Your website lacks contributors. Not just visitors; authentic, down-to-earth, intelligent, content creators. With the availability of free community software such as phpBB and Drupal, it is relatively simple for anyone to setup their own online forum. So how do you get people to use yours?

I use to help an old gaming buddy with his websites. He wanted to make a community for a specific MMORPG. He grabbed a copy of phpNuke, filled it with some useful mods, added a cool template, and uploaded it to his new domain. The website was a good infrastructure for the project, but it didn’t have anything unique. Regardless, he assumed it would develop personality as the members poured in.

The website went no where. After half a year, the forum was still empty and he had less than 50 registered members. The problem was that he was too cool for his own website. Realistically, he would never had joined the site if he had stumbled upon it himself. There was nothing unique about it and - more importantly - members got nothing out of the deal.

Most communities will not succeed in the long run. Forums can be thumbed through like toilet paper. To get people to join yours, you need to give them something in return. You can join pretty much any forum and talk about video games, so why would you talk about them on your forum?

Do something unique and give members incentive to contribute. If you’re too cool to post on your own site, you need to find a new lunch table.