Want to fund it? Get a job bozo!

You're joking but that is seriously what I did. I wanted to fund my forum a bit so I did yard work for people. Once I graduated from high school I got an actual job, that is funding in its purest form.

My website is purely funded from my wages (and a credit card) right now..

I may look at adverts, premium memberships, and/or donations down the line, but it'll be some time yet before I start to consider it.

This was a funny topic...but yeah, we don't get enough donations from members anymore so I've been taking on some simple design projects to help out with funding for Christianity Haven. We don't have many bills thankfully but we want to have enough on hand in case we come across a really great add on in the future.

I have no paid website of my own so I don't have to kick-start or look for funds for it but even if I had one I would be fully prepared to invest (mind it I said "Invest") because it's a long term investment which comes back with interest or maybe a huge profit if you invest carefully. 

Posted by: Lammchen

This was a funny topic...but yeah, we don't get enough donations from members anymore so I've been taking on some simple design projects to help out with funding for Christianity Haven. We don't have many bills thankfully but we want to have enough on hand in case we come across a really great add on in the future.

Religious forums would be an exception - assuming you're not scamming people (Jim and Tammy Baker) or something - LOL.

Posted by: TheJason

Posted by: Lammchen

This was a funny topic...but yeah, we don't get enough donations from members anymore so I've been taking on some simple design projects to help out with funding for Christianity Haven. We don't have many bills thankfully but we want to have enough on hand in case we come across a really great add on in the future.

Religious forums would be an exception - assuming you're not scamming people (Jim and Tammy Baker) or something - LOL.

I need to learn how to put my makeup on heavier and cry for my members  LOL

Posted by: TheJason

Posted by: Lammchen

This was a funny topic...but yeah, we don't get enough donations from members anymore so I've been taking on some simple design projects to help out with funding for Christianity Haven. We don't have many bills thankfully but we want to have enough on hand in case we come across a really great add on in the future.

Religious forums would be an exception - assuming you're not scamming people (Jim and Tammy Baker) or something - LOL.

This is a new case for me. What happened in that case?

I pay for my websites out of pocket myself. 😛 There's nothing wrong asking for donations for your work though! But that's just it, most of the forums I worked on in the past were fan forums, and I didn't want to make a profit out of something I don't own. (Sure the site was mine, but the property the site is based off of wasn't...)

I looked into adsense and that kind of thing... but in order to make money there you had to have such a massive userbase or traffic flowing in or else you wouldn't make much at all. (It was like pennies per thousand visits. Unless someone clicked on an ad in which case you did make more... but even then clicks are rare and can't be counted on.)

So nowadays I just pay for things with money I earn from my job. And it really is the easiest/most reliable way to fund a forum. Maybe if the forum gets too large and starts needing a dedicated server it might be necessary to look into crowd funding or something. But for most people that's just never going to happen/be a concern. I mean to get a forum to that level you'd need like a million or better posts and like 1,000+ users visiting/posting each day.

That said there are options out there so people don't have to pay for thing to get started. Free forum hosts exist. You don't have to launch right into a paid forum software like Xenforo on a VPS with cPanel and a .com url. (Which that can be very costly to get going...) and it seems like people either forget these options exist or they snub their noses up and act like they're too good for them. Despite in many cases I've seen these same people unable to tell a free forum host from a paid one.

As far I am concerned, adsense is the last thing in my list. I have bad experience not once but twice even if it was not totally  Adsense to blame. Once members clicked too many adverts which crossed the standard limits and on another occasion I left the country where I registered for adsense so it brought no result.