Increase server population quickly?

Discussion in 'Bukkit Discussion' started by Suprem20, Apr 20, 2012.

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  1. Offline

    Suprem20

    Small servers be doomed, it's practically impossible to be recognized and gain popularity quickly with all those lists promoting old, overated and overpopulated servers. Then, when you finally get some views, you are swarmed by an avalanche of "planetminecraft staff members", menacing of shutting down your server, griefers and trolls. How do you guys manage to get population, is there a way for young servers to evolve or are we stuck with the same severs?

    I have good server hardware, but what does it gives me, I top 35 players, sometimes the server is completely empty. It's a waste of money to host a server for that small amount of players when you could have 30 more.
     
  2. Offline

    Killburner

    Now, why would we divulge our secrets with all this supposed competition? :p

    IMHO, take what makes your server different than the other 100,000 servers out there, and advertise accordingly. Think if your server as a business. Draw up with a business plan and adhere to that plan while your promoting. If players are leaving your server, ask yourself why, and how you can better retain them in the future. If your drawing in the wrong types (the type that cause drama), then change your advertising pitch to point them away from your server. If your server and operations are a well-oiled machine, players will take notice and stick around.

    I've been hosting a server for almost 14 months now, and I'm in the same boat as you at times. When there's only a handful of players on, you have to ask yourself if it's worth the effort. But with heavy advertising comes players with intentions of making your life as an owner/operator a living hell.

    Good luck!
     
  3. Offline

    Suprem20

    Thanks for the answer, this is truly a hard work, sometimes it can be pretty depressing seeing four players on your server claiming to be hacker. Anyhow, I will continue my quest to get more population. I have a question, what is worth more, global publicity or more direct minecraft server lists adds?
     
  4. Offline

    Tog

    If you're desperate you could always advertise on 4chan or SA.
     
  5. Offline

    MikeA

    You clearly don't know how it is to run multiple production servers for over 1 year.
     
  6. Offline

    Killburner

    Let's see, maybe that was the point of his post? Clearly your response contributed nothing useful to this topic, other than apparent boasting of your own knowledge.

    What's with the lack of tact around the forums lately?
     
    nathanthesnooper and Tobstah like this.
  7. Offline

    iidunno

    Just to point this out but there are over 33000 minecraft servers.
     
  8. Offline

    MUSTARDJAR-BMS

    i am hosting a server as well BUT i am in the same boat only a hadfull of players but recently i have had an exponential amount of ppl joining my server. sad thing is my server is running off of a friends computer so i have to drop $200 to get a comp to run the server well. but to the point to gain a population i have noticed is to be friends with players who DO enter. say hello to every, single, person, who enters ure server. what i have been doing is offering starter packs to entering players, e.g full set of iron tools,door,bed,chest, and 3-5 stacks of any wood or stone to build with and 1 dimond. this makes the server feel more at home to ppl who come from bigger servers and wanna slow down. ALSO plugins plugins plugins. the way ure server runs how its paced matters A LOT. im not gonna say what i am running but if ppl love the feel and flow of ure server they will stay and bring others!. some people i call "big time players" much like big city people they like it fast paced and exciting events, i offer a pvp arena ! and allow things like louring and pvp in wild. this gives those people an escape from the slow kinda "do it ureself" world. other little things i do to keep ppl around and to keep me from going insane from boredom is i go on random mining sprees using my powers to make it fun. e.g use xray mod to take them straight to what they want and super pickaxe to mine quick also giving them everything i get and even toss in some gold apple and such. when players enter a server they look right away at administration. how admins mods and ops act. if these groups of people arent proactive or helpful players will feel left out or helpless. i can say that my admin-mod team is AMAZING. all really great people who help A LOT. i can basically kick back at any time if i wanted and play the game or go mining like i mentioned earlier. then we start getting to the exterior of the server. 1. communication, one mistake i made was not having a donation buttion. when the inside is good ppl wanna pay pay pay for permissions. having groups set up and a forums us CRUCIAL. i messed up again and im BARLEY setting up a forums and using a domain as the IP. one more mistake im about to make is my IP has changed 2 times and soon gonna be a 3rd i havent thought of a way to tell ppl what the new domain is gonna be :1. also on the outside, skype, twitter, forums and i been using tumblr are also crucial. these are so the players who are wayyy into ure server can have a haven to bask in or a way to feel "in the loop". one aspect of my server that players love about my server is i offered a teamspeak lobby but as you may know they cost money:(. so we are now using "Raidcall" (raidcall.com) and i created a group (BlueMountainServer, which you may contact me on for more help ect.) this is a verbal speak for players which is GREAT for admins to communicate for anti-griefing and simply FUN!:). lastly alll i can leave you with is will. what are YOU gonna put into it ? my server has failed , plugins sucked, griefed, no players, failed connections problems, no funds, a friend having us "by the balls" cuz its on his comp, and just flat out put down by ourselves and other people, BUT we hung in there and now im having visits from popular youtubers :) its a lot of stress sleepless nights and shitty eye sight later. but if you want it . it WILL happen. feel free to contact me our skype is BlueMountainServer, or the raidcall as i mentioned earlier :) and i am MUSTARDJAR and vicmac1995 can also help you as we both own/run the server and been through everything :) hope i helped at LEAST once :)
     
    Spawnstah likes this.
  9. Offline

    Obliviator

    ^^ Wall of Text
    tl:dr
     
  10. Offline

    MikeA

    And only 500 are online.
     
  11. Offline

    iidunno

    No really. There's only 500 with a player base that can support them.
     
  12. Offline

    MUSTARDJAR-BMS

    Well he must not want it if he doesn't even have the ambition to read what I had to say. I don't think he's been on yet but when he does I hope he reads what I had to say. :)
     
  13. Offline

    DrAgonmoray

    Suprem20

    Just letting you know that I'm working on a server list that will help out small servers. Here's a screenshot of the server page so far:
    Show Spoiler
    [​IMG]


    You can't see the comments area, nor the voting area in that screenshot.
    Everything on there is real and dynamic, with the exception of the Reviews section. I'm working on those right now.

    Edit:
    omg, the times in the first graph are messed up. Imma fix.
     
    JOPHESTUS, Tauryuu and Suprem20 like this.
  14. Offline

    SirTyler

    No one will read a wall of text, there is a reason Formatting was developed.
     
  15. Offline

    MUSTARDJAR-BMS

    Then why ask for help if you aren't willing to put forth the time to read an answer of someone helping ? Ov read walls and walls of txt. If anything what you are saying is useless. Your just saying how my help isn't useful but YOU aren't quick to help anyone.? So why act like you know it all? Ignorant ppl act like they know it all.
     
  16. Offline

    Vhab

    I don't think anyone sane would work through that wall of text.

    Look up paragraphs, they're cool.
     
    Tobstah, soulgriever and DrAgonmoray like this.
  17. Offline

    MUSTARDJAR-BMS

    ok ill admit i probably shoulda wrote in paragraphs but i also wrote this at 3am this morning so yeah. but whatever idgaf bout it. he will read it if he really wants help all we are doing is talking ABOUT the comments instead of helping this guy lol. im done talk all the shit you guys want.
     
  18. Offline

    Suprem20

    Seems really nice, when do you think it will be public to all?
     
  19. Offline

    DrAgonmoray

    Not sure. For some reason, work has been really slow :|
     
  20. Offline

    M1sT3rM4n

    What is this sorcery that you are conjuring?
     
    DrAgonmoray likes this.
  21. Offline

    DrAgonmoray

    I'm not entirely sure how to respond to that.
    It makes cake.
     
    soulgriever likes this.
  22. Offline

    nala3

    Just say it makes cake, that should appease him
     
  23. Offline

    JohnTheRipper

    Minestatus reports 13.8k servers, with 6.6k online and 34k players online. That's quite a bit!

    Honestly, the only way to do it is to find your niche, promote your server EVERYWHERE, and do your best to run a good community.

    I've been running since January, and I'm seeing consistent daily peaks of 15 players. Personally, I consider my 800 unique visitors a fairly nice amount of growth, but you can expand much faster with a good niche.

    Take Sanguine, Convicted, Killion, etc as an example. Sanguine was one of the first prison servers. It had daily peaks of about 30, within a very short time of being created. This was all last year, but the point still stands — they found their niche, and got a lot of players within a very short time. The same goes for Convicted — they found their niche as a prison server, and got their current playerbase by exploiting that niche. Killion is another example, but admittibly they are only this large because of the MCF promotion.

    It's no longer possible to advertise via server lists. They can help with SEO and the like, but players browsing a server list aren't going to go to page xyz to find your server, they just want to try the ones on the first few pages. Of course, this means that sponsored servers and the bigger servers are always going to get bigger, by virtue of their (sometimes botted) votes and monetary donations. Minestatus is making $2500/month off of their advertising, which is quite impressive when you consider that the founder is running it on a cheap Linode VPS.

    My goal when starting a304 was to provide amazing quality, fun plugins, and overall the best gaming experience out there that I could provide (within reason!). Instead of home-hosting or renting a VPS/shared space, I went with a dedi. Sure, it's a little expensive, but it means that resources and lag are almost a non-issue (although my provider has network problems during the evening, but so far it hasn't been too bad). My server is what you'd call "Generic Survival", but the difference is that I've made an effort of using good plugins, setting them up well, building a nice spawn, and staffing it well. I also advertised everywhere I can, with the exception of one or two server lists and SA/4chan. The thing is, I don't fear anyone attacking me, so I don't mind advertising on places like planet minecraft and reddit. Sure, they might grief a bit, but it's quickly rolled back, and I've had some long-term high quality players come from those sites. Gigabit line means most skiddies can't boot me offline, and I haven't really seen much in terms of network attacks as a whole.

    Anyways, I'd say 35 players is pretty good. Focus on improving and slimming down your plugins, maybe add some to improve the experience or make it more fun, and make sure to advertise everywhere you can.
     
    Killburner likes this.
  24. Offline

    Obliviator

    Oh, Hi.
    Im seeing peaks of nearly 50 players on good days :3
     
  25. Offline

    sillyrosster

    You didn't help at all..

    Anyways, my server is not 'popular' you could say, but it never has no-one online :)
    I advertise everywhere I can. Being in the 1000-2000 range on Minestatus gets you some attention :p
     
  26. Offline

    M1sT3rM4n

    Minecraft PSAs bring all the homeboys to my yard.
     
    Fuzzwolf likes this.
  27. Offline

    KakusCraft

    Sad But True :/


    I absolutely agree.


    I ran a succesfull server, its a local server for indonesian players only, peaked at 32 players (32 slots), we tried to give "essentials.joinfullserver" permission last sunday, and its bloated to 55 players !

    Unfortunately our hardware is not strong enough actually to hold 55 players throughout the day, we will upgrade but not too soon, hosting in Indonesia is expensive.

    Here is some tips :

    1. Make it different
    Don't just be "another minecraft server". Make something unique that will make you different from any other server. It can be the server name, the server currency, the economy system, custom plugins, special events, anything you can imagine.

    2. Take care of your players
    Make sure you take care EVERY players, each of them. This will make them comfortable and happy playing on our server.

    3. Always update
    Always update your server with new features so that people won't get bored and there will be some excitement on every update.

    4. Keep praying Or think positive :)
    It is bullshit if someone say this world is fair :/ ! I consider one of my biggest competitor is ovverated. Just a server, with /home, /sethome, /spawn, /tpa, and all of the basic commands + McMMO and everything that these days server have on average + a not very good economy system. And yet, till this day that server is the "top server". I think the reason they are still the top server is because they are the "first" public server in Indonesia.

    Not boasting ourself but on the other side, we made attractive logo, graphics stuff, custom plugins, balancing the economy system, attractive quest system, building competitions, active community forums, taking care of our players, adding new features, make videos, but we are still number 2 :3

    If that is the case there is not really much you can do. "Top servers" have a lot of populations just simply because they already had a "name" out there. They either one of the first public servers, have a tons of money for advertising , or, they are just simply lucky.

    Just pray (if you believe in god) or just think positive :)

    5. Do not be distracted by others
    It pisses me off sometimes when former players from my server decided to make another server, that is just a RIP OFF from my server, copied whitelist application, copied notice messages, etc.

    Also some small servers who threatened to DDOS, when their server never last more than 2 months :/

    Or some servers that are using my server as "media for their advertisements".

    I have learned just to "ignore" it, because if you get distracted by that it means ur only wasting your time that is 100x more valuable if you use it to think about your servers. Eg : held events or adding features.


    Hope those tips help you :)
     
  28. Offline

    Suprem20

    Thanks for the reply! Actually, talking of DDoS, I recently had to deal with an attack. Some users spammed me with some false packets, it was pretty annoying and kept my server down for a night. Hopefully, we were able to nullroute all the IPs causing the attack. Even sued an IP that got banned from his provider. Wasn't a fun task but we got through it and now the server is growing better than ever!
     
  29. Offline

    xxlegitsniper95

    1. Give away free money for example tournaments who ever wins gets 5 dollars.
    2. Advertise on servers and YouTube.
    3. Don't feel depressed feel happy you don't have to deal with Greifers and other stuff
    4. Be different. Make there be a reason why people wanna get on.
     
  30. Offline

    Dreeass

    I can't say like I had my server up for a year like everyone else here but so far it has been up for 3 months and recently I made a quite big decision.
    Translating every sentence, word and letter to Dutch. Most of the normall players left, but some stayed and new people are joining every day, I can advertise the server cheap and with succes. Since I'm Dutch it is also easier for me to talk to everyone and write on forums and website. I hope that the server will stand out a bit. And I wish you good luck with yours.
     
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