How to build a community operation system!

This article uses the 5w1h analysis method to introduce and analyze a series of applicable methods from why to build a community to how to build a community, which may bring you inspiration and thinking.

• "What should I do if the group is dead and no one speaks?"
• “What if the number of people in the group does not increase but decreases?”
• "Participation in group activities is low, how can we improve activity?"
• “How can we increase interaction in the group and get more people to participate?”

Do these questions seem familiar?

These are questions that many people will ask. No matter how many methods there are, even if I tell you, you may not be able to use them effectively. To talk about specialization in a profession, one must first determine the path. Because only when the logic is clear and the roots are strong, and the operators apply fertilizers and remove pests, can the leaves of the community flourish. We need to consider community operations from a deeper logic perspective.

Operations are inseparable from business. Our operational actions are all carried out on the basis of business. Therefore, we must first determine the business logic and then build an operation system, which of course includes a community system. Here we use the 5w1h analysis method to introduce it.

Why build

First, let’s figure out why we need to build a community system?

The concept of community has only been truly developed for three or four years, and various industries have rushed in to try to establish communities, and most communities have died out. Not every industry is suitable for expanding its business scope through social networking, even though the term private domain traffic is hyped up.

So, what kind of business is suitable for building and operating a community?

1. Sell products

There are specific products to sell, and the community is used to expand sales channels. Such products are generally low-decision products, and are mainly suitable for display and discussion. For example, various WeChat business communities, Daily Fresh communities, etc.

2. Short-term value-added services

Provide value-added services to customers, such as services other than products. For example, the community of an online education company.

3. Expand your network

Build communities based on work, industry, circles, etc., with a focus on the workplace. It is beneficial for group members to expand their personal network, transfer information, increase business value, and cooperate in the industry, etc. For example, women’s career line community, marketing director group, SEM circle, etc.

4. Interest groups

Communities are formed based on interests and hobbies, and the main theme within the group is always interests and hobbies, sharing relevant information and participating in related activities. For example, groups of handicraft enthusiasts and outdoor sports groups. Generally, the group owners of such groups are senior enthusiasts and community KOLs, who lead the group members to grow together.

5. Branding (for objects)

Provide a sticky platform for user experience and user word of mouth to be carried out and spread.

A brand community is defined as a specialized, non-geographical community based on a set of social relationships among consumers who use a certain brand. This is the big brand community.

Brand communities are linked by the emotional interests of group members in the brand. For example, Xibei’s attempts at community building focus on personal accounts, specifically designing content for parent-child images, and carefully creating the IP image of parent-child restaurants in the catering industry. At the same time, it establishes welfare groups and sells products in conjunction with the selection mall mini-program.

6. Build influence (on people)

By making use of the model of creating accounts and forming groups, fans can be quickly accumulated and influence can be established in a certain field. For example, Teacher Guan’s Guan Family Community.

7. Monetization needs

Big names or KOLs in various fields have their own monetization needs, and they achieve monetization goals by establishing paid communities. The specific form can be based on WeChat community, adopting the paid group entry model to continuously output knowledge information reports and other related content. Alternatively, you can set up paid communities through community tool products such as Knowledge Planet and Utopia to output corresponding value. At the same time, you can use tools such as Utopia to provide 1v1 paid services to members. Top celebrities have a strong demand for monetization, and efficient and user-friendly tool products are their pain points. Small businesses in the central region have both monetization and branding needs.

The above seven categories are most suitable for establishing a community, so before establishing a community, the person in charge must think clearly about whether your field is suitable for establishing a community, or which aspect of your field is suitable for operating a community, and just compare it with the above seven points.

Generally speaking, building a community at the company level is definitely for the purpose of monetization. Depending on the different stages, the form of monetization will be slightly different. The number of seed users in the early stage, the number of large-scale users in the mid-term, and the community benefits in the mid- and late stages, etc.

Where to build

1. QQ

An open platform that can search for keywords and perform keyword optimization. A gathering place for a large number of post-95s.

The upper limit of a QQ group is 2,000 people, and it is directly connected to the QQ tribe for content accumulation. There are also various means of content management within the group, such as group files, group videos, group albums, etc. You can start live broadcast. For member management, there are administrator settings and muting, interesting tools for anonymity, beautiful fonts, etc., which are all very distinctive. The official provides basic data analysis. The QQ group function design is more conducive to community maintenance than WeChat.

2. WeChat

Closed platform. You can only invite or scan the QR code to join the community, you cannot search and add people. Members in the group have social relationships and a sense of trust. The maximum number of members in a single group is 500. There is currently no control on the number of personal account groups. Users have good payment habits, which is conducive to community monetization.

Currently, groups with more than 40 people can be set up with administrators for collaborative management. There is currently no content sedimentation mechanism, and third-party mini-programs are needed to cooperate in content sedimentation. The official website does not provide data analysis, and requires third-party cooperation to extract data, such as group drawing, wetool, etc. WeChat has a single function, and the corresponding management and maintenance of the community requires the use of third-party tools, such as check-in tools, group robots, batch management software, etc.

3. Third-party social tool platform app

Utopia, Knowledge Planet, Little Red Circle, etc.

This type of social tool platform mainly solves the pain points of content accumulation and paid communities. At the same time, Utopia Innovation has launched membership payment services and real-time group chat functions, and provides data analysis support and group owner university services. It is no longer just a community operation tool, but also provides support for the growth of group owners and the building of their personal brands.

Disadvantages: It is not an open platform, and the group owner needs to attract traffic himself or herself or the official assistance to attract traffic.

4. Internet community public platforms such as Tieba

It’s an old community gathering place with all kinds of things.

It is open, but has many restrictions, and user activity continues to decline. It is not recommended for general companies or individuals to spend energy on it.

5. New community platforms such as Xianyu

Users build community fish ponds based on their interests.

Currently, Xianyu has a clear Sesame Credit requirement for pond owners, which must be above 800 points. This policy limits the possibility of large-scale construction of fish ponds, creating a certain scarcity of fish ponds. Most of the existing fish ponds are old fish ponds, which were built when there were no restrictions. There is no development channel for newly built fish ponds. Fishpond mainly posts pictures, texts and short videos, which is similar to traditional simple communities. At the same time, the fish pond has group chat, which allows real-time communication. Provide content tags for publishers to choose. Data analysis is not available at this time. No third-party tools are provided for service. Especially suitable for interest groups.

6. Build your own community platform

Examples include Dongqiudi, Hupu, and Douchiao, etc. Building a large community based on interests, hobbies, geographical location, etc. requires a certain scale of company to operate.

Other channels are not within the scope of discussion due to their size.

The community operation team can comprehensively consider the choice of position based on the purpose of building the community.

How to build

After determining why and where to build it, the next step is to actually start building the community operation system.

The construction process is divided into three steps: sort out business logic – determine operational goals – break down operational goals.

1. After deciding to build a community operation system, you must first sort out the business logic

The analysis here is based on the community operation system of an Internet medical enterprise (referred to as Company A). The business logic of this Internet medical company A is the standard business model of app community + social group (WeChat + QQ) + product. It is the most commonly used model to prevent violent loss of users and is currently the best user operation model. The monetization method is e-commerce, which will be converted into community e-commerce in the later stage.

Before discussing the operating system in detail, let’s first look at the specific manifestation of Company A’s business logic, which is a set of 1256 points. The community users are patients and their family members and friends who have medical needs. Company A outputs content as an organizer, and users are the beneficiaries and content contributors. At the same time, they build trust and continue to consume products in the future.

Several problems in the logic of the community operation system:

1. Creation of the operation team’s personality and formulation of the community’s tone

2. Follow up with detailed goals and breakdown

3. Grasping superficial needs and core needs: directly affecting the standardized content of community operation actions

4. Content and users are inseparable in community operations, which means value output

5. The design of our two-way interaction and feedback mechanism with users: activity design. Welfare feedback. The user becomes the administrator. Shape KOL. Establish sharers. You can try the following label design: sharer, manager, fissioner.

6. How can we discover the core needs of users and realize and satisfy them? Dig first then satisfy!

This question is very important. This involves the wisdom of making trade-offs, because you may not be able to fully meet the core needs of users, but you can meet peripheral needs around the core needs. Meeting peripheral needs to the extreme is also a business.

• For example, in consumer scenario communities, coupons and event notifications are direct demands.
• For brand scene communities, timely after-sales services and new product introductions are direct demands.
• Communities based on interests and hobbies, sharing and discussion of related content, etc. are direct needs.
• For a networking community, successfully building connections is a direct demand.
• Let’s talk about the slightly more special patient communities. Their core demand is to cure diseases. The core demand of all traditional Chinese medicine communities, diabetes communities, liver disease communities, medical-related mother-and-child communities, etc. is to cure diseases. Only hospitals can meet this demand, so we need to meet their peripheral needs within the community system and form our core value.

2. Determine operational goals

Company A's positioning: A vertical community in the medical niche field, allowing patients to gather together for warmth (spiritual healing) and gain experience (PGC+UGC), and monetize through the sale of goods and services. It is a companionship community that grows together. This should be the original creation of Company A in the field of mobile medical care, which has triggered a trend.

Note: Different industries do not affect the commonality of the underlying logic. You are welcome to learn from them. The operational goal is to establish good activity and a professional brand image through community operations in preparation for the next step of community monetization. The early goal is activity, and the later goal is activity + conversion. To achieve operational goals, it is necessary to match core values ​​- gain experience + resource connection (product sales can also be included).

3. Implementation

Break down the operational goals, and then implement them, determine what to do, who will do it, and match resource and financial support.

Design community operation system based on business logic

The highlight part of the operation work is what makes it different from similar communities or competing products, and it is the part that requires a lot of resources and operations. It is also an important source for Company A to establish a good reputation among the user community. This is the deepest level at which the brand reaches.

Ordinary basic operational work, that is, routine operational actions must be carried out in a standardized manner. Let users form a habit and clearly realize that this is a managed community, then in the minds of users, the positioning of this community will be formal and trustworthy. Subsequent work will be easy to carry out. From a psychological point of view, it is the acquisition of regularity.

Formulation of community rules: The rules of the community are formulated based on the specific circumstances of the business and the community. It is usually pinned to the top of the community and group announcements are set up in the community. Community rules must be communicated to users when they first come into contact with the community and reinforced subsequently. Only communities with clear organizational discipline can create value for operators.

No doubt about it .

Standardization of community actions:

1. Provide daily news morning reports and articles on the latest industry trends. (Combined with own self-media platform and app content)
2. Related topics will be discussed at fixed times. (Also matches community topics in the app)
3. Recruitment of core operations managers
4. Discover KOLs. Arrange Sharing
5. Encourage check-in and communication
6. Mining and filtering topics, etc. (The actual implementation will be very detailed, this is just an example)

Special actions for key maintenance (for reference only):

1. Establishment of offline patient mutual aid association

(The necessity of meeting in person in a community. Only when you actually meet in person can you have real stickiness)

2. Establish mutual aid communities for specific diseases

(Similar social relationships, subculture derivatives, like-minded needs, small group organizations, segmented group organizations)

3. Assist local mutual aid associations in organizing activities

(Organizational rights must be delegated to local offline organizations to reduce our workload and increase community viscosity and sense of organizational identity and participation. They are not only community users but also organizers of the community.)

4. Experts in the community give lectures and answer questions

(The core demand is weakened to meet the peripheral needs, establish the professional authority of the organizer, and provide some young expert doctors with fame and fortune channels. Here, experts are the B-end customers we need to maintain. Establishing a good cooperation mechanism with B-end customers for mutual benefit will create convenient conditions for our C-end operations. Therefore, the community must establish an available B-end network circle.)

5. Establishment of user contribution and user sharing mechanism

(All communities with aspirations should focus on maintaining this action. Community must produce content. UGC is the strongest weapon to obtain content and user loyalty, a win-win situation)

6. Establishment of KOL community maintenance and output mechanism

(Combining own resources, providing financial incentives. Suitable for community organizations with communities. The KOLs in the community and the KOLs in the group may not be the same group of people because of different usage habits. Communities generally have a growth system.)

7. Privatization of community members

(All group members must be added as personal account friends , and at the same time promote the addition of public accounts. Reach out as many points as possible and don't waste any opportunity to contact users! Once a user leaves the group, he is still in the personal account. Even if the personal account is deleted, the user is still in the public account. In the process of privatizing community members, it is necessary to make layered classification labels, consumption, interaction, geographical location, birthday, family and other important characteristics. No more than 20 friends can be added per day, and pay attention to the setting of adding greetings. For example: Xibei VIP customers have exclusive coupons issued separately, please download WeChat. Take advantage of scarcity, one of the nine psychological factors of operation)

8. Special activities within the group

(For example: a 20-minute KTV competition every Friday. A one-hour "I Read You Listen to Everyone's Book" activity every Wednesday. Arrange corresponding activities according to the particularity of the community. Another example: a mid-to-high-end investment community holds a weekly project sharing and promotion meeting within the group to promote upstream and downstream cooperation)

9. Optimization of service and product providers to meet users’ core needs for resources.

For example, in the medical field, connecting with hospitals, overseas medical treatment, second consultation, etc. The outdoor community connects with the clothing and equipment supply chain as well as scenic spot activities.

Once the operational goals have been established and their operations have been broken down, they need to be implemented and begin matching people, money, and materials, as well as connecting resources. Once all the above preparations are ready, you can start building a community operation system.

Summarize

Discuss the situation and determine the top-level system architecture from top to bottom, so that there will be rules to follow for specific implementation. Once the community is running normally, it is a natural step to start attracting new members. Of course, all of this involves many details, such as using people, groups, platforms, and media, maintaining the core values ​​without deviation, and implementing them in place. It will be hard for this community not to be popular.

Author: Cook Annie

Source: Cook Annie