Activity

The most important thing for me is simply an active group. This is, of course, the most challenging aspect to running a site. As gamers we have so many different distractions and places to go for gaming news, tips, tricks, videos, etc, it’s hard to start something new and different.

I mean, we’ve seen successful sites close their doors either due to many factors such as inactivity, people just getting burned out on the site, the constant maintenance, etc.

I’m not a very creative person, so I don’t really know what kind of niche we could try and fill that hasn’t already been tried – or doesn’t already have a community.

Personally, I’m a part of probably a half dozen sites, but they are all struggling in some capacity. I expect most of us would fall into this category. I still enjoy forums and conversing with others about the games we play. I still think forums have a place in gaming, but the choice of groups can be overwhelming. If you have no clue where to start it can be hard to get plugged-in with a group.

Chaos, with streaming, it’s not all about the skill of your gameplay. I have streamers I watch that are self-described “scrubs”, but it’s just the entertainment factor that keeps me watching, not the skill of the individual. I do have people that are highly skilled gamers that I watch as well, but they are also very engaging with their chat.

If you are serious about wanting to be a successful streamer, just be yourself and interact with your chat. Also, you need a webcam so people can watch you as that just increases the entertainment factor. When I watch streamers, I rarely care about the people they play with because I’m there to watch the streamer and not other strangers play. Entertaining teammates can help, but it really should be all about you and your interaction with chat.