Give yourself the best chance of community building success

successful online communities

The key to building a successful online community is to start small – build individual, meaningful relationships between you and potential members, and amongst your potential members. Don’t rush to build an online community website before you do this – you’ve already made the first (and probably the most common) mistake.

Step one – Why is a community needed?

Why do you want an online community in the first place? To increase brand awareness/perception? To reduce costs? To better engage with your customers/target audience? Because everyone else is doing the same? The first three are valid reasons – the last one might be valid, but it’s the least likely to see you succeed.

Step two – Where are your potential members?

It’s much easier to find vegetarians online than it is fortune cookie writers. This needs to be considered – the harder your potential members are to find, the more challenging it will be to build a community in the first place. There are advantages, though – the harder these people are to find, the less likely it is that a competitor has already moved in. Smaller groups are better at building relationships – so see this as an advantage (albeit a challenging one).

Step three – Reach out and build relationships.

As you come across potential members, you need to reach out. This doesn’t mean you spam them or ’sell’ to them. If they have a blog, read it and leave comments that have value. If they are on Twitter, get involved in a conversation or two. You need to provide the value here – if you aren’t relevant or you don’t satisfy an individual’s self-interest, you won’t get very far.

You need to be genuine, and be human. Have a personality (that’s still allowed, you know) and enjoy this stage – you are now getting your name out there; what it gets associated with (good or bad) is up to you.

Step four – Develop relationships.

Although you should be slowly reaching out to new people, don’t do this at the expense of those you have already built relationships with. Now is the time to build on those relationships and develop them further. Find out what these individuals want – what is their self-interest here? Why were they initially receptive to what you had to offer?

If you aren’t sure, ask. Remember, you need to tailor the online community to meet the needs of your members – not your own needs. Find out what these members want and make sure you deliver.

Step five – Golden members.

Not everyone you approach will be interested in working with you on this project. That’s OK – you only want a small number of dedicated individuals at this stage anyway.

Those that are interested are hugely valuable – make sure you treat them as such. It takes monumental effort for someone to reach out to you (when most of us go online we become lazy, cynical and fed up with being marketed to). Bring these individuals in as your initial members – give them extra responsibilities and make sure you listen to what they say. Choose the right people, and they will help ensure your community is relevant, attractive and fun.

Don’t make the mistake of thinking the website is the most important aspect of your online community. It isn’t – people and relationships are. You can build a community without a website. You can’t build a community without people. Always remind yourself of this fact and you’ll be ahead of most of your competition.

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13 Responses to “Give yourself the best chance of community building success”

Nicole Price:
January 23rd, 2010 at 3:50 am
The two items in your post that appeal to me most are:
1. The value of those who are genuinely interested and
2. The importance of people and realtionships.

Attention paid to these two aspects will result in maximum mileage for community building.
Andrew:
January 28th, 2010 at 6:57 am
This is a very timely article. A lot of people nowadays are after quantity and not the quality. Quality in relationships, in products and in many others are often overlooked. We should take a step back and analyze our purpose and goal in building communities. It should be people-oriented and relationship-oriented. And I also agree that we should start building small.
Sasch:
January 31st, 2010 at 6:29 pm
@Andrew – well said my friend. People are after Quality in everything they do, and building a good, stable online Community is no different.

It indeed should be aimed at people and relationships… And always start small building up as you go along, and getting feedback from the people you want to attract to your community…
Sharon:
February 5th, 2010 at 10:55 am
Re: #2 and picking your target audience. This is a struggle. Whether you have a mainstream topic or not, it’s hard to reach the right people, just for different reasons. On a mainstream topic, though, a USP can help: something that no one else in your subject field is offering.
Nicole Price:
February 5th, 2010 at 10:59 am
I have just been given an example of how community managers do not follow what you have advised here. I had been a member for almost eighteen months in sub group. After a number of complaints from me about a rather unpleasant member, I got an advise in very polite terms, but in effect telling me to lump it. My requests for deleting my name from their mailing list is also not being accepted by their mechanized system. I have just marked them for black list on my filter. I have decided to lump it!
Ed Harris:
February 17th, 2010 at 2:23 pm
The “potential members” aspect is my biggest challenge. Many of my “prospects” are already members of bigger established Forums which makes it harder to add them as regulars. Obviously, I need to find some unique aspects that might spark their interest.
Tom:
February 19th, 2010 at 9:33 am
Great post. I think too often these days people focus on the technology, rather than focusing on the relationships.
Matt:
February 19th, 2010 at 7:05 pm
I would love to build a community around our site (renters in the San Diego area) but I don’t think the commonality is there for the members to be interested enough- the fact that they all share this one thing in common isn’t enough motivation to join a group. Too bad because a lot of good could come from it- I think
Doug:
March 1st, 2010 at 4:18 pm
Building relationships is more important than most people realize. I was raised in a small town and I noticed my dad was providing extra service perks like washing windows and vacuuming cars when customers would get their car worked on by mechanics. The customers admired that little extra touch and were repeat customers.
Rachel:
March 3rd, 2010 at 4:12 pm
Great ideas – I don’t have a community but love participating in them! I forwarded this link to BlogFrog, they are a great community building group of moms. Hopefully these tips will help them.
David:
March 4th, 2010 at 4:05 am
How long should you give it before seeing success? If a new forum doesn’t take off after a year or two, is it better to shut it down, or just leave it sit unused?
Kirsty:
March 4th, 2010 at 11:55 pm
I have to agree entirely with your post. I thinking building communities is certainly one of the strongest ways to achieve success.

After all its the relationships that build business.
Martin Reed - Community Manager:
March 5th, 2010 at 12:37 pm
David – It depends on what you mean by ‘take off’; different communities have different goals. If you’re not happy with how the community is progressing after a year, or even two, then you need to work out why you aren’t happy, and what can be done to fix that. Don’t forget to ask your members what they think, either!

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Nicole Price:

January 23rd, 2010 at 3:50 am

The two items in your post that appeal to me most are:
1. The value of those who are genuinely interested and
2. The importance of people and realtionships.

Attention paid to these two aspects will result in maximum mileage for community building.

Andrew:

January 28th, 2010 at 6:57 am

This is a very timely article. A lot of people nowadays are after quantity and not the quality. Quality in relationships, in products and in many others are often overlooked. We should take a step back and analyze our purpose and goal in building communities. It should be people-oriented and relationship-oriented. And I also agree that we should start building small.

Sasch:

January 31st, 2010 at 6:29 pm

@Andrew – well said my friend. People are after Quality in everything they do, and building a good, stable online Community is no different.

It indeed should be aimed at people and relationships… And always start small building up as you go along, and getting feedback from the people you want to attract to your community…

Sharon:

February 5th, 2010 at 10:55 am

Re: #2 and picking your target audience. This is a struggle. Whether you have a mainstream topic or not, it’s hard to reach the right people, just for different reasons. On a mainstream topic, though, a USP can help: something that no one else in your subject field is offering.

February 5th, 2010 at 10:59 am

I have just been given an example of how community managers do not follow what you have advised here. I had been a member for almost eighteen months in sub group. After a number of complaints from me about a rather unpleasant member, I got an advise in very polite terms, but in effect telling me to lump it. My requests for deleting my name from their mailing list is also not being accepted by their mechanized system. I have just marked them for black list on my filter. I have decided to lump it!

Ed Harris:

February 17th, 2010 at 2:23 pm

The “potential members” aspect is my biggest challenge. Many of my “prospects” are already members of bigger established Forums which makes it harder to add them as regulars. Obviously, I need to find some unique aspects that might spark their interest.

Tom:

February 19th, 2010 at 9:33 am

Great post. I think too often these days people focus on the technology, rather than focusing on the relationships.

Matt:

February 19th, 2010 at 7:05 pm

I would love to build a community around our site (renters in the San Diego area) but I don’t think the commonality is there for the members to be interested enough- the fact that they all share this one thing in common isn’t enough motivation to join a group. Too bad because a lot of good could come from it- I think

Doug:

March 1st, 2010 at 4:18 pm

Building relationships is more important than most people realize. I was raised in a small town and I noticed my dad was providing extra service perks like washing windows and vacuuming cars when customers would get their car worked on by mechanics. The customers admired that little extra touch and were repeat customers.

Rachel:

March 3rd, 2010 at 4:12 pm

Great ideas – I don’t have a community but love participating in them! I forwarded this link to BlogFrog, they are a great community building group of moms. Hopefully these tips will help them.

David:

March 4th, 2010 at 4:05 am

How long should you give it before seeing success? If a new forum doesn’t take off after a year or two, is it better to shut it down, or just leave it sit unused?

Kirsty:

March 4th, 2010 at 11:55 pm

I have to agree entirely with your post. I thinking building communities is certainly one of the strongest ways to achieve success.

After all its the relationships that build business.

Martin Reed - Community Manager:

March 5th, 2010 at 12:37 pm

David – It depends on what you mean by ‘take off’; different communities have different goals. If you’re not happy with how the community is progressing after a year, or even two, then you need to work out why you aren’t happy, and what can be done to fix that. Don’t forget to ask your members what they think, either!

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