[agilius]

I know a guy who has this cool web design blog PR 5~6 and now he started a forum on the same subject. The blog and the forum are linked together. What do you think about this type of move? I don't really understand why he would have both a forum and a blog. Could it be that he want to have the blog for those who don't talk that much and the forum for idea sharing and other related user interactions?

[zenneth]

Yeah, that's the idea of creating a blog and a forum combined together. Although blogs may present your ideas and get visitors to read your material, somehow the comments are not enough to create instant interaction and it won't encourage visitors to get involve in active discussion. That's why he needs a forum here to do the job.

[mira]

I too think thats its a very good idea. If you have got good niche you should go for many sites for same niche with some different contents.

[moraho]

best way to spread your catch in the net is you expand your reach. Yes blog is the beginning step and then forum will certainly get more traffic.

[serenacyh]

Forum and blogging are different concepts in my opinion. Forum is more for diverse discussions of broader topics whereas if a niche blog, focus and perhaps one sided (the blogger's perspective). I am not sure if the two concepts combine together would bear fruit or get out of control in the end but that again depends on the webmaster's goals and purpose.

[alec11]

building forum is not as easy as building forum.
and of course forum need member, not just visitors like blog.

[nooby4ever]

Originally Posted by alec11

building forum is not as easy as building forum.
and of course forum need member, not just visitors like blog.

that's true, a forum really needs members and if a forum is dead people don't join it and will leave the site (you can always start with pay to post xD, then you will have a, active , forum like this)

[lifeplayer]

This is one of the great idea to link your blog and website/forum together since it will increase your traffic and might help in PR. As known that many "big" website are doing this as well, even google or yahoo do have their official blog