Building Branded Communities

Lisa Barnett, Senior Community Manager

All About Me

First, Some Definitions

What is Community?

How Do You Feel About Online Communities?

• A dangerous place full of weirdos• A scary place full of teens who speak in a language I

don’t understand

• A useful place to go for specific information (e.g. support forums)

• A wonderful way of connecting with people all around the world who are on my wavelength

• A place which enables me to interact with my customers

Why have a Community?

Market Researc

h

R&D

Collaboration

EvangelismCustomer Service

Community

Community Management

Growing Building Nurturing

Facilitation

Negotiation

Strategy

Collaboration

Conflict Management

Why Community Management?

Main challenge faced in building a community?

People don’t behave the way you expect or want them to

Tools Allow for free and easy communication

Leadership Encourage the behaviour you want to see in the community

Culture Ideas and egos are fragile, so create a safe haven

Community Management is the Answer

Community Management allows the shaping of all of the above

Enter the Community Manager

A Jack of All Trades

Inside the Mind

Traits of the Community Manager

The Community Manager Diet

Community Management Best Practise

Your Audience

• Understand your members

• Build trust

• It’s not about you

• Foster belonging

Make It Valuable

• Demonstrate the value of community membership

• Look beyond the obvious

• Communities create a stickiness 

• Think long term

• Let Your Members Promote

Build the Right Community

• Look after your garden 

• Protect membership from sales   

• Promote thought leadership

• Encourage positive outcomes

Build the Right Community

• Size Matters

• Men & Women Participate Differently

• Social media & community are not the same

Be Realistic

• Building communities takes time

• Win small victories

• Build guidebooks or playbooks

Support Community Managers

Your community manager needs authority

Acknowledge the often overwhelming nature of the community manager role

Setting Expectations

• Have moderation staff available 24/7 in shifts where possible if the community is active around the clock

• Try not to post in the forum on off hours

• Implement automation where possible

• Encourage forum members to help others

When building a new community, it is critically important to set the availability expectations with customers upfront

10 steps for building a great branded community

1. Set your objectives

• But be prepared to be flexible

2. Make your tools easy to use

3. Don’t try and be everywhere

4. Keep it clean and safe

5. Set expectations

6. Have engaging content

But not full of marketing messages

7. Be consistent

8. Incentivise your audience

What’s in it for me?

9. Empower your champions

• Publicly recognised as your power users• Can act as your eyes and ears• Get moderator status• In return, you share

freebies/discounts/special offers with them

10. Don’t be afraid to ask

Thank you

Lisa BarnettSenior Community Manager eModerationlisa.barnett@emoderation.comuk.linkedin.com/in/lisabarnettwww.twitter.com/lisab88