Best Practices: How do you Organize and Manage an Online Community

The word “community” comes from the Latin communitas, or “public spirit”. It’s a social unit which encompasses and often contains like-minded individuals with a common place and interests. It’s thanks to this social construct that you are currently able to read this on a tablet, laptop or a smart phone.

The power which a common gathering of individuals has is quite astounding – it’s the glue which keeps societies together. By understanding this, we start to delve deeper into understanding why online communities are so vital to the success of many enterprises, including our very own.

Until the end of the article, you will be armed with a fundamental understanding of what role online communities play in the development of an enterprise, how to develop and grow them and how to manage them properly.

How to Understanding Online Community Management

What is this section about? In this section you will get an idea of how communities change and the way community management should change with them. It will explain the core reason for adapting to the natural changes within a community.

It’s easy to describe a community by the total of its sum parts. It would be more appropriate, however, to say that its individual participants shape it into what it is. While an outside guiding force can give form by the means of rules and regulation, the end results is wholly dependent on the participants and how they interact with the rules and one another.

Why is online community management and moderation important? While the initial idea of a community can be to discuss a specific topic, like cars, hobbies or movies, with time communities can deviate from the original purpose of their creation. By managing your community you can avoid it slipping too far off from its original course.

Some notable examples of this are Tumblr and Twitter, two of the most influential online platforms to ever exist in the past 20 years. Both started off with one particular idea, but then took on a life of their own. What’s the point of this all? The main idea we are conveying is that communities naturally change their shape with time and that you should go along with the process rather than try to fight it.

Always keep in mind that people build relationships and it is the expression of those relationships that actually causes the shift. This is the strength of a community. Change is a natural process which is the glue of the community.

Tampering with the natural evolution of a community might cause it to stagnate and for people to leave. In order to properly maintain and manage an online community, you must understand your community and there are five prongs which help you do exactly that.

What are the Different Aspects of Online Community Organization

In this section you will get a general understanding of the five ways to organize a community. Listening. Analyzing. Engaging, Measuring, Adapting. Listen Listening to one’s community will create two things – one - an understanding of the community itself, and two - the sensation that your opinions matter and are heard. ‍

People like being heard and they like to feel as though their opinions affect the community they engage with. Great examples of this are game development communities which provide feedback to the developers, who in turn use this feedback to make their game better and mold it to their community. Rockstar Games is by far the most famous example of the benefits of listening to one’s community as can be seen in this article by CBR’s Samuel Williams.

Thanks to this they have managed to foster one of the longest standing player bases in modern gaming (10 years and going strong). Analyze Listening gives you data which you can analyze. Analyzing what you’ve heard your community say makes cold data into information which you can use to better facilitate a relationship with the people who comprise your community.

Engaging your community using the information which analyzing gave you will yield two major things – (1) more accurate and effective engagement with your community, (2) higher community trust. Engage Engaging your community starts from your side – you decide how and when to do it. It’s important to learn from the information you’ve gathered exactly how your community would respond to your engagement.

This is where measuring the response from your engagement comes into play. This can be done in several ways. Measure  Measuring the response of your informed engagement can be done both numerically and quantitatively. Numerical engagement uses the numbers of replies, shares and views and the quantitative measurement takes into consideration the quality of engagement.

Quality of engagement can be separated into these groups:

1. Time on page;
2. Shares;
3. Replies to those shares;
4. Mentions in other posts;
5. Interactions between communities.

To end the community organization cycle you need to use what you’ve learned so far by adapting to it. Adapt Adapting to the measurement of your informed engagement with your community will allow you to fine-tune your approach and reach a far deeper connection within your community. This will make it a healthier experience which will increase trust in your brand and will actually yield useful data regarding your product and the people who are using it.

How Many Types of  Online Communities are There

Let's learn about the different types of online communities that are out there as well as the two major variants – closed and opened communities:

There are two distinct types of online communities – open and closed ones. Closed communities often have a far smaller pool of participants, though they enjoy a higher quality of engagement – these types of communities often close after a period of time due to two reasons – (1) hard to get new members in, (2) lack of engaging interactions between members.

Social Media Communities – Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn

Mostly used for short-form engagement, marketing campaigns and polls.

Forums – (Reddit) community forums can be attached to any website or be a standalone website

Great for long-form engagement and community discussions

Websites – government websites, services websites, online stores, etc.

These types of communities are limited in their ability to express, however, are not limited by the platform. They are located directly on the brand’s website.

Chats - Discord, Twitch, YouTube Gaming, Facebook Gaming

These communities are chat-based with the possibility of high volume engagement, however, are limited by the time of engagement in regards to information.

Crowd Funding Platforms - Patreon, Kickstarter, Indiegogo, etc.

Based around an artist or creator, they are community boards where creators can share information. Allow for personal interaction with the core of the community. Very strong social bond.

Ok, that’s great, but why does it all of this matter at all? Why should you as a CloudCart merchant or partner care for online communities? The reasons are quite fascinating.

7 Reasons Why Brands Strive to Create Online Communities

Let's take a look at the power of online communities as a marketing tool and why it’s important to create them in the first place. You will learn about the psychology behind them and why the biggest names in the business use them.‍

INFO: A “brand” is the identity of a specific company. It is the image and persona which people directly connect with a service or a product. It is the storefront. It is the face of the company which the customers see.

🛒 Reason 1: Communities are a strong marketing tool – by having a strong community you create and information channel where people can directly get information regarding your service or product line. You can use the size and dedication of your community as a marketing tool to show people your brand is beloved and actually used by people. ‍

🛒 Reason 2: Provides self-propelling brand exposure – once a community starts rolling, you don’t really have to do much in terms of brand maintenance within that community. If people are behind the idea of your product they will spread it for you. ‍

🛒 Reason 3: Brand loyalty – as we said above, people become loyal to things they can trust. Trust is built with time and with predictability. If your product is worth it people will stick to it. ‍

🛒 Reason 4: Increases trust in the brand – the trust which a brand can generate towards itself is directly related to the amount of sales it can generate. The more a person trusts a brand and its product or service, the higher the chance he will become a repeat customer and will recommend it to their close friends and family. ‍

🛒 Reason 5: Human tribalism – psychologists call “tribalism” the human ability to relate and connect to people of similar background and interest. Anthropological studies on tribalism showcase a narrative which extends not only in the ancient history of mankind, but also to this day. The subject of brand tribalism is closely related to our human instinct to connect to others, and is well described in the paper “Brand tribalism: An anthropological perspective” by Harry A. Taute and Jeremy J. Sierra.‍

What does all this mean for you and your company? Online communities tap into the depths of the human psyche and better allow you to connect with your users, increasing not only the chances of them buying your product, but also creating brand loyalty.

Air Jordan's Nike Great Marketing Example

‍🛒 Reason 6:  Monkey See, Monkey Do – people do what others do, especially if it’s ‘COOL’. This is something we all intuitively understand, like what happened to Nike – one of the leading shoe brands. A great source which deals with the topic of Nike’s Jordan Airs’ rise is Business Insider’s “Why Nike Jordan Airs are so expensive?” article.‍

‍🛒 Reason 7: Strong leads source – A community is also a strong leads source. The leads which come from within a community are higher quality because they come already positively predisposed to what you are offering. They are also better informed about your brand.‍

How does all of this relate to you? With CloudCart’s new Marketing Suite integrations, you will be able to use all of this new knowledge and put it into practice. Here’s how.

How can your CloudCart Online Store Benefit off of Online Communities

What is this section about? In this section you will learn what CloudCart’s Marketing Suite integrations can do to help you with your online community. CloudCart provides you with the tools to create, manage and engage with your very own online community.

Our Marketing Suite allows you to:

🛒 Create special code-discounts for community members;

🛒 Create landing pages for specific campaigns;

🛒 Create smart collections of selected catalogues and products;

🛒 Segment your audiences based on gathered information;

🛒 Create hyperpersonalized messages based on customer data;

🛒 Connect through Viber, FB Messenger, SMS, etc.;

🛒 Use A.I. and machine learning to identify your core marketing persona.

Using the already integrated tools we’ve produced for your online store builder, you can basically start cultivating high-end leads from your very own personal community. You can also understand it far better than before and finally communicate your story to them efficiently and at the right time.

To Make a Long Story Short

Communities have a culture. That culture can be around any topic or interest. Brands purposefully create online communities using several platforms like social media, forums, websites, chats, etc. Using the power of human tribalism you can create brand loyalty and increase your sales and the quality of your leads.

You can also learn more about your users. Utilizing CloudCart’s Marketing Suite you can guide and shape your community and create specialized, personalized marketing campaigns with Viber, SMS, Email Push Notifications and much more.

We hope this article has been informative and helped you better understand the true weight which community creation has for your business’ bottom line.

Find more useful Tips & Tricks that can skyrocket your growth here.