How to create a community that gives af?

Its not an easy feat to start a community, its actually a lot of work. Finding the right people first takes a little bit of a hustle. I have been reaching out to community leaders and having 1:1 conversations with them through my Podcast and it shed some light onto it from that stand point.

But I also know what it takes from personal experience. For me, I have been very community oriented for the past 10-15 years. I was first introduced into a community from my co-workers back in Ottawa, Canada around 2009.

I had recently joined my first product company, in a time where I was very influencial and learning way more than I ever had. Two of my peers in the office made a regular habit of joining the Ruby and Javascript meetup groups where people could basically volunteer to stand up in front of everyone and take the mic for 15-30 minutes at a time and talk about a topic that they were passionate about or showcase something that was novel they had been working on.

There was always a free some-some too, beers and pizza mainly that was sponsored by some other company (shoutout to Shopify for hosting and Nazim Ahmed for the ????) This is a sure fire way to get a sleuth of developers of all types to show up in the after hours to participate.

"Free beer and pizza? Lets go! I may also learn something too? Sweet! ...maybe I'll make a new friend or business connection" - Pretty-Much Everyone

I never did get to work with any of them though they tried to snake me from my company at the time that I was an equity holder of, but I probably should have taken them up on the chance in hindsight. (Equity is a dream killer 99% of the time. Go after working with those badasses instead of trying to take a promise to the bank, someday)

Theres a lot to unpack there, but in essence;

1. you need to have your demographic in the know
2. there needs to be something for free as a lure
3. there needs to be a potential prize for being there
4. participation occasionally reaps a reward (RICE - Core Motivations, look it up)

With this as a foundation you can get started. Create a place for your people to congregate. It needs to be a space that they are likely to already be at (IRL, downtown by all the tech companies for Ruby/Js groups is ideal) virtually you have your pick.

Slack, Whatsapp, Telegram, FB Groups, and there is a new wave of custom places (..that I wont dignify with a shoutout because I am building one (Clickstudio.pro in 2025 lets goo! early adopter pricing in effect, join the telegram community here ) are great places to start.

Next you need to hone in on your group. you need to pile in as many people as possible, the barrier to entry here needs to be relatively low otherwise people will quickly disregard it.

I have two communities I am building right now, learning how to do it as we go. I have tapped into the network of my other community's because they have already done some of the work of finding them for me.

For my Free community, these are a group of people who I could potentially have as clients if I am successfully able to show them that I can help them in their mission, but also freely open to providing tonnes of value without asking for anything from them ( other than some engagement clout, lets hack the algorithm! )

Over the span of the last year, I have been in regular attendance at events, collecting linkedin connections, I always create a Note specific to where I found that person, an introduction to who I am, but also noting where we are connecting from.

This is a way of categorizing people as the fall into your linkedin messaging.

"People will show you who they are" - @raddrick

In that first interaction people fall into 5 categories online.

1. They don't accept your connection - good riddance
2. They silently accept your connection - fomo or clout seekers
3. They say "thanks!" or "happy to connect" - kindness, thats bonus points
4. The express interest in what you do - you may have a winner here
5. They connect with you 1:1 - the true ones, opportunity builders here

They don't know that they're being assess, and in fact, we all are, always. Remember that.

I connected with almost 700 people and only 2 of them were complete psychopaths (we wont mention who, but I've got my eye on you.) You need to keep an eye on them, dont block them or delete their messages so that when they come knocking one day you know whats what.

With these categories you can quickly boil down who are good candidates for your communities. PROTIP: don't go straight for the calendly link. Sus them out first. unless they express interest right away in what you are doing or offering (Category 4) dropping a 1:1 opportunity is something that you need to guard. You don't want to spend that time with everyone, those who are busy, who's time is of relatively high value cherish their time will be put off by this.

Send them an invite to your group, where ever its hosted, and establish the rules for being a good participant, show them the incentives and rewards for being there, and then police those rules so that people dont get pissed off and leave.

Sometimes having your phone notifications going off a thousand times a day is annoying, but when each message could lead to a "high score" then its less annoying. people will silent your group and eventually leave, so establish a value proposition quickly and enforce its value. People love a leaderboard

Community's need to be two things, as often as possible, Entertaining + Informative. You wont get into the hearts of them with just one or the other.

Here is the Rulebook for my Free Entrepreneurs Community:

Good Evening ALL! 

I am going to be doing a few new things in the community and I would like to welcome you to be the first. 

My podcast is about solopreneurs, digital nomads, fractional CXOs, and community leaders

Week 1 - solopreneur spotlight
Week 2 - digital nomad spotlight
Week 3 - fractional CXO spotlight
Week 4 - community leader spotlight

The spotlight will be in consideration to whomever is most active in the month, if there is none, I will elect someone to share their ikigai on my Newsletter that I am posting daily

aka. their Mission, Passion, Profession, and Vocation which could lead to a spot on the Bridging the Gap Podcast which I hosting as often as possible, I will release it Tuesday and Thursday from this day forth.

I will keep track of those who are posting most and at the end of the month the most active community member will get a free 1:1 session (US$250 value) with me awarded on the last day of the month. That can be in the capacity of a CTO / CPO / Entrepreneur / Founder / Digital Nomad

Top marks for:

1. sharing a post in @shameless self-promotion daily to create engagement, i will tally up if there is a like, a comment, and a share within those posts. you must also like the post in whatsapp to qualify

2. participating in the daily exercise
  Mondays- Meme Monday
  Tuesdays- Tune Tuesday
  Wednesdays- Win Wednesday
  Thursday- Throwback Thursday
  Friday- Founder Friday (Pitch Practice)
  Saturday- Sharing is Caring Saturdays
  Sunday- Keep it Simple Sundays KISS

3. Every 15th month we will have a virtual meetup with breakout rooms for 30 minutes to 1 hour in a https://leancoffee.org/ format aiming for groups of up to 8 people to discuss whatever is the most interesting to the group

4. loss of marks (-1) for chatting in @shamelesspromotion (go to @captainschat if you want to discuss something with the group, DM if directly) Just links in there to your social posts. Keep it tidy for everyone else!

5. bonus marks if you give constructive feedback to people's pitches. honesty is the best policy, the purpose is to get better, so show up every week and nail that pitch!

I hope that makes sense!

DM me if you have any questions. If you want to be in the Spotlight these next 6 weeks please send me a small paragraph as well as this info:

- Name
- Home City, Country
- Current City, Country
- Passion
- Profession
- Vocation
- Mission
- Your Startup's Name
- Your Startup's Socials
- Your Startup's website
- Your 1 minute pitch transcript
- Current Company (if other job)
- Current Role at Company (if applicable)        

People like structure, people like to win, people like free stuff, people like to talk about themselves and show their peers what they are doing.

A Community needs to have all those things for them to give af!

Lots more to say about this! Paid community learnings next week..

Stay Tuned!

@raddrick

https://raddstudio.com

Radd Studio is a fractional multi-preneur studio that helps solopreneurs and digital nomads build out their leadership teams. It's guided by Ikigai and Kaizen, meaning that it's just one well-spent hour per day making continuous improvements in verticals that product owners might lack strength in or might not have time for.