How to build up a social community membership from scratch?

One of the best and most popular script used is Vbulletin. Most of the reputable forums are powered by Vbulletin. The second recommendation I'd have is phpBB. It is absolutely free and open sourced versus Vbulletin which is licence based. I have used both and had no problems with either of them. If you can fork out some money I'd suggest going with Vbulletin. Here is a list of the biggest internet forums http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Internet_forums. You can see most of them are powered by Vbulletin and the second most popular script is phpBB. Regarding fresh look you can simply hire someone or buy a Template.

After looking at your site, I definitely belive that you have something that is extremely valuable and can definitely be popular in tech communities. Yes, your copy needs to be more focused. What is it? I would have a landing page (or a cover page) that makes it really simple for a visitor to understand what it is and why this will help them. Include an email field and offer a free eBook. I would highly suggest that you use Optimizely or Unbounce to A/B test your copy and call to actions. (Side Note: Keep in mind how much traffic you have when calculating test significance) Since you are focusing on a developers/engineers, I would reach out to 10 of your most passionate fans that have contributed or have shared your GitHub repo. Ask them if they would be willing to contribute to the site sharing their thoughts. The more influential these people are the better. Instead of assuming they have a login ask them to create an account right on that page. Also, include Twitter login. One point I would make regarding SEO: Include the name of the articles in the URL of the comment pages. This helps with sharing and rankings on SEO. Use Twitter as a growth engine and tweet out all the latest posts that you are curating to your sites Twitter account. Then if you have an active twitter following start engaging fellow engineers asking them questions about these posts. This heightens engagement and starts getting your audience engaged (some of which will convert). To take this one step further find the author of the posts you are sharing and mention them in the post saying that their article has been curated on your site (better yet you could say their article is being discussed on your site). The author will be inclined to retweet and share their post with their following. Have some variability in using this tactic, variability makes it more valuable. Use SumoMe as a really simple way to add email capture popups on the site. In regards to strategy, you may find it more sustainable to use the closed/invite only model for commenting like Product Hunt used. This creates a higher perceived value for those that access to commenting which in turn increases engagement. This strategy would go nicely with the initial outreach I mentioned above. I hope this helps. I would love to chat further here is my Clarity VIP link for a free call. https://clarity.fm/lipmanb/vip/t

Social media is a good way to spread the word, but first you need to make sure you're delivering solid content and that search engines see you as an authority. The majority of new traffic to a site comes from Google and Bing. Sign up for Google Webmaster and from there you'll be able to see if you're getting indexed and what keywords people are using to find your blog. You may be surprised to find that you're not attracting the audience you think you're attracting. Good and consistent content is key.

I make a point of introducing myself to people online who are unlikely to become clients. You for instance. That's not altruism. It's curiosity. Learning about other people's business models, industries, unique challenges and goals -- even absorbing their phrases, vocabulary, and style -- prepares me for some other branding client later on. Being attuned to other people is the starting point of real life interactions, isn't it? Business networking is no different from wandering around from the car mechanic's to the coffee shop and striking up conversations with people along the way.

Identify why freelancers would be willing to join a paid community when there are so many free communities already available to them. In order to get people to join and stay they must know what value you can bring that they can't get elsewhere without paying. It is difficult to keep people active even in free communities. Charging them for the privilege is a tougher challenge. Either way, it is typically the leader(s) who keep things going. In every group I've ever joined or started when I stopped driving the bus the groups faded and died. You may be, hire, or partner with strong leaders who become a major attraction. Freelancing is very broad, so unless you bring on other experts you might consider narrowing your focus to a specific type of freelancing skill or at least start out in a particular industry.