Forums, bulletin boards, newsgroups - A good source for targteted leads.

Generally speaking, most of my referrals to this site, and my other site, Mad About Madrid, come from search engines and other blogs. However, it is surprising how many come from the various forums that I subscribe to and leave my pearls of wisdom on! Analysing the activity of visitors to the blog I have noticed that those coming in from forums tend to spend more time on the blog and view more pages - which are obviously key objectives of the site. I am pretty sure that the one of the reasons is that these visitors are probably more 'converted' or further down the decision path than other visitors.

So, how does it work? For my Mad About Madrid website I identified a couple of forums that I thought it would be worth leaving comments on - they include Madridman, Bootsnall and Fodors. Every time I leave a comment, my intention is always to add value to that post, and not to use it as a way of blatantly pushing my own products or services. Once I did do this and got my knuckles wrapped from the moderator. It won't happen again, promise!

When you have completed your posting you must ensure that you add your signature to the post, typically this will be a link back to your website. Most forums will allow you to create your own signature and preview your posting before publishing it. As long as you have answered the query, or 'added value' to that posting, you will have done enough to awaken that person's curiosity and send him/her to your website.

One other thing I have noticed abut forums is that they do tend to be time sensitive and unless your posting is relatively fresh, people won't click on it.