Overview:

Why do vast majority of online community building and engagement efforts fail? The tools and those who deploy online strategy are often pointed to as the culprits. Is that fair? Sometime yes…sometimes no! In this session we’ll explore the importance of an organisation’s general communication and engagement practices and how those relate to success and failure online. We’ll hear directly from several people currently managing online projects to stimulate our learning. Participants will leave the session with a keen awareness of the questions they must answer related to planning for, launching, nurturing and sustaining successful community building and engagement projects online.

NOTE – Participants were invited to review materials (and participate if they wished) before the conference via an online platform that was used during the session at http://sc.blogs.com/summit_collaborative/online-comm_video-tutorials_1.html . The platform is also available following the session to create a real-life learning environment that demonstrates the possibilities for online community building and engagement.

Session Facilitator:

Marc Osten (Summit Collaborative)

Biography:

Marc Osten has more than twenty years experience as an activist, innovator and consultant with non-governmental organisations. He is founder of the Summit Collaborative, an organization that provides program development, and Web/Internet strategy support to NGOs and foundations. He began his career in the non-profit sector in the early 1980s as a peace and environmental activist. He was part of the first wave of non-profit activists to use the Internet in the 1980’s while he was at Greenpeace. Today he spends most of his time working on implementation of Web 2.0 projects to engage various audiences.

Session Notes:

Marc displayed video from web 2.0 social media session which links to this session.

People made onotes on why online community is useful, why they fail and how to overcome resistance

Site available as follow up resource for this session http://sc.blogs.com/lasa08/

Will look at:

• why online community is useful
• why they fail
• how to overcome resistance

Online communities go through phases. From strategy, to maturity from Forrester Research

Helpful to ask the right questions

Strategy

Audience – who is your community?

Don’t get caught up thinking about tools and technology. Think anbout the social and cultural factors.

What does the community rally around? Online communities need a sense of self identity. Without this, they can’t work.

There are a few kind of communities, online communities can be successful when they replicate already existing communities, or represent nascent communities.

Is there a high level of trust in the community?

There are different types of networks. We will focus on those existing around organisations, where the organisation is at the centre.

Some models include broadcasting (the same message to everyone). Others about narrowcasting to specific groups. Others are more distributed. Different organisations have networks that are of different types.

Whilst there are many different models of networks, some organisations feel that ICT support force them to accept standard models that may not be appropriate. It is crucial to find the right model of network for the kind of online community you want to build.

The internet is new, and people are caught up in the buzz of change.

Key principle is listening.

Online communities can develop very slowly.

• 1% of your community will be high participatory.
• 10% will be listening commenting
• 90% are watching

watching and listening is not bad. Many people get a lot out of just listening. If promoting listening is the aim, then lurking is good.

• Lurking shouldn't be seen as a bad thing.
• Email is the power app to get people into your online community

Try and encourage activity by seeding, by asking. Try promoting engagement by sending editorialised email. If the mail is relevant, then people won’t complain about receiving it.

There is no evidence to say that people are

Don't be afraid to try new things to stimulate engagement. If your organisation has trust within a community then new approaches work.

Understand that communities can have personalities and can be made more attractive by promoting this.

End of slides

Marc distributed Online engagement planning guide tool.

It is crucial to start by looking at your audience, splitting in up and understanding the different types of communities that make up your audience.

Launching an online community needs to fit within the other processes that are happening within your organisation at the time – the organisation's strategic priorities.

Time should be taken to look at the long term longevity of the project. There is nothing wrong with online communities that close after a certain period of time.
Content. Consider the type of content that will be discussed. This informs the structure of the community.