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Proof that people involved in global online communities are much happier.

Online communities are not social networks. Social networks are not online communities. Bold statement. Let’s break it down a little further to explain. Everyone would accept Facebook as an example of a strong social network. Looking at Facebook, we can see it is all about ‘me’. Facebook for me is about my details, my friends, my activity (the feed), comments relating to me (the wall), my groups, events I’m attending… well, you get the idea. So where social networks are about ‘me’, online communities are about ‘us’. A good example of an online community is Wikipedia. Wikipedia is created and maintained by contributions from lots of people. Contributions that do not directly relate to themselves; unless I’m Bill Gates or similar, I’m not going to have a profile presence on Wikipedia. Even if I was Bill Gates, I would be using Wikipedia different to how I use Facebook. So two separate entities that use very similar tools (online user generated content) to create and communicate their content.

An analogy of the above is gardening… let’s imagine that a social network is the same as your own little garden. You are free to plant what flowers you want, put up a nice white picket fence, maybe one of those horrible water features. Whatever you do, the garden is yours and your friends can only come in to the garden and look at your work. An online community is like a communal garden. Using the same gardening tools, the community plant flowers, dig holes, put up fences, but no-one can claim ownership over the garden or any piece of it. The garden as a whole is the creation of the community.

Interesting fact:
If the UK population of adults all set about the task of rewriting everything on Wikipedia…
it would take less than five minutes

Another good example of an online community is Trip Advisor. Most people have used it at some point or another to help with their travel plans or check out a hotel review. Trip Advisor shows that for an online community to grow it cannot be owned by the brand. The brand must be part of the community. This is not to say Trip Advisor is at the whim of it’s own population but that the brand must respect the community and what they deliver. The brand must realise it is part of a larger whole. Recent stats show over 100 users spending over 40 hours a week updating Trip Advisor – more hours than most people work in a week! These are unpaid people who do this because they want to make Trip Advisor the number one travel website – the same goal as the brand itself. They do not do this because they want to generate Expedia more money! (Expedia own Trip Advisor). This shows how it is easier (and I use that term loosely) to engage online communities than social networks, as on social networks people are there for themselves. In the community, people want to contribute and basic community practice is to associate a ‘credit’ with their level of contributions to date.

Interesting fact:
25% of Expedia’s total turnover comes directly from Trip Advisor…
despite the fact it recommends many other travel service providers

Consumer communities are a form of marketing. It’s a different form of marketing with new rules and etiquette. It’s always best to consult marketers who have a wealth of knowledge regarding community marketing – conveniently Neoco can help. Neoco are an integrated digital marketing agency that have delivered a wealth of community and social marketing across digital channels. This article is one of the many insights we produce and deliver to our clients on a regular basis. Let us know if this was helpful or if you have any questions.