Have a team to manage the digital community
Growing a community is similar to running a town, so you need to know that there is a number of jobs required to manage the community which consists of the system, the content & the users. It largely depends on the anticipated level of activities, the number of classifications & the level of interactions you want from your community.
Below are the roles involved to grow and manage the communities:
- System administrator
- Content administrator
- User administrator
- Moderator
- Community manager
- Content supplier
Leverage your existing user authentication system
If you have an existing user base, you can consider having a single sign on integration. This enables the existing user database to integrate with online community database.
Develop your usage policy
A usage policy helps you to ward off abuse or inadvertent post. You can also build keyword search to provide early warning help. Alternatively you can provide a feature that enable community influencers to report abuse.
In order to do that, you need to setup your own simple housekeeping rules such as the following:
- no profanity
- treat others with respect
- stay on the topic
Involve stakeholders
You need to involve the following stakeholders:
- Sponsors
- Brand owners
- Marketing staff
- Key digital influencers
By involving them in the design process, you allow the community itself to create the look & feel of its existence and thereby creating a sustainable extension of the corporate brand.
Great! Now you have read the strategy guideline, have you started executing your plan? If so, do you have an idea on the next step? If not, you can read my next post [Now you launch your community formation strategy, what's next?] .