Marketing to the Social Web: How Digital Customer Communities Build Your Business was my read on the plane ride back from hiking in Big Sur this week. I highly recommend the book (and the hikes). You’ll be hearing more about the ideas it sparked.
In a section on recruiting members for your social network, author Larry Weber summarizes why people join social networks:
1. To meet people and communicate with others, either those they know or new people
2. To entertain themselves, especially with photos, music or videos
3. To learn something new about topics of interest
4. To influence others by expressing opinions in a forum
(His source is a report titled “S-Commerce: Beyond MySpace and YouTube; a New Approach for Brands to Participate in Social Networking”)
The challenge for those starting social networks is how to promote some or many of those activities within their communities. I’m brainstorming here…
To ENCOURAGE MEETING PEOPLE, networks have search features to enable members to find those they know. These same search functions also may allow them to search member profiles by keyword/topic, for example, to see if anyone in the community likes caramels or has used SCORE to build their businesses. Participants can link to others, forming virtual bonds. The ability to create and interact in groups also makes it easy to congregate and share with like-minded people.
The ENTERTAINMENT MECHANISMS are obvious. Networks can facilitate the uploading of and linking to videos, music and pictures. Widgets are also entertaining. For example, I seem to enjoy listing books I am reading or have read in IREAD on Facebook. I use a widget to “poke” others to draw their attention to my profile. Friends of mine play games like Scrabulous (a version of scrabble) on Facebook, which surely qualifies as entertainment.
LEARNING SOMETHING NEW? I’m trying to think how networks makes this happen. (My ex-librarian’s mind goes to lists of topic references and links, but that seems to occur elsewhere.) As I read others’ profiles, I learn what they like, where they go, what entertains them. You might argue that local news feeds on your network (“Status updates” in Facebook or “Network Updates” in Linkedin) encourage this knowledge, meeting both the objectives of learning something and entertainment. Using LinkedIn’s search function, I learn information useful for business networking, like who works for what company, and who knows someone I want to know. I can also use its forum features to post a question and learn the answer from others in the network.
The ability to INFLUENCE OTHERS happens differently on Facebook and Linkedin. In the former, I interact with others and indirectly influence them by posting comments and opinions on their “wall.” The ability for members to create personal blogs that are integrated into the network (I’m thinking about my SCORE Chicago Ning site) also provide a means of self-expression and influence. And I use widgets, for example, to give others a “book chuck” and notify them of a book I am reading. On LinkedIn, the ability to influence is more structured, as I can participate in the Answers section of the site, where I offer my opinions on the questions posted both others. Furthermore, I get rated on my responses by the community. Ratings, polls, and reviews are clearly mechanisms of influence.
Help me out here, please, with a comment. Why do people join, and how can those of us starting social networks stoke those fires?
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Another reason why people join may be if there is some type of reward in it for them – whether that’s a contest, sweepstakes, revenue-share, etc. Probably doesn’t happen as much as the other reason you list, but it’s still a factor occasionally.
I have been really wrestling with this question based on about a year’s worth of experience with my site, which has not been really a social networking site.
Some people contacted me after i wrote two articles about customer service at big box stores like Home Depot and Lowes. The articles were based on my unique experiences and frustrations when visiting the stores.
Many people contacted me via email after the articles were published on the site. They were very candid and frustrated and I had several conversations with them via email about their feelings and ideas on these stores.
When I allowed comments on my redesigned site, the articles generated a few more comments. This time the commenters were talking to each other.
So what’s the takeaway? I think people also join sites because they feel wronged or a sense of injustice. Maybe they are just tired of being taken advantage of want to raise their fists with others.
In retrospect, you can stoke the fires by stepping into people’s shoes and relating your own frustrations, joys, challenges, etc. In other words “Be real and forget about BSing people.
I love this blog series! I’m actually looking
into putting together a social networking
website most likely using Ning. A lot of people
I feel joined Facebook because of the “herd” or
“cattle” effect. I’m trying to figure out how
to get the ball rolling. I don’t necessarily like
inviting people on facebook, linkedin, etc because
it feels like I am trying to “sell” something
and people do not typically like that. Having
said that, creating groups on these sites might
be one of the best ways of getting the ball
rolling and creating momentum.
It’s all about what you can offer the user and
your ability to LISTEN and ADAPT to potential
changes that need to be made to the social
networking website.
I apologize for the rambling….
Thanks!
-HIB
Great Stuff!!!!
George,(Kisalita-E-Friends Social Network,C.E.O /Owner