Suggestions For Effective Posts

What might increase the likelihood that someone will read your new thread? What can you do to encourage people to actually view the video that you have posted? How can you get people to read the article that you are sharing in a post?

I have a few tips, and perhaps you can come up with others if you think about what might prompt you look further than what is in front of you.

First, and I think this is the most important thing, you can give your thread a title that gives people an idea of what it's about. Not everyone is interested in everything that is posted here, nor does everyone have time to read everything here, so we look for things that sound interesting to us. So if you give your posts a title that lets other members know what it's about, they can more accurately determine whether they might be interested. That's a lot better for search engine purposes, too.

Some videos that are embedded into the forum have titles or blurbs that do a pretty good job of letting people know what they are about and others, such as songs, may not need more than the artist's name and the song title.

However, I don't watch even half of the videos that are posted here, either because I don't have the time or because I don't know if I'd be interested. If you would give me an idea as to why I should be interested in viewing the video, I'll be more likely to. So if you take the time to sell the video that you're embedding in the forum, more people are likely to view it. Give us an idea what it's about, why you believed that it was worth sharing.

In most cases, it helps to know who did the video too. There are some video producers whose stuff I have no interest in watching, which certainly doesn't mean that you shouldn't share them because others may be interested. There are others that I've probably seen, because I follow their channel on Youtube.

As for links, I like to know where the link is going to take me, so it helps to know what the source is. There too, you'll get more people to click on the link if you can tell us why you think its worth reading. A synopsis of the story might help in furthering discussion in the thread even from those who haven't read the entire article.

These are a few tips, and I am not offering them as criticism of what anyone here is doing because I have often embedded video without explanation, and I sometimes post links without sufficient explanation. I do try to always state my source so that you will know which site you'll be visiting if you should decide to click the link, and I often quote sections of the source article.

What might someone do to get you to read their thread, watch their video, or click on their links?

 

I am bumping this because I think I made some good points here, particularly about posting video or links to other sites. In some cases, like when you are posting in the thread about what music you are listening to, there's no need to so, but your post is going to receive more views if you give it a good title, and those who view the post are more likely to view the video or click on the link if you tell us something about it. There are millions of YouTube and Facebook videos and even more webpages on the Internet, so it will help if you tell us why you want us to look at the one you're suggesting.

I know that if you post a link to a news article or blog that you want people to read, I am unlikely to click on it. If you give me an idea of what it is about by quoting sections of it or by giving your own opinion on it, I might be interested enough to want to learn more.

 

Here's an idea, particularly for those of you who have been here for a year or less, although our long-time forum members might have fun with it too.

If you're bored sometime or find yourself trying to think of something to say, click back to some of the older threads in a topic area that you think you might be interested in, and reply to one of our older threads. Do so only if you have something to contribute to the thread of course, but it is quite likely that some of our newer members would be interested in some of the things that were discussed here two or three years ago.

I know. Some forum administrators get angry when old threads are popped up. I feel just the opposite, however. As long as you have something to add to the thread, I enjoy seeing older topics renewed.

Keep in mind, of course, that some of the forum members who participated in these older threads are no longer with us, including those who have simply left the forum, but also those who have left this life. We honor them by continuing their discussions although, of course, we can't always expect a reply.

 

Why not? It's something I do quite a lot, yet some members are afraid to having been scolded for doing that in other forums.

 

Some of the older threads in "Other Reminiscences" are particularly good.

 

Usually what I do when I want to start a thread about something is do a word search, and that way I can see if there was an appropriate older thread where my new thoughts would fit in, or whether I should just start a whole new thread.
As an example, the magnesium deficiency thread I just started.
When i looked back through, I could see that we had discussed magnesium as parts of other threads, but the only one actually dedicated to magnesium was @Terry Page ‘s thread about magnesium oil.
I debated just adding onto his thread; but then I thought that my topic was actually going to be more about all of the symptoms of magnesium deficiency, and not just about using the oil for more energy like Terry does; so I started a new thread.
Probably I add on to older threads as often as I start new ones, because we have some really good older threads that can be brought back up.
After starting my magnesium thread, now Terry’s thread has also been brought up, so we are again reading all of the good information in that thread.
I am really glad that we can go back to old threads and revive them when we want to continue the discussion.

 

When you are going to post a joke, cartoon, meme or a funny photo or something else that isn't likely to result in a discussion or continued conversation, it would help if you'd do that in an ongoing thread, one of several that we have for that purpose, some of which are several pages long. In that way, we won't have a whole bunch of orphaned threads, with only a post and a couple of LOLs or something. I'd rather have fewer threads, each with a lot of posts.

Often, when I am starting a thread, I will give it a name that suggests that it can be used for other, similar posts, to encourage others to post to it even if they didn't have anything to say about the specific thing that I posted.

 

I know that some of you are active in other forums too, and that's fine. I also know that it's likely that many of you are going to talk about the same things sometimes, since that's a pretty natural thing to do, but if you are starting a topic here that you have started in another forum, please don't copy and paste it. Start it anew, use different words and, if it's at all possible, try to think of something new to say. There's no point in having two forums that are a copy of one another, and that goes for threads and posts too.

I intentionally avoided the temptation of looking at any other forums when I started this one, so as not to inadvertently copy what someone else was doing, yet knowing that two forums intended for seniors are going to share some things in common, nevertheless.

 

Everything else that has been said here is still valid, but I thought I'd add to it. If you would like to find interesting, engaging threads here, then you should make a point of starting them. Think of a topic that you'd like to talk about, particularly something that you can imagine other people joining in on. Off-hand comments on something that you haven't put much thought into are fine; there's a place for that here, but we have several threads for that. Come up with a topic that is interesting to you, then try to interest others in it as well. If you begin your thread with an opening post that doesn't say much, it isn't likely to engage others so, while you don't necessarily want to exhaust everything you have to say about a topic in the opening post, the OP should be substantive. Show that you have an interest in it, and you will interest others.

At the same time, when you read the opening post of someone else's thread, try to think of something that you could contribute to the conversation, preferably without taking it off-topic. If you enjoy someone's opening post, go ahead and click the "like" button but it would be way better if you would also contribute to the conversation.