How to keep your community active? Here are 2 tips to share with you!

Community activity is a difficult problem faced by every Internet person who operates a community . How to make a community active? How to keep the community active? This article analyzes these two issues and gives two suggestions for your reference and learning.

It’s 2020, and traffic is getting more expensive than last year.

Everyone is thinking about building existing resources, building private domains, and creating communities. Trying to use private domains and communities to alleviate traffic difficulties.

However, the biggest dilemma faced by most groups created by people is how to keep the group active and how to prevent the group from dying. I searched for a lot of tutorials online, and red envelopes were sent out one after another, but they were always gone after they were snatched away; various activities were held every week, but fewer and fewer people participated; when I signed in and punched in every day, it was always the same old faces.

what to do?

How to make a community active, and how to keep it active?

Step 1: Understand why you want to build a community

When it comes to building communities, how do most people do it?

Directly invite a group of familiar/strangers into the group, and then discuss issues, chat, send red envelopes, etc. in the group. Then we place our hopes on self-connection between people, hope that the group can play its value, and hope to reap the rewards.

Obviously not. After operating such a group for a period of time, you will find that the operator is very tired and has wasted a lot of time on it but cannot stop, otherwise it will become silent and become a dead group.

Is community a new thing that appeared after the emergence of QQ, WeChat and Knowledge Planet? No. Communities have always existed and have lasted for thousands of years, and QQ, WeChat, Knowledge Planet, etc. are just Internet carriers of communities. If we add our colleagues to a WeChat group, does that mean we have established a new community? Obviously not. Regardless of whether this group exists or not, our colleague relationship already exists, and the WeChat group is just the carrier of this relationship.

What most people want to build is a community based on zero social relationships, building a community from scratch, cultivating social relationships, establishing links, and leveraging value, rather than finding a carrier for existing relationships.

If you want to start a business, you first need to have an idea and find a way to turn the idea into a product. You wouldn’t just hire a product, technology, or operations person, and then find an investor and tell him, “Boss, I want to start a business. I don’t know what I want to do, but I want to start a business!” Do you believe that you will be kicked out?

In the past few years, the financing environment was very good, and many people could raise money with just a PPT, but at least they had a PPT and an idea in the PPT. This is the root of entrepreneurship.

You understand the above principle, but when you are building a community, you often forget what the root of a community is! Do you think that inviting people to join a WeChat group, then setting some rules and regulations for the group and letting them play freely is the prototype of a community? Not really. We must understand that communities do not exist in WeChat (QQ, Knowledge Planet). These are just carriers of communities. Communities only exist in social relationships between people and in people’s psychology.

How to build a real community? What is the key point here?

A good community needs its "roots" . This root is the foundation of the community. It is the core competitiveness that distinguishes your community from other communities and the basis for subsequent operations.

This root is the “like-minded” members of the community and the common vision of all community members. Because our ultimate goal is to connect everyone together through a certain vision, rather than using WeChat to gather everyone in a group.

Speaking of this, many friends added me on WeChat and asked me if they could join a group and what the requirements were, but in fact I haven’t created a group yet. Because I didn't know what this vision was, I didn't start. Once I figure this out, I will definitely start dealing with community matters.

I have said a lot in class, but to sum it up it can be just one sentence. When building a community, our goal is not to "gather a group of people" but to "have a certain vision and then gather a group of people to work together." The essence of a community is to gather a group of people and do one thing.

I set up a sports group with my friends in order to lose weight. What we set up was not actually a "sports enthusiasts exchange group" but a group called "lose 20 pounds together in 3 months".

Or you may join a "certain e-commerce in-app purchasing group", which is essentially a "come together to grab bargains" group.

Many of the groups we create now focus on how to find a group of people, but do not consider what to do together. Such groups cannot last long and are too tiring to operate.

So how do we find the vision of a community and use the vision to unite community members?

The vision of a community all stems from some kind of "pain point".

The pain point of the sports group mentioned above is that they are fat and it is difficult to lose weight; the pain point of the internal purchasing group is the human nature of low-income people who like to take advantage of small bargains. Another example is the famous Qiuye PPT community. The pain point when it started was that too many people suffered from not knowing how to use PPT and wanted to learn PPT well. The pain point of the wealth-making community within the Knowledge Planet comes from the fact that everyone is pursuing wealth but doesn't know how to do it.

Therefore, when building a community and finding the "roots" of the community, we must start from the pain points, think clearly ourselves, and then tell community members: We participate in this community in order to gain something together and to change something together.

Through the fact that we are together, we can change this "pain point" and achieve this vision.

Through this analysis, we now understand the most critical step in building a community.

Find a pain point, develop a vision, gather a group of people, and build a community.

For example, if you are the owner of a women's clothing Taobao store, in order to increase repeat purchases and improve user stickiness, you need to group old users and create a community. So how do you start? It’s actually not that difficult.

The first step is to find a pain point.

Analyze user composition based on product characteristics. For example, the products are mainly aimed at fashionable women aged 18-25 in 23rd-tier cities who pursue beauty but also value comfort.

The pain point is that many clothes cannot be both good-looking and comfortable. Too many girls give up comfort in pursuit of beauty.

The second step is to develop a vision.

So what is our vision in building a community? It is to allow women to pursue beauty comfortably. We don't compromise or give up. We pursue both beauty and comfort. I want them all.

The next step is to find such a group of people and build a community. What are discussed in the group every day? It is the pursuit of beauty, comfort, and a better life. Merchants can just hit the pain points of users. Only such a community will have vitality and conversion power.

Compared to randomly creating a group, expanding it to hundreds of people, and posting advertisements, promotions, discounts and other information in the group every day, which type of community will be more lasting and more vital?

Building a high-quality and vibrant community is not something that can be done on a whim or just by doing it. It requires planning and design. It’s like when you are a director making a movie, you don’t invite Li Xian, Xiao Zhan, Di Lieba and other celebrity actors together, and then tell them to come on, just play freely, and call me after the filming is done. You need a plan, script design, lines, etc. More importantly, you need to know what kind of story you want to shoot and what kind of emotions you want to express.

The second trick: a sense of ritual empowers the community

In order to maintain the cohesion of the community and keep it active, in addition to having a clear sense of mission, fixed ritualized behaviors are also needed.

That’s right, it’s the sense of ritual of the community.

The reason why many communities lack activity, tend to be quiet, and even "die" is actually because they lack a sense of ritual. The sense of ceremony represents the community manager’s respect for community members and reflects the manager’s dedication.

Haruki Murakami said: Without small happiness, life is nothing but a dry desert. The same goes for communities. Without cohesion and a sense of ritual, the community is nothing but a pile of loose sand.

Valentine's Day requires a bouquet of roses, and every time Apple releases a new mobile phone, it needs to hold a grand press conference. Those days that give you expectations have fixed ritual behaviors.

I have participated in dozens of communities and have summed up a pattern: communities that continue to be active are those that value a sense of ritual.

When new members join the community, they have no idea what they should and should not do in the group, nor can they form fixed community participation habits, which may even lower their expectations of the community.

However, if a community has a complete sense of ritual and does the same thing in a fixed way periodically, it can cultivate the habit of participation among community members and make them have expectations for the community's activities.

For example, when a new member joins the community, a welcome ceremony is held to inform him what the community is about, what he can and cannot do here, what he can gain, and what he needs to pay. This is a very simple welcome ceremony, and also the first time new members understand the community’s sense of ritual.

Of course, this welcome ceremony could be even more perfect. For example, the administrator adds the WeChat of a new member, gives him a more detailed introduction to the community, understands his personal situation, and conducts tiered operations.

There will be many activities in the community, and if you want to increase the sense of participation of community members and maintain the activity of the community, you need to "ritualize" these activities.

Use the sense of ritual to empower community activities.

So how can we ritualize community activities so that more people can continue to participate in the activities and increase community activity?

1. The ritual needs to be fixed and strictly enforced

The purpose of a sense of ritual is to get more people involved, and the most important point in increasing the sense of participation of community members is that everyone knows what to expect before the ceremony begins.

I personally love the Marvel movies. The style of Marvel movies is relatively fixed. In fact, we already know the general framework before watching them. The superhero completes a small task - encounters a big challenge - overcomes difficulties and completes the challenge - the grand ending. We know the general framework of the movie, and we also know that the superheroes will face big villain challenges, but what kind of challenges they will be, how the superheroes will overcome them, whether anyone will sacrifice, etc., are what I am looking forward to.

Therefore, I already knew what to expect before the movie started. Therefore, once the movie starts, I will be fully engaged and follow the plot to satisfy my expectations.

The same goes for community activities. Regular activities can be fixed, such as fixed time, fixed process, fixed mode, etc. This way, community members will already be looking forward to the event before it starts, greatly enhancing their sense of participation. Those who have no expectations for the activities are no longer suitable for this community and can go their separate ways.

For example, in a community project that I managed before, the main community members were all high-end cycling enthusiasts. In order to enhance the sense of ceremony of the event, I set the community's special sale event to 8 p.m. every Friday night. During the rest of the time, those who like to chat can chat freely (as long as the content is legal), and those who don't like to chat can block the messages. Sometimes there may not be any news for a week, but as soon as 8 o'clock every Friday night arrives, the group immediately becomes active and everyone is preparing to grab benefits.

This is to use the sense of ritual to empower the event, make everyone look forward to the event, enhance their sense of participation, and increase activity.

On the contrary, if there is too much randomness, such as giving out a lecture today and sending out a red envelope tomorrow, most members will not have developed a sense of expectation. Even if they encounter or participate in the event by chance, their sense of participation in the event will be very shallow.

Therefore, community organizers should regularize activities, cultivate community members' sense of expectation and participation, and increase activity levels.

2. Design a clear trigger “button”

What is said above is that we need to cultivate a sense of anticipation, but the sense of anticipation cannot exist forever and it cannot be maintained for a long time.

Therefore, it is necessary to set a trigger "button" for "expectation". When this "button" is touched, a sense of expectation will arise.

For example, if a movie you have been looking forward to for a long time is about to be released, when will your anticipation be highest? It must be after booking the tickets, right? So booking a ticket is the trigger “button”.

The trigger "button" can be an event or a fixed time. For example, in the example I mentioned above, 8 o'clock every Friday night is a trigger "button". When the time comes, everyone knows that they have to grab the benefits, and many group members even set alarms every Friday.

This year, many "junk ads" have been popular, such as "XX couple photo shoot, go wherever you want to shoot", and Xche.com's "Know all the prices, you won't suffer a loss when buying a car". They use a highly repetitive brainwashing mode to quickly install a trigger "button" in the consumer's brain, so that every time the consumer thinks of this scene, they will immediately associate it with the advertiser.

If you don’t believe me, let me give you two examples.

1. The Chinese New Year is coming soon. What will you buy for your elders when you go home for the New Year?
2. When you eat hotpot with your friends, what would you drink if you are afraid of getting a sore throat?

I won’t tell you the answer, I’m sure you all already understand it.

Many communities will have activities such as sending red envelopes and posting photos to new members, which are essentially a way to cultivate a sense of ritual in the community, and the joining of new members is the "button" that triggers group membership.

To keep the community active, you need to design a trigger "button" so that when group members reach a certain moment, they will reflexively enter your community ritual.

At this stage, all major products have begun to build up their inventory and take a refined operation route. The same goes for community operation. We must abandon the previous rough operation methods, continue to empower the community, and keep the community active.

In 2020, I wish everyone promotion, salary increase and money.

Author: T Brother

Source: Official Account: Let’s Play with User Operations (ID: happy_yiyi517)