Pretty much the title says it all, no where in the FAQ does it say what year it was started and how it got to be so big now. Of course i have only been coming to Sherdog since 2005 and joined it a while later, and i have seen a lot of threads on the same thing, over and over. However i have never heard the story how it was started and how it got so big...anyone else interested???
I will tell you some of the things that make this site fly are the fighter stats early on they saw a need to keep stats on fight results. That turned out to be a huge idea. Right now I think they have over 25,000 professional fighters listed on the database way beyond anyone else I would think. I am pretty sure that tool is the most visited on the site. The other was advertising they do run ads. I have seen the google ads for Sherdog a few years ago not so much now but a good way to get the news out about the site. The other thing is people who go to the site they get good word of mouth.
A lot of new people are likely signed that way but the biggest is the fact that the mods play a big part in the sites success. Almost anytime of the day the mods are on the site keeping the site well managed. One of the biggest things is the fact there always seem to be tons of people on the site. You could reply to a thread and get 10 answers in less then 20 mins and that part is also big because there is always tons of people posting on this site like crazy people it's not odd to see many people with 4,000 or more posts rabid fans and OT posters LOL.
So I would say keys of success to get Sherdog like effect.
1) When building a site find a nitch like what Sherdog did fighter stats. If your site is about cars keep stats about street races or car races. It does not even have to do with car racing stats it could be about part prices or race car driver names anything that people would be interested in.
2) Active site make sure you get some friends or brothers or sisters posting on the site people like going to a site that is doing something at first.
3) Mods getting others to be a part of it select a few people who you can trust to understand the admin console in vBulletin in Sherdogs case or PHPBB or whatever forum you select. If your site is busy you need a number of people to keep the site from getting out of hand. I would not be the least bit surprised if they banned over 50,000 people or more from this site.
4) Advertise it is not a bad word getting people to go to your site helps build it. Sherdog I have seen their sites logo in cages and rings as well as google ads. Starting with google adwords or Yahoo text ads can help promote the site. It cost money but it is likely the best way now because of web clutter to get people aware of your site. Word of mouth helps get friends or classmates on your site posting. Trust me this is the hard part getting others to be part of it.
5) Last but not least keeping the site running whatever you do the site on the site has to stay running as much as possible. This site rarely do you see it down for more then a few hours. This site has the mods around to keep the admins like Garrett aware of the sites status.
Other things that where important but not as much was fighter posting. Tons of popular fighters used to post a lot on this site. People like Bas Rutten, Rampage Jackson and many more there is a few threads out there with a list of fighters that posted on Sherdog. This is not as important as it once was but it help get people signed on the site.