If you’re wondering how to get people to join your Discord server, here we’ll cover 12+ Discord server ideas you can use to promote and grow your community fast (and for free!).
In fact, promoting Discord servers it’s essential for any community builders looking to get new members and improve engagement among the existing ones. Let’s see how to achieve this:
1. Set Clear Rules and Guidelines
After starting a Discord server for your online community, one of the first things to do is to set basic guidelines to ensure high-quality conversations. Also, clear rules will help you set expectations and nurture real engagement within your community.
Otherwise, if the group is full of spam and unrelated discussions, it will probably not be long before you end up with an inactive Discord server.
2. Add Your Server to Discord Servers Directories
The first step to spreading the word about your community is to add your Discord server to Unita’s directory! 👇
Promote Your Discord Community
In fact, promoting Discord servers in Discord servers directories is a surefire way to get noticed. These types of websites help users to find particular servers based on their interests. If you’re wondering how to get people to join your Discord server, this is a great way to get started.
Some of the most popular Discord servers directories (besides Unita) include:
3. Promote Your Server on Social Media
Among this pool of Discord server ideas, another good way to advertise a Discord server is to promote on social media.
Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram are well-known platforms where you can share your server’s link, although there are many free content distribution platforms for you to grow your audience.
Other options include adding the server’s link in your bio, or in videos’ descriptions if you’re using YouTube.
However, if you’re using social media to promote your Discord server, keep in mind that you’re going to need a sound social media strategy and high-quality content to get followers and build an engaged community.
4. Leverage Reddit
Another way to grow your Discord server is to share it on Reddit. There are many subreddits where you can organically share your Discord server, just make sure you’re not breaking any rules.
For example, many Discord servers have specific days or threads where members can self-promote their communities and businesses. You can leverage this to share your community and grow your Discord server.
To find a subreddit to advertise your Discord server, you can explore our Reddit directory to find and join popular subreddits.
Lastly, keep in mind that for redditors to listen to you inside a subreddit, you need to provide real value to the community, instead of only self-promoting your server.
5. Be Active and Engaging
For your community to grow, it’s crucial to listen to your audience. For instance, a great way to do this is by facilitating channels in your Discord server for members to express their thoughts.
Other Discord server ideas, besides creating a feedback channel, include reading members’ reviews, comments, and experiences to see how to make your Discord server better.
Audience-building 101:
— Jessie 🟣 (@jessievbreugel) May 9, 2022
👉 Understand what you're about
👉 Position yourself accordingly
👉 Be strategic about your audience
👉 Create engaging content
👉 Validate your product ideas
👉 Harvest your audience
👉 Launch your product
👉 Earn online
Did I miss anything?
Also, while you as a community builder might be really active behind the scenes, to boost member engagement it’s essential to interact with all members, specially the most active ones. You can’t just propose an activity and wait for others to participate without any incentive!
On the contrary, community managers need to lead the conversation to promote genuine interest. After all, offering real value is the best way to ensure people organically want to be part of your community, and one of the pilars of improving member retention and engagement.
6. Customize Your Server
Customizing your server is a must to create an experience that’s tailored to your members’ specific interests. In fact, by doing so, you can build a friendly community that serves as a safe place for users to discuss their topics of interest.
To customize the server, you’ll have to go to ‘Server Settings’. Here, it’s worth going through the options one by one and deciding what you want to modify from Discord’s defaults.
One of the benefits of having a community server (instead of a regular server) is that you’ll have access to extra customization options, like a Welcome Screen. This screen will appear to new users when they join the server, so it’s a great way to welcome new members.
Additionally, you can explore other communities to get Discord server theme ideas, which can help you get inspiration to craft your server’s aesthetic.
Lastly, you could also add some custom emojis to make your server more personalized. The free version allows you to add up to 50 static emojis.
To add more emojis and also animated GIFs, among other customization options, you’ll need to upgrade:
7. Upgrade to Paid Boosts
If you want to have a lot more customization power, you’ll need access to paid boosts and to Discord Nitro.
On the one hand, boosts unlock extra features for your server, which add up with a higher number of boosts. Each boost starts at $4.99 per month.
What’s interesting about boosts is that anyone can purchase them for your server. If members love your community, they can boost it and get perks for everyone!
On the other hand, Nitro is the paid version of Discord. It unlocks not only server features but also perks for your personal Discord account. It costs $99.99 per year or $9.99 per month.
8. Offer Incentives
Another of the many Discord server ideas covered in this post includes offering benefits to grow your Discord server.
Some member incentives and benefits ideas include exclusive content, learning resources, and even offering mentorships or workshops.
You could also try to partner with complementary businesses and other communities to offer valuable deals to your members.
These types of exclusive deals work great both to attract new members and retain existing ones. They also allow you to incentivize people by offering something valuable to them that’s more expensive or unavailable for non-members.
9. Send a Weekly Newsletter
To advertise a Discord server, sending your actual and potential members a weekly newsletter with that week’s events it’s a great idea.
A community newsletter serves as a way to keep members updated on what’s going on in the group. Also, it work as a reminder for them to show up in the server and participate in its events.
To achieve the same purpose, you could also create an announcement channel, but it won’t have the same reach to potential members. Still, it’s a great way to keep improving members’ engagement.
Reminder: We have a comprehensive guide covering all about starting and monetizing a community newsletter, make sure to check it out!
10. Host Exciting Events
This is a strategy most communities use, as connecting with like-minded people is one of the main reasons why people join online groups. So hosting events might be a sure bet in order to cultivate community habits.
Communities usually organize virtual or hybrid events such as webinars, AMAs, or interviews with experts. Additionally, you could explore some in-person options, such as regular local chapters and breakfasts or dinners.
11. Add Bots to Your Discord Server
One of the things to add to your Discord server to make it more interesting is, without any doubt, useful and funny bots.
Not only bots can make your life easier as a Discord server admin, but they can also help with members’ engagement. In fact, bots perform different functions automatically and can help you moderate the community, give memes to users, or put on some music.
12. Add Moderators to Your Community
Through a clear set of rules and guidelines, moderators will make sure the community stays chaos-free, making it a safe and friendly space for everyone.
Also, having a well-chosen moderator will help your community be more ordered, which can help you avoid spam and attract new members to your Discord server.
13. Use Analytics!
A big part of improving your Discord server is using analytics and key performance indicators to track success and test if your strategy is working.
In this case, to analyze your strategy you can use your members’ feedback, gathering information through community chats, surveys, or interviews, and using Discord’s built-in analytics.
Remember: in order to grow your community, you should find multiple ways to promote your Discord server and make it popular in your niche.
And for welcoming those well-earned new members, don’t forget that a good onboarding strategy is key for them to join and remain active!
