Now that everything is online, what happens to online-only communities?

At the beginning of the COVID-19 lockdown, I noticed all kinds of professional and social communities were jumping to the online world. As someone used to work remotely and certain accumulated expertise in keeping friendships and family ties across the world, the new situation seemed not to bring any specific impact to my regular life. However, I quickly realized how much this isolation was affecting people around me: my social communities started to get on fire!

My Whatsapp groups accumulated over 100 messages every day, all my contacts were posting Insta stories, joining live cooking sessions and all sorts of virtual events. Even me, I've tried out some Tiktok voices even though I promised I wouldn't do it. The Meetup gatherings in Berlin turned virtual, and we even had to find a new approach to the digital literacy workshops at ReDi School. How can you teach someone to use a computer, and do it online? Well, there is nothing impossible! Soon my email inbox started to be filled in by COVID-19-related newsletters, advertisements, fundraising campaigns, offers, vouchers, initiatives... some were more interesting than others, I must say, and they all included coronavirus greetings that became quite annoying - as this Huffington Post article explains. I took some time to unsubscribe from a few email lists.

Oh, and don't forget the media. Online press conferences, Facebook live interviews, notifications from News apps. And Netflix launching La Casa de Papel in the middle of the chaos. In the beginning, all these sounded like fun to someone excited about online community building. But then, it felt like there was SO MUCH HAPPENING, I did not even have the time to digest. Instead, I went back to reading books and improvised some singing. Somehow I'm drawing the facade of the building in front of my balcony on a piece of paper. And I'm eating unexpected amounts of chocolate while working remotely. To be honest, I feel infoxicated. I even uninstalled Instagram and Facebook. I can't look at my phone anymore.

But the thing is... my job consists of building an online community. Not just now because people cannot meet in person. Like in general. A global - and amazing ;) - community of online learners at Kiron that we try to keep active and engaged. How are we community managers supposed to tackle the challenge of keeping people connected in the midst of this content craziness? While asking myself this question, I started overthinking. And I'm sharing here my thoughts with you:

1. Let's calm down for a sec

Don't rush. Sit down and make a plan. If people are staying inside for some time, this is definitely an opportunity. But let's not forget they are forced to do that. It's not a choice. The community is probably worried about their families, jobs, or mental health. Maybe all of them. Some might not even have a place they call home or home might be too far away from it. I'd think twice before saying #stayhome.

Let's plan out a content strategy targeting specific goals for 1-month time and then reevaluate. I think a good goal needs to be creative and perhaps not too ambitious. Trying to make a video challenge that goes viral or giving away vouchers are interesting ways of engaging your audience. But these don't work when there are thousands of other companies doing the exact same thing. Let's add an extra shot of empathy. My personal goal was that the student community feels we are present, that there are human beings behind the screen supporting them and listening to what they want to achieve. UX research and social listening are tools we should regularly use, not just because of Covid-19, then it might become opportunistic. Although it all depends on the tone we use to communicate. Maybe this is an opportunity to give users more attention and see how can we add value to their expectations. This brings me to the next point...

2. Ask your users: How are you doing?

Depending on the relationship we have with them, users might be expecting something specific from us, or maybe nothing in particular. We are probably IN LOVE with our product and we think it's the most awesome thing in the world. But we are not building our product for us. Before advertising anything, let's take some time and ask our users. How are you doing? What could we do for you? Is there anything we should be doing differently? What do you think about us? My team and I told them - hey, we know you might have to stay inside these days, why don't we talk? If you have the time, we'd like to hear from you. We targeted a small number of users and tried out the format of a virtual coffee meetup. Around 10 people from different parts of the globe joined that first experiment and it was fun.

We would all agree that 10 out of thousands is not a high number. However, if we target a diverse group, it might end up being a good representation of our audience. In my experience, organized meetups are an opportunity for students to bond with each other. Emotional connections are powerful, they make a positive impact on the users and keep them engaged. In such a special situation, I learned that even the smallest impact is worth it. Users are more likely to lose interest in our community if they don't have any connection there. Let me tell you a story about books...

A few years ago, while working for a Spanish publishing company, I was trying to boost the sales of a book for young adults that was a bestseller in half of Europe but not yet in Spain. Most people paid hundreds of euros to influencers for featuring books (or any other item) on Youtube, but I did not have that budget. OMG, what am I supposed to do? Well, I watched dozens of videos from teenage influencers and picked the one that I knew would love the book (and had 300k followers). I sent her three copies and suggested a reading challenge with two friends I knew from her videos. In the end, she published a 10-min video talking about the plot that triggered several likes and comments. Super exciting campaign. No money involved. The book reached the top of young adult best-selling books that year. She loved the idea because she felt I thought about what she would like to read, instead of offering money for featuring something random. What I want to say is: we should never underestimate the power of emotionally connected users because they might act as amplifiers and help us expand our community (here's an interesting podcast about online emotional connections).

Most companies might not have the capacity to talk to their customers or users directly, or perhaps they choose not to prioritize personal connections because the impact is limited. Alternatively, drip marketing is an interesting way of targeting large amounts of users based on their behavior. I'd go for simple campaigns that look like a normal email: no headers and footers, limited photos, direct and simple language. I must say it can be frustrating that people are not reacting, and that's fine. We should limit the times we reach out to our community while in lockdown. We can easily bother them and we don't want that.

3. Prioritize quality over quantity

Speaking of bothering people, don't you have the feeling that every time you check your Instagram there are, at least, 10 people doing a live session? Are you able to choose what do you want to listen to? Or you just give up and don't watch any? Quality over quantity should be a must in any online content strategy. But I feel now the quality is even more important: we want to be relevant and add value. And do that before the fingertip scrolls down (which is, how often? 3 seconds?). If our users are overwhelmed, we need to make a thorough selection of what we want to share with them. Good content needs to be short, visual and driving to action. I believe in the combination of self-produced content pieces with a selection of content from external sources. And build some consistency around them.

Improvisation is our best enemy here. Even those social media accounts that seem casual and spontaneous have a content marketing strategy behind. I sometimes get stuck when creating content because it feels like everything is already said and done in the online world. No room for innovation. Well, talking to our users directly can give us some food for thought. To me, collecting feedback and listening to our audience is key to develop a system that consistently generates new content ideas. Last comment I'd like to add: don't overcomplicate things. Content strategists tend to say "create content that sells". That's an important point, but I'd rather go for creating content that tells a story, content that triggers feelings. A few quick ideas: feature stories from users, reply every single comment in your posts, create polls where people can express priorities, collect opportunities from out there that your users will like, or reward the most engaged with something personalized.

As usual, there is no one-for-everyone recipe. Get to know your audience and experiment. Making a mistake is not the end of the world. It brings us to the next page and that's enough. Especially if we are dealing with a pandemic.

(c) Photo by Volodymyr Hryshchenko