7 Ways to Improve your Online Community Engagement
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Only 7% of people in an online community are active. How are you going to engage 93% of them?
Your brand and content will be more well-known and seen as a reliable resource if your community is active and involved. Because you've built a relationship with your audience, they'll always choose you above any other options.
One of the most critical responsibilities of community administrators and owners is to ensure that members remain engaged and actively participate in the community. Several tried-and-effective methods of engaging the community are used by many content creators, which we’ll discuss later on.
In this article, you’ll learn:
- Is online community important?
- What is online community engagement?
- 7 ways to improve online community engagement
- And many more…
Is an online community important?
As a business owner and content creator, you need to have an online community. It allows you to create trust with your audience and potential customers, build mutually beneficial connections and relationships, and improve your product and service without spending too much money.
What is an online community engagement?
Community engagement is about keeping members engaged in the brand or content and encouraging them to contribute to its growth. Stronger ties and greater member loyalty are the byproducts of an active community.
Positive relationships within and outside the group are the bedrock of community engagement. The community must be moderated, objections dealt with, and trusted. Additionally, it’s worth noting that community is broadened when used in conjunction with 'engagement.' The attention shifts away from individuals, and toward a larger group, and inclusivity comes into play.
7 Ways to Improve Online Community Engagement
Have a proper welcome to new members
It only takes a few well-placed words of encouragement to reassure someone feels at home and is surrounded by like-minded people. You can use a pre-written direct message or an automated email. Plus, consider holding ice-breaker activities once a week or once a month, along with other fun and engaging activities for newcomers to meet one another. This will earn you bonus points.
You may use this template to welcome new members to your community.
“ Greetings, and thank you for joining us. Why don't you introduce yourself in our thread for the newest community members? Is there a subject you'd want to discuss?”
Build trust right away
When building trust, authenticity is typically cited as a critical factor. Trying to portray yourself as someone or something you aren't will eventually lead to your community losing respect for you and trust in you.
Don't deceive your customers. Tell them the truth if you anticipate an improvement or updates will take longer than two weeks to be released. Don't strive to please everyone all of the time; it's impossible, and your efforts will unravel eventually.
Keep order in place
To spark engagement, you must lead by example. Setting expectations and order are essential parts of every relationship. It's your community. You get to decide exactly what that means and how it should operate. In the end, you should always think about what is best for your own community.
Keep in mind that you have the complete autonomy to enforce your own rules and order. So organize your community ahead of time. When a discussion goes out of hand, what are your plans? What is the limit of acceptable content? It’s better to be prepared than not!
Post content regularly
TurnTo and Ipsos conducted a survey in which 90% of consumers admitted that other people's reviews impacted their purchases. According to half of the participants, UGC is more influential than search engines, promotional mailers, and display advertising. People are more likely to buy products if they see lots of good user-generated content.
Memes, blog entries, tweets, white papers, videos, and more are examples of online community engagement content.
Writing posts is a difficulty that many community managers face. A lot of the time, it seems like they have nothing to say or that what they are saying is too simplistic. However, one of our life's laws states that the simpler something is, the better. Remember that your community members turn to you for your wisdom and experience.
Let your members express themselves
Although some members are content to take in the information simply, they still need to feel a sense of belonging. Many of them joined your online community because they wanted to meet new people and express their individuality.
A warm welcome is a great way to get people talking right away, but there's more you can do. Use surveys, brainstorming, debating sessions, and digital gatherings to test new ideas. Try something new! You can even solicit input from your group members if you'd like. Create a fun game where everyone is invited to participate, comment, and connect without fear of censure.
Celebrate small wins
Celebrating small wins as a team can be in many forms. Showing them how they’ve reached various milestones is what matters most. Discover how to recognize and celebrate modest victories with the entire community.
You can use live streaming to bring new customers or members to your online community on certain days or particular events. You can also use Zoom meetings to arrange a time to meet with other members. Think of it as a virtual party with all the trimmings of a real-life gathering.
Surprise and amaze your members to enhance the community experience. Nevertheless, a simple thank you note and a gift certificate for the most active or valuable members are all that are necessary.
Create your private community
When you're just getting started as a content creator or business owner, it's a given that you'll use social media to establish a following. Something is alluring about having many potential subscribers and followers in one spot. But it's also time-consuming, dangerous, and becoming more contentious.
Social media isn't a long-term solution if you're looking for genuine loyalty, deeper connections, and a more meaningful online space to call your own. The most gratifying and reliable alternative is to build your own custom or private online community platform in the long run. Like other platforms, Backspace allows you to grow your online community by posting creative content and engaging with your members.
What’s a Rich Text element?
The rich text element allows you to create and format headings, paragraphs, blockquotes, images, and video all in one place instead of having to add and format them individually. Just double-click and easily create content.
Static and dynamic content editing
A rich text element can be used with static or dynamic content. For static content, just drop it into any page and begin editing. For dynamic content, add a rich text field to any collection and then connect a rich text element to that field in the settings panel. Voila!
How to customize formatting for each rich text
Headings, paragraphs, blockquotes, figures, images, and figure captions can all be styled after a class is added to the rich text element using the "When inside of" nested selector system.
