Due to a request from my last article, How To Motivate Yourself: Setting Goals, I have decided to pick a specific goal I listed there and explain one way you could accomplish this. So give thanks to GAK for this article ;)

Understand Your Previous Record and How Your Broke It

Before jumping into specific tricks and tips to breaking the “Most Members Online (MMO)” Record, I want to discuss an important issue in breaking the record. Before deciding to break your current MMO record, you must understand how the last one was broken. Did you have a specific event that day? Was there anything special about that day? Did you happen to massively advertise the day before?

What made you break your forum’s last record? If you can remember and understand the circumstances that lead to that, then let’s talk about what tricks and tips you can use to break it now. If you do not remember, it is fine, but it’ll probably be a bit harder to accomplish the same effect.

Specific Tricks and Tips

• Have a Strong and Ready Event – there must be a reason, an incentive, for members to come on that specific day. You cannot expect a lot of members to just show up and stay online unless there is a very good reason to be there. Plan an event for that specific day, maybe host a 24 Hour Posting Contest. You obviously need an event that will focus on that specific day, and if you really want to try and focus it during a specific time of day, try that out. Your event should be big and fun enough that many members, active and inactive, will want to join. You obviously will not break your current record with your current active members, you will somehow have to attract your inactive members with an attractive event.
  One specific event that could have your members online for long periods of time is also a scavenger hunt. A scavenger hunt forces members to find specific items on the forum that you hide. Depending on how hard you create the scavenger hunt and how good the prizes are for the winner, you can probably expect your members to stay online quite a while for this sort of an event. Top it off with a huge day event, and you can find yourself with a new record my friend.

• Bulk Email Frequently – Email all your members about this special day and what you are trying to accomplish frequently. Don’t spam their emails, but try to get the message across to them 3 or so times. It takes a few times for something like this to sink into inactive members, so emailing them once will probably not be as effective. Tell them about your event and your prizes and get them excited about that day. Make sure you are able to provide that event for the whole day. An event that only lasts half a day will not be as effective.
• Advertising The Event – there are a few ways to advertise this event and I suggest using all techniques if possible. These tricks include: a large banner at the top of your forum, signatures for the event, and constant updates on your announcement forum. Go wild with your advertisements, and if possible, try to advertise on other forums as well!
• Plan It On A Day Where Most Members Are Normally Active – you should be able to find out what days your forum is most active normally. Make sure you plan this event on that day and make sure you have all day free for this event on your forum. This day will most likely fall on a weekend. Make sure the majority of your staff are able to participate as well.
• Use IM to remind – if you have IM and have some of your member’s usernames, then have discussions about the event. Make sure they will attend. IM’ing can also become very useful on the day of the event, because you will be able to instantly communicate with members that are online on the IM service but not on your forum. Having IM at this event can become very useful!
• Close the Forums Before The Event – this will create anticipation and hype for the forum. If possible, have some sort of chat where the members can talk meanwhile the board is offline. You can see how this will create a lot of anticipation. When you then open the forum, you will most likely have a lot of members ready to sign-in and get started with the events! Make sure that the event is also the very first forum they see. This will make it easily accessible.
• Get a New Theme If Possible – a new theme can increase the likely hood that you will break the MMO record because it gives the forum a refreshing feel. Old members will feel that the forum is new and changed.

Question to the Readers

• Do you plan on breaking your forum’s “Most Members Online” record now that you’ve seen this article?

Related posts:

1. How To Motivate Yourself: Setting Goals
2. Posting Contests – One Way To Increase Forum Activity
3. How To Motivate Staff Members – Top 10 Tips