Twice,
When lived in the US, I was a moderator of a review forum (yeah, I know my english sucks
)
I start with sending that site a request to have a forum for the area I lived, because the state I lived basically has no info on the net. The owner gave me the forum, I was the moderator, but it surely an empty one. very much like what 141 English just start. Today it is the biggest one in that area I lived, a lot efforts put in from me and all the bro who later join in.
It takes time to build up, for me, 141 English is doing OK. But if still not enough, we need to let people know. let people bring people. Let WG know , so they will tell customers come to post. We also need to make info clearly available, set the rule ...etc. For example, cunning's D1 database is a good one, plus now he requires 30 reading access is even better.
As you said, the english forum is an add on. But if we make this forum the major one for English speaking people, then the owner of this site will look at it differently, let's be honest, if english forum does bring business, then the owner cares.
send the message out, mention it when bro are on other site, let wg know we review them, welcome wg's post, welcome managers' post ...etc. Even in chinese in fine, we translate it.
just like business, if you want to have it grow fast, then actively attack. otherwise, we sit here and wait for people come in by themself (the owner of my that forum put a lot effort into improving have her site show up on top in search engine)