business and how it has worked out.

Everyone and their mother's business has a facebook page, but what about a real forum community.

Anyone done this successfully to get consistent traffic on the site and an increase in sales in person?

Would be interesting to hear what industries it could work in.
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I don't think anyone would appreciate it as it may be considered as just a large advertisement.
 
Adam H

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I have a client who has a forum that compliments his business and allows other avenues to open up as a result of it, It not really customer facing but more of a certification for other service providers in the same space. The problem with alot of brick and mortar businesses is unless its a tech based company with tech savvy customer base a support / promotional forum for them would get used rarely unless there was a specific pull for it.

Id say however the time spend establishing and maintaining a forum like that could be spent else where which is more productive and profitable.
 
R0binHood

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What kind of business is it?

One industry I've been thinking about is the gym and fitness industry.

I've got a friend who is looking into building his brand and opening a gym. I can think of lots of ways that a forum could be a good way to compliment this.

As a personal trainer you could share one to one info and communicate and share info with with a customer through a forum over the weeks as they train.

Lots of existing gym forums have training log sections where people track their progress publicly and get feedback from other users, why not share it with and get feedback from the members of the gym that you actually visit?

To most new gym goers, starting at the gym can be very intimidating. If there's a local online community, they can safely ask questions from the veteran gym goers who use the same equipment as them.

They could also get to know and put faces to the names of the people that they see every time they go to the gym creating a more friendly and personable environment when working out.

You ever notice how incredibly awkward and eye-averting some people can be at the gym?

What if you were able to answer a fitness question for them on the forum and the next day instead of them timidly asking when you'd be finished with that machine they enthusiasticly greet you by name and thank you for the tip on the website?

It could be used to help members find gym partners to train with. From personal experience at least, I find I'm much more motivated to actually get my ass into the gym if I'm working out with someone else. You both get results quicker, but how do you do that with a stranger at the local gym? Through a forum....

I used to train with my housemate and we'd encourage each other, we were both seeing results! Then I moved city and neither of us did nothing at the gym for over a year as we didn't have each other to bounce off. I'd have loved to have found a new training partner at a gym in the new city, but didn't know anyone local.

The gym owner could sell supplements and other gear through the forum using affiliate links to the customers and earn a bit of revenue that way. Stuff they're already recommending them to go out and by verbally at the training session.

Just a few ideas...
 
zappaDPJ

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In the terms described, I can't see that working out particularly well for either the business or the forum. A site built on Wordpress which is open to customer comments might be a better bet.

Support forums can be very beneficial to some businesses insofar as they are labour saving and cost effective but whether they generate new business is highly debatable because customers are more likely to post when they have a problem.
 
R0binHood

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zappaDPJ said:
A site built on Wordpress which is open to customer comments might be a better bet.
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I agree for the direct customer interaction perhaps or to provide them with reference materials. The main site will be WP.

The rest of the community ideas I feel could still be valid.

zappaDPJ said:
Support forums can be very beneficial to some businesses insofar as they are labour saving and cot effective but whether they will generate new business is highly debatable because customers are more likely to post when they have a problem.
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It wouldn't be just a support forum. It's would be a community for members to meet other members of the local geographical community who are all committed to improving their health.

Currently 100% of this chaps business comes from referrals, it's all word of mouth from happy customers however he is only one man. I think it could be good to start to get the customers in contact with each other to build a community around the gym and the ethos of the company which is promoting a holistic view to improving your health and living a healthy lifestyle. What better way to do that than to interact more with people in the same mindset?

I'm not sure there would be potential issues when a customer has a problem. Hopefully they would discuss this with the company directly before posting something on the forum. And even if they did, as long as it's dealt with in a professional, efficient and transparent way then would it really cause any issues?
 
zappaDPJ

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R0binHood said:
I'm not sure there would be potential issues when a customer has a problem. Hopefully they would discuss this with the company directly before posting something on the forum. And even if they did, as long as it's dealt with in a professional, efficient and transparent way then would it really cause any issues?
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I don't know. Perhaps I should given the amount of experience I've had in that area as I manage a number of customer service forums.

When everything is as it should be customers rarely post anything to that effect but when things go wrong it's a different story. So what you end up with is a forum full a complaints. This is good from one perspective, it's a very cost effective way of dealing with complaints, especially when it effects multiple customers.

The downside is that perspective customers see mainly complaints. I can't say with any authority what effect that might have on the business the forum serves but I suspect it's not all good.
 
Alex.

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No, not personally. Though on autos forums, vendors often have their own section which they're able to moderate to a degree. These vendors are either online, or are more often brick and mortar stores with an online presence.
 
R0binHood

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Yeah, I only just started using auto forums and noticed that. Not exactly the same as what I was thinking as they don't really moderate or administrate it, just use the sponsored forum to sell their bits and bobs.
 
s.molinari

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Why can't a brick and mortar company have a forum? How else can one say, "Our services and/ or products are so good, we don't even mind our customers talking together about them, discussing common problems (since we know we aren't perfect) and suggesting ideas to improve upon and do better." and offer the platform to do it? That is a very healthy position to take and it is great, when you can.

Scott
 
Strength101

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R0binHood said:
What kind of business is it?

One industry I've been thinking about is the gym and fitness industry.

I've got a friend who is looking into building his brand and opening a gym. I can think of lots of ways that a forum could be a good way to compliment this.

As a personal trainer you could share one to one info and communicate and share info with with a customer through a forum over the weeks as they train.

Lots of existing gym forums have training log sections where people track their progress publicly and get feedback from other users, why not share it with and get feedback from the members of the gym that you actually visit?

To most new gym goers, starting at the gym can be very intimidating. If there's a local online community, they can safely ask questions from the veteran gym goers who use the same equipment as them.

They could also get to know and put faces to the names of the people that they see every time they go to the gym creating a more friendly and personable environment when working out.

You ever notice how incredibly awkward and eye-averting some people can be at the gym?

What if you were able to answer a fitness question for them on the forum and the next day instead of them timidly asking when you'd be finished with that machine they enthusiasticly greet you by name and thank you for the tip on the website?

It could be used to help members find gym partners to train with. From personal experience at least, I find I'm much more motivated to actually get my ass into the gym if I'm working out with someone else. You both get results quicker, but how do you do that with a stranger at the local gym? Through a forum....

I used to train with my housemate and we'd encourage each other, we were both seeing results! Then I moved city and neither of us did nothing at the gym for over a year as we didn't have each other to bounce off. I'd have loved to have found a new training partner at a gym in the new city, but didn't know anyone local.

The gym owner could sell supplements and other gear through the forum using affiliate links to the customers and earn a bit of revenue that way. Stuff they're already recommending them to go out and by verbally at the training session.

Just a few ideas...
Click to expand...
Already done ;)
 
R0binHood

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Great site! Your premium sales page is brilliant, was it built using bootstrap or some kind of landing page builder?

Signed up :)

If I understand it correctly you seem to be targeting motivated body builders looking to find quality educational content to improve their training and to be able to get discuss topics with industry leaders?

I'm assuming you have users from around the country and the world? Not just London?

Is it just a website or is there a brick and mortar facility associated with it?

I'm curious about your business model. How do you pay the 'Pros' in this instance. Is it per question asked in a private ticket system, or is it a cut of the member fees in exchange for hanging out on the site?

What profile completion add on are you using? I bought Robbo's one a couple of years ago, but it was always buggy for me.
 
Strength101

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R0binHood said:
Great site! Your premium sales page is brilliant, was it built using bootstrap or some kind of landing page builder?

Signed up :)

If I understand it correctly you seem to be targeting motivated body builders looking to find quality educational content to improve their training and to be able to get discuss topics with industry leaders?

I'm assuming you have users from around the country and the world? Not just London?

Is it just a website or is there a brick and mortar facility associated with it?

I'm curious about your business model. How do you pay the 'Pros' in this instance. Is it per question asked in a private ticket system, or is it a cut of the member fees in exchange for hanging out on the site?

What profile completion add on are you using? I bought Robbo's one a couple of years ago, but it was always buggy for me.
Click to expand...
Not bodybuilders as such, just general strength enthusiasts. Most take the route into Powerlifting.

And yes, we have members from all over the world. The London thing is for our upcoming seminar in February, if you watch any of the World's Strongest Man programs, you'll probably have seen Laurence Shahlaei's name come up;
11951858_10203892564268565_943661052226792847_n.jpg

We're just a website at the moment but that will be changing soon - I don't want to give too much away! :)

It helps to be fairly well known in the strength community and having many high profile friends to score the Pro's - again, don't want to give a full proof plan to help someone build a rival company now, do we!? ;)

Most of the addons we use are custom built by my business partner.
 
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