Community operation: Why are more and more communities dying?

(1) Inception: The first stage of group building, from the group owner to the seed users. Building a group is definitely not the job of the group owner alone. There must be a first batch of seed users. In the early stage of group building, when the seed users join the group, the rules must be explained in the group, and then new users can be introduced.

(2) Growth: The growth period starts from the time when new members are introduced. The entire growth period will be differentiated according to the positioning of the community. A lecture group with no threshold can grow in a few hours, while social groups and symbiotic groups with paid thresholds require long-term precipitation and development before they can grow gradually.

(3) Active: The real activity of a community does not start when the group owner starts sending group announcements and advertisements. The group is considered truly active only when group members (non-seed users) begin to actively participate in group topics and group activities.

(4) Fission: This fission includes the fission of personnel and the fission of transactions. The fission of personnel is when group members take the initiative to pull in new members and introduce new members on a large scale, then personnel fission begins. The fission of transactions often occurs after the grass-roots official is recognized by everyone, such as in the form of group orders and group following.

(5) Decline: When users think that a group has no value, they will choose to block or exit the group and choose other positions. Or due to irregular community operation and management, group members have no topics to talk about and no consensus to reach. The silence and mobility of people will gradually change.

(6) Death: Active members leave the community, and the group owner’s speech is not recognized or responded to by group members. The group dies only when all group members voluntarily quit or the group owner disbands the group chat.

The life cycle of a community has a cycle. If you want to extend this cycle, you must start from user needs, start with refinement, continuously output, and form self-fission.

So what is the reason that the community that we have worked so hard to operate eventually becomes a dead group? After working on and researching many communities, I found that there are eight main reasons for the death of communities:

1. Not positioning well

No matter what group you create, you must first have a clear positioning. Positioning can be said to be the soul of a community. What value can you bring to others is also the main reason for attracting others to join your group.

Because people tend to seek benefits and avoid harm. For example, the positioning of Shehu, which we are doing now, is to focus on the automated traffic and monetization of the community. We have already thought about the positioning before we started, so that we know what to do next around this positioning.

2. No group rules

As the saying goes, there is no order without rules. If any community wants to function normally, it must set corresponding rules. Rules are not for reading, but for execution.

The Broken Window Theory holds that if unhealthy phenomena are allowed to exist in an environment, they will induce others to follow suit, and the situation will become out of control.

As a result, many groups are now filled with all kinds of messy information! This is the consequence of not having group rules or not enforcing group rules, and it is also an important reason why many groups become dead groups.

However, the corresponding group rules cannot be too strict, otherwise group members will not dare to speak actively in the group for fear of accidentally violating the group rules.

Therefore, group rules should be enforced in moderation to give those who do not intentionally violate the group rules a chance to repent and reform, and they can also be used as a warning to others when necessary.

3. No threshold

The height of the entry threshold determines the quality of the community, which is enough to illustrate the importance of the threshold to the community, because people often do not cherish things that are free or easily obtained.

There is no way, that's human nature, so setting a threshold is on the one hand to screen out accurate users, and on the other hand to make group members feel that their gains are hard-earned, so that they will know how to cherish them.

There are generally two main thresholds: one is to pay to join the group, and the other is to share to join the group.

Therefore, when building a community, do not ignore quality in pursuit of quantity. If you do not set a good threshold for joining the group, there will be all kinds of people in the group, and many of them will come just to post advertisements. This will undoubtedly lay a bad foundation for the future!

4. Lack of value output

It is said that it is easy to create a group but difficult to maintain it. By continuously outputting value, building a trusting relationship with users, and establishing a good value output system and content system for the community, how to obtain the content and materials you output is a question that everyone who runs a community needs to think about!

Only by continuously outputting valuable or interesting things can group members get what they need and feel that this is a community that is working hard. In return, group members will give you more in return. This is also an important way to build a community brand and increase activity.

5. Lack of interaction

One of the most important purposes of establishing a group is to quickly narrow the distance between us and the members and gradually build trust through output and interaction. Without interaction, there is no trust, and without trust, there is no transaction.

Everyone knows the popular fish pond theory. A group is equivalent to a fish pond. After you have established your own group and introduced the fry into the fish pond, there is an important process of fish farming. Raising the fry requires continuous interaction and output.

Many groups are set up without first growing the fish, but start selling goods right away, which results in it becoming a one-man show. This is also the reason why many groups are blocked by their members!

6. No Continuous Operation

A good community cannot be separated from continuous operation. Building a community is just the beginning. We also need continuous operation and maintenance, and regularly hold some fun and interesting activities, such as lucky draws, check-ins, sharing, etc.

Establishing a drainage system to continuously attract accurate users to join the community is the only way to ensure the vitality of the community, allow the community to operate for a long time, and achieve rapid fission-like development!

7. Lack of innovation

The mobile Internet era allows information to change rapidly, and everyone has a tendency to get tired of the old and love the new. Each of us has more and more choices, which makes it difficult for people to continue to love one thing.

Group members often leave after participating in a community activity and getting satisfaction or gaining something. Because people are always very interested in new and interesting things in order to maintain their presence on the Internet and relieve boredom and emptiness.

Communities also need to be injected with fresh blood and innovation to maintain their vitality. They must continuously explore some new and interesting ways to play, learn to think from the user's perspective, give group members enough freshness, and give group members enough reasons to stay in the community.

8. Lack of opinion leaders

Opinion leaders are usually the most active people in the group. It is this group of people who keep the community active. They can be set as group administrators and receive some benefits as incentives from time to time, which will give them a certain sense of responsibility and honor in the community, thus producing a positive promoting effect.

As the most important group leader in a community, if you have little time to interact and communicate in the group, then you must invite some opinion leaders to join or discover opinion leaders, which is crucial to the development of the community.

They can be said to be the real soul of a community, and group members often need the leadership of these opinion leaders to maintain the value and activity of the community.

Summarize:

If you want to run a community well, you need to start with positioning, design the entire structure or framework, fill in the blanks step by step, and when all conditions are met, it will be a successful community.