#1 Why community could be a more valuable element of your business than you might realise.

If you work directly with groups of students or ELT professionals, you’re probably already at least partly aware of the importance of community. You know that group dynamics are important, and that at least some of the reason why your students have chosen to work in a group (apart from cost), is probably to learn in a shared environment.

However, the benefits go much further than this and can also apply even if you only ever teach, train or coach one to one.

In the latest Earn Learn Thrive LinkedIn Live with Designed to Flourish alumna Lisa Wood , we talked about Lisa’s lightbulb moment around her online teaching business, Your English Self.

Having trained as a neurolanguage coach with Rachel Paling , Lisa was enjoying working with clients 1-2-1, but still felt that something was missing, both for her and the students. Could it be community? She decided to start a twelve week coaching programme, and found that, when it was over, the students just didn’t want to leave. They were having too much fun within this new community, and wanted to know what was next!

Lisa uses a platform called Mighty Networks, which allows you to create a free public space, as well as private spaces for closed groups, and so, her students went into this public group. And they kept chatting, and using English, and sharing stories and photos… and out of this came the idea for her new on-going membership, YES to Fluency. One of her students inspired this when she referred to other people in the community Lisa had created as her ‘fluency mates’

My experience was quite similar. I started off only coaching ELT freelancers 1-2-1, and then developed a 12 week business foundations group programme, Flourishing Foundations.

And at the end of that 12 weeks, such strong supportive bonds had been formed within the group, that they didn’t want to leave. So for the last couple of years I’ve offered an on-going Mastermind membership just for the alumni of that 12 week programme, so they can continue to get support from me, and, crucially from each other.

In terms of the students, there is more and more evidence that community based learning really works. This usually refers to students interacting with their local communities, but it clearly also applies to communities of learning. The value of community in both cases revolves around the authentic connections formed, and the very real need to communicate and work together.

In terms of us as business owners, we often find that students or clients come to us for content, to be taught something specific, but that they stay for community.

This is great news if you use a membership model in your business, but it’s also highly applicable when our clients may finish working with us but (still) want to be part of a wider community. Previous clients are likely to want to work with us again, because they already know that we provide a great service, making the marketing relatively effortless, and if they stay ‘in our world’, they are also quite likely to think of us first when a friend or colleague asks them for a recommendation.

An 'alumni' community can enable even 1-2-1 students to find like-minded people, and get ongoing support.

It can also work the other way around, of course. As business owners, we need to recognise that people are not necessarily going to be ready to work with us straightaway. Even if our offer is perfect for them, it might not be the right time in terms of availability, or finances, or they just might want more time to get to know us, find out more about what we do, hear from some other people who have worked from us and so on.

So creating a community can also be a way of giving them that opportunity to get to the place where they’re ready, in their own time, with no pressure. And, whether they end up working directly with us or not, it’s an opportunity for us to give them at least some help and support, with no expectations. Which feels good, and why not?

Maybe that’s a mailing list, with useful or motivating emails, or a free Facebook group, or a membership. These can all be a form of community.

So, what communities have you already created, or could you create, which might benefit both you and your clients and potential clients?

I'll be sending The Thriving ELT Freelancer LinkedIn newsletter twice a month, and the content will be exclusive to those of you who have signed up to it.

If you’d like to watch the live I’ve been referring to in this newsletter, here’s the link:

https://www.dhirubhai.net/video/event/urn:li:ugcPost:6977568342962270208/

And the next Earn learn Thrive LinkedIn Live will be on 7th October at 10.30am UK time, with Rhona Snelling . Rhona is a a freelance ELT author, speaker, editor, and project manager, and we’ll be talking about how to get into ELT materials writing as a freelancer