Online communities have become a driving force in shaping interactions and experiences. Whether through social media platforms, forums, messaging apps, or online events, people seek spaces to connect, share information, and engage around shared interests, passions, and even product evaluations.
Research shows that more than 75% of internet users participate in online communities, highlighting their significance. The value of community goes beyond just connection. As consumers demand more openness and authenticity, businesses that build strong communities stand to gain insights into their audience’s needs, preferences, and behaviors. Community engagement creates a win-win situation where members can learn and grow on their terms while businesses gain valuable feedback, improve products, and boost marketing efforts.
What is Community Growth and the Benefits of Community Engagement
“Community growth” is about an organization’s efforts to build, nurture, and strengthen its community. A community can take many shapes but often comprises users, customers, contributors, champions, and influencers who interact and share ideas online. These conversations happen across many platforms like Slack, Twitter, LinkedIn, Discord, Reddit, etc.
When exploring community growth strategies, you’ll often hear “community-led growth.” Although similar, the two are slightly different. Community growth is about building and strengthening the community itself. Community-led growth happens when that community actively drives business results—like attracting new customers, boosting product use, and increasing revenue.
Another growing approach is “intelligent community growth,” which uses AI and machine learning to help scale up the work of community managers. Some of the main benefits of this are.
- Get a full view of each community member across all channels, including details from different platforms (like Slack, GitHub, LinkedIn, and Twitter) and product and customer data.
- Spotting key insights and trends within the community, such as popular topics, member activity, and overall sentiment.
- Acting on insights effectively, like sending automated welcome messages to new members or catching signs of negative sentiment around a product.
- Tracking community health metrics and showing how the community impacts business outcomes.
This makes it easier for organizations to grow and manage their communities in a way that aligns with business goals. We will share 10 expert tips you can use to grow your community.
Expert Tips to Grow Your Online Community
Here are some proven strategies to remember for brands aiming to grow an online community and engagement. These tips can help boost engagement and create a stronger sense of connection and unity within your community.
- Define Your Purpose and Audience Persona
Before building a community, understanding why you’re creating it and whom you’re creating it for is crucial. Start by identifying your motivations and creating a clear mission statement. A persona helps refine this understanding, offering insights into how your community can provide value that others cannot.
Building detailed personas for each community ensures alignment across all steps, from platform choice to promotional strategy. For each persona, map out characteristics like their interests, challenges, and preferences since the persona you’re building significantly shapes the community’s focus more than even the platform itself. With a clear persona, you’ll ensure the community remains consistently engaging and aligned with member needs.
- Identify and Understand Your Ideal Audience
Once you know your purpose, the next step is to identify your audience. Knowing what drives your members—their passions, pain points, and interests—is key to curating relevant content and fostering an active space.
Gather demographic, psychographic, and behavioral data on potential members to deepen this understanding. Create a profile that includes age, profession, values, communication styles, and motivations for joining the community. Immersing yourself in communities they already frequent, like Facebook groups or Reddit, is a way to gain an insider’s perspective. This step builds a foundation for choosing effective channels, communication tone, and engagement strategies.
- Identify Key Internal Stakeholders
Successful community-building involves collaboration. Begin by identifying key stakeholders who will impact and benefit from the community. This includes the following.
- Community Managers and Moderators: They manage day-to-day interactions and uphold community standards.
- Impacted Departments: For external communities, marketing teams benefit from insights generated by member interactions, while product teams can gather feedback. For internal communities, departments like HR and operations might play central roles.
- Upper Management: Support from upper management ensures alignment with overall business goals, securing buy-in and resources. Clear roles among stakeholders streamline communication and ensure everyone understands the community’s values and objectives.
- Set Success Metrics Aligned with Goals
To gauge the impact of your community, establish specific metrics aligned with your goals. Metrics vary based on community objectives—brand awareness metrics may include member growth and engagement rate, while customer support goals may track response time and resolution rates.
Metrics should also reflect each team’s contributions. For example, marketing could track NPS scores, while operations might assess efficiency gains. The more you align metrics with the business values, the more sustainable the community will be. Regularly revisiting metrics ensures your community evolves with changing objectives.
- Choose the Right Platform for Your Community
Your community platform affects the engagement and flexibility you have with members. Understanding the behaviors and metrics you aim to target before selecting tools. Determine if you need a free, owned, or paid community model.
Consider key factors: Where does your audience already spend time? Does the platform offer features like exclusive content access, data tracking, or community management tools? Social media and community engagement go hand in hand; public platforms (like Facebook or LinkedIn) can be effective for broad engagement, while owned platforms allow more control and brand consistency. Public channels are often recommended to build credibility, with the option to move to private spaces later.
- Set Up the Community Framework
Once the platform is selected, it’s time to build. Familiarize yourself with your chosen social media marketing platform’s features, configure spam controls, set up a branded theme, and assign roles like moderators and admins. Your setup should facilitate smooth onboarding, consistent branding, and efficient moderation.
Key steps include.
- Defining Roles and Permissions: Assign moderators and admin roles and test permissions.
- Branding: Align community visuals with your brand’s style, such as color schemes and logos.
- Testing Sign-Up and Features: Test all processes to ensure a seamless experience, especially if it’s a self-hosted platform.
- Setting Up Gamification: Rewarding members with badges or perks drives engagement, fostering a fun and motivating environment.
Consider crisis planning and preparing protocols for unforeseen issues to maintain a positive experience.
[Recommended reading: 10 Best Video Marketing Tools to Promote Your Brand Online]
- Promote and Launch Your Community with Engagement in Mind
A successful launch is more than just creating awareness—it’s about sparking engagement from day one. Start by promoting your community through your existing channels like email newsletters, social media, and outreach via sales or customer service teams. Highlight the value of joining, emphasizing how it addresses members’ challenges or interests.
During the launch phase, focus on drawing in an active, engaged audience rather than just numbers. Encourage meaningful interaction with gamification, member shoutouts, or exclusive content. Partnering with influencers or advocates who align with your mission can also help amplify your reach for community engagement on social media.
- Build Early Momentum with Strategic Onboarding
The first interactions show how members perceive your community, so it’s essential to create a smooth and engaging onboarding process. Provide clear guidance on using the platform and set expectations for participation.
Engage early members with welcome messages, polls, or icebreaker discussions that prompt them to interact. Reward contributions with badges or perks to incentivize engagement. An initial group of enthusiastic members can help set the tone for the rest of your community and encourage others to join in actively.
- Encourage Ongoing Participation and Feedback
Sustained engagement requires constant nurturing. Create regular opportunities for members to interact through activities like live chats, exclusive events, or contests. Use polls or open-ended questions to involve them in decisions, fostering a sense of ownership.
Feedback is key to understanding member needs and ensuring relevance. Gather input regularly through surveys or direct conversations, and act on it to show members that their voices matter. Personalizing the experience by responding to suggestions or featuring members’ contributions can significantly deepen connections.
- Be Flexible Based on Community Insights
Communities grow and change over time, and flexibility is essential to their success. Be prepared to adjust your approach based on member behavior and preferences. If certain content or engagement strategies perform particularly well, double down on those efforts.
Regularly evaluate your goals and metrics, refining the experience as needed to stay aligned with member interests. Staying adaptable not only ensures continued relevance but also strengthens the trust and connection within your community.
Conclusion
Every successful community’s core is a group of people coming together with a shared vision. By emphasizing the creation of a space where members can form meaningful connections, your community is set to thrive.
With Global Upscale, you gain access to powerful tools that go beyond just marketing. Our platform brings together community building, content creation, and strategic engagement under one roof. We make it easy for you to manage everything. Whether you have questions, want to schedule an appointment, or need more information about our services, our team is here to assist you. Press here to schedule a 30-minute free strategic consultation
