Big wins are rarely in community development.

Gamification has a minimal, short-term, impact (about 5%).

Moving and changing platforms has a tiny impact (unless you’re using a terrible platform, then it has a big impact).

Adding a new feature has almost 0 impact.

If you want to significantly increase levels of participation, there are several big wins. 

1)   Attract the most interested members/narrow the focus of the...

You don’t compare your life against George Clooney.

He’s not in your peer group.

A-List celebrities might, but not you.

You measure yourself against those you consider your peers. You measure yourself against a relatively small group of people whom, at some point, have had the same level, interest, or held the same position, as yourself (at the same time – people don’t compare themselves to the deceased).

Early on, this was your school friends. Later, it was your...

About half of our clients manage communities of practice (CoPs).

The most common problem facing those involved in communities of practice is busyness. Their target audience is too busy to participate in the community, or so they claim. 

This is almost never true. In almost every sector you can find an example of a successful community. It can be doctors, lawyers, accountants, teachers. You will find successful communities. 

The challenge is changing...

Resist the urge to tackle a big goal when you launch a community.

Big goals take time, they're hard to achieve, and you're likely to lose your members before you get there. 

If you want a community that can achieve big goals, you need to have a thriving community. To have a thriving community, you need momentum. 

In the early stages (or in a revival phase) a community needs...

You can get everything right, and be tripped up by the minutia. 

Compare, for example, these two approaches:

Hi Susan,

My name is Richard Millington, I'm the community manager for CoinCrazy. 

CoinCrazy is an organization that sells rare coins to passionate collectors like yourself. As part of our mission, we have recently created a community for people that are passionate about rare coins. 

...

What if you sent your community the following message:

Hi everyone, 

I'd like to share a few things that might help you be a star member of this, or any other, community. If this isn't your goal, that's fine. Keep participating as you are. We're thrilled to have you. If you want to be one of the star people, then read on. 

First, participate frequently. You can't be a star member of this community if you...

If you want to increase the number of useful discussions, increase the number of non-useful discussions. 

Look at this image:

From a conveying useful information...

Imagine you have a successful mailing list/newsgroup.

People subscribe once to whichever groups they like and then receive e-mails when someone posts to the group.

The community comes to them. It's inserted into their existing habits. They don't have to go to the community.

This is a powerful thing. It's far harder to make someone regularly visit a community platform every day than to check their e-mail every day. 

This isn't to say you can...

This is a collection of my favourite and most popular posts from the last six years. It should give you a great overview about both the strategy and the process of creating an online community from scratch.

The Online Community Basics

1. A Primer About Successful Online Communities
2. ...