Research shows that communities work. So why does no one participate?

You've seen the stats: People want to feel more connected. Brands with communities have higher revenues among those participants. A sense of belonging makes your customers more loyal. People crave people. We're all in a rush to create a community, a forum, a group, a Slack channel, or even a full-fledged membership site. You get people signed up, they're all cheering you on, and then?

Crickets.

For this month's Pulse check, we decided to dive in to the phenomenon we call Communities. What really counts as a community? What are the great ones doing right? What are the languishing ones missing? And what makes people really feel connected to them?

Communities you've joined

Question #1: What communities do you currently consider yourself a member on?

This question was intended to see where people went first when thinking of their communities. Everyone started out with their professional affiliations like SITE, Women in Events, Smart Meetings VIP, and CEMA. Then they branched out to more personal Facebook groups like astrophotography, Boxer dogs, and neighborhoods. Some began adding local ones like Camp Gladiator, their culdesac in their neighborhood, and even their local chamber of commerce. I feel connected to my son's Boy Scout community, even though I'm not the one actually in it, and I feel connected as an Aggie (from Texas A&M), even though I don't go there anymore and am a fair-weather football fan, at best. Communities could be free, paid, or free with paid activities - that part didn't matter for the "membership" in our participants' minds.

Question #2: What communities did you used to belong to but you stopped (and why did you stop?)

Next we moved on to communities that became no longer relevant and explored that a little. Some were obvious examples, like no longer being part of the PTA when your kids graduated from school, or not being part of the Society for Government Meeting Professionals when they left the government sector. But the majority of the others were examples of the community no longer meeting the content or connection needs of the members; either the content got too broad and was no longer helpful, or the content got too specific (association focused, for example) and was no longer relevant. Several said when their local chapters disbanded, they left the association because they felt no connection to the national level.

The belonging part

Question #1: What makes you feel like you belong to a community?

We wanted to explore what makes people feel like they belong to a community. As one of our participants noted after the meeting, it was only recently that he began to realize that an association does not necessarily equal a community.

The five core elements of feeling like you belong in a community boiled down to:

1. The ability to make an impact on others/sense of being needed - "people know me and would miss me if I left."
2. Having opportunities to create friendships that transcend the membership in the community.
3. Being able to gain value from belonging - mostly connections, but content, too.
4. Not TOO salesy, but opportunities to buy things or experiences is good because you move deeper into the community.
5. Inclusively intimate - small enough gatherings to be able to have things in common with other members, but plenty of opportunities for more people to be added in.

Question #2: What do you get out of your community?

We all agreed that we join a community to achieve some fulfillment of a need that I have. Whether it's to be connected to your neighbors for when you need a cup of sugar or to be in a professional association to grow your skillset and your network. Our top 3 things we get from our communities are:

1. A sense of belonging and feeling connected to something bigger than myself.
2. Learning new things and meeting new people.
3. Recognition, the ability to contribute, and getting value from participating.

What doesn't work

Question #1: If you are using technology or safety partners for your events, who have you found to partner with and what service are they providing?

So then we switched gears to talk about what DOESN'T work in communities we have been involved in. The number one reason communities fail us is when they don't foster connection and just push out content. At that point, they have an audience, not a community. We commiserated over a number of our previously-loved professional associations that took that kind of turn during the pandemic. Just when we needed connection the most, they turned to email newsletters and webcasts, rather than bringing people together to help each other.

A few other reasons communities fail or become irrelevant to us were:

• Going too broad and trying to be everything to everybody
• Being tagged to participate endlessly, or being guilted about not being as active as they want you to be
• Cliques or exclusive attitudes within the community
• Self-centered leadership
• Lack of administration/facilitation (in online communities)
• Trying to create a community around a one-time event that has no actual "movement"

Question #2: How much content is right for a community to push out to you?

No more than once a week, was the rally cry from our participants, but segmenting the content into Announcements, Recommendations, and Conversations was one suggestion to help community members understand what type of involvement is expected of them. Announcements are simply one-way notifications of upcoming activities or new content. Recommendations are two-way content where community members ask for advice or recommendations on a specific topic. Conversations are opportunities for community members to connect with each other (online, virtually, or in person) for problem solving, new perspectives, or trying something out together.

If you are a large community with a variety of content, allowing your community members to either control the content they see, or easily sift through it to find what's relevant is vital.

One person suggested that ever piece of content that a community creates should be considered and opportunity for engagement, so community managers should create a call to action and a way for community members to engage with that content.

Who is fulfilling your needs and what is missing?

Question #1: What communities are doing it right?

One participants said she's part of the "F-Bomb Breakfast Club" which meets on the First F-ing Friday and they are very curated in their gatherings. They are well-managed, and the participants are there for a common goal. https://www.fbombbreakfastclub.com/

Several of us said we love the community around Morning Brew. Even though this one is more of an audience than a community, they are building in more and more ways to get connected as they grow, including creating educational programs that bring like-minded learners together to grow professionally. Wanna subscribe? morningbrew.com/daily/r/?kid=a901d5 (that's my referral link - I am TWO referrals away from earning a LAPTOP STICKER!!! How's that for making me feel like part of the tribe?)

A "Just Because" happy hour group was mentioned because it's a non-selling industry gathering that just lets people connect without the pressure of a professional gathering.

Social Media Marketing Society was brought up as a good community construct because you can join for free, but then pay to be part of content, events, and classes.

And (gratefully) Haute Dokimazo was brought up as a good community model because there are regular opportunities to connect with new people in different and exciting ways that help form connections that transcend the group.

Question #1: What is MISSING from your communities?

Onboarding was a big one - once you join some of these communities, you get a "thank you for your payment" or "thanks for signing up!" notification, but nothing to really cement your sense of BELONGING.

Several people said the communities they currently belong to are missing a virtual water cooler or on-the-spot connection in the moment. Those communities aren't providing opportunities right now to meet and have conversation.

One person said they are missing the "care." Especially in the pandemic times, the communities are pushing out messaging about why they are important, but they are not taking the time to make the community MEMBERS feel like they are important.

Summary

It seems that the perfect recipe for community is give, take, contribute, receive, listen, watch, share, join, participate, invite a friend, make a friend, be a friend. I'm reminded of the famous Derek Sivers' TED Talk about how to create a movement . A community isn't one person (a.k.a. one lone nut) starting something. It's not a second person joining it (the first follower). It's getting that third person in through the sense of belonging that makes everyone else want to belong.

We learned that the community doesn't necessarily need an identifier for its community members, though it's helpful if you want it to grown (think Funnel Hackers for the ClickFunnels community or Hautie for the Haute Dokimazo community or Aggies for the Texas A&M community), but professional associations often fail to create this movement-level identity, making it harder to feel like you "belong" when you stop paying your dues.

We learned that people join communities to give value just as much as they join to get value, so if the community is build around pushing content out, it is completely missing out on the incredible minds it has gathered.

We learned that sales within the community is not taboo, but it needs to be clear, not required, and not constantly being pushed.

In the end, it's not up to the community to decide how engaged its community members are - it's up to the community members to decide. Personally, even though I'm not currently a member of CEMA (though I plan to re-join!) nor am *I* a Boy Scout (my son is), those are two organizations that feel strong connections to and tell people about. So while they may not view me as "active community members," I view myself as being in their circle of influence. Facebook group members may be lurkers and not contribute, but they feel like a part of the community just be being able to witness the conversations that are taking place inside. Tricky, eh? Now... what do we do with that when our executives want community engagement metrics? Ah, a topic for another Pulse.

We're excited to leverage these insights as we grow our Hautie community, and we hope you can use them as you create and grow your own communities, whether personal or professional!

Great conversation, great insights! We look forward to doing it again in October - Join us for our next Pulse Check on October 15th at 11am Central. This one-hour insights session is free to join. https://bit.ly/HDPulseCheck

Liz Lathan, CMP is co-founder of Haute Dokimazo , sparking profitable relationships anchored in genuine connection through rousing shared experiences and conversations. Explore the #HugLife community for marketing and event professionals!

Haute Dokimazo is part of Haute Companies , a family of companies that believe in human connection, from events to media (podcasts, videos, and more) to direct mail to swag to entertainment talent management to strategy session facilitation.

Contact Liz at [email protected] to inquire about how Haute can help you create programs that foster deep and trusting relationships with your customers and workforce.