Care and Feeding of Your Association’s Social Network

Ray van Hilst van Hilst Communications

“If you build it they will come…”

…. Or will you play to an empty house?

Success is Not Guaranteed “The failure rate for online communities has been a

popular research topic over the past few years and it is estimated that over 60% of online communities fail to thrive.”

Vanessa DiMauro SocialMedia Today

http://www.socialmediatoday.com/vanessadimauro/103702/5-steps-remedy-failing-online-community

Listen Launch Lead

"One way to be popular is to listen attentively to a lot of things you already know.”

- George Bernard Shaw

Benefits of Paying Attention   Identify your best topics

–  Is this something people will talk about?   Find your best content creators

–  Who are my subject matter experts?

Top Things to Listen For   Compliments   Complaints   Expressed Needs   Competitors   Crowds   Influencers

Adapted from The Top 10 Reasons to Monitor Your Brand in Social Media by Radian6 http://www.radian6.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/Top10Reasons.pdf

Places to Listen   Current Communities

–  Listservs, Forums, Your Website   Public Social Media

–  LinkedIn Groups, Facebook Pages, Blogs, Twitter

  Monitoring Tools

Current Communities   Listservs   Forums   Committees   Your Website

–  Analytics

LinkedIn Groups

Monitoring Tools   Free Tools

–  Addictomatic - http://addictomatic.com/ –  Google Alerts and Google Reader –  Twitter and Tweetdeck

  Paid Services –  Radian6 –  Flowtown –  Trackur

Make a Plan   Choose What to Monitor   Identify Your Metrics

–  Likes, Retweets, Links –  What makes someone an “influencer”

  Document and Measure   Monitor over Time

What You’ll Get Out of This   Topics that your audiences care about   A list of the online thought leaders who write and

comment on these topics

Resources   Beth Kanter – What Tools are You Using

–  http://www.bethkanter.org/toolbox-listen-engage/   Deirdre Reed – Social Media Monitoring: Are

You Listening to Me? –  http://deirdrereid.com/2010/10/12/social-media-brand-

reputation-monitoring/   10 Steps for Successful Social Media Monitoring

–  http://mashable.com/2010/08/02/successful-social-media-monitoring/

“If you wait until you are sure, you will never take off the training wheels.”

“We see our customers as invited guests to a party, and we are the hosts. It's our job every day to make every important aspect of the customer experience a little bit better.”

Jeff Bezos

Building a Launch Plan   Who to Invite   What to Introduce   How to Invite

Engagement Pyramid – Charlene Li Curators  

Producers  

Commentators  

Sharers  

Watchers  

http://www.slideshare.net/charleneli/understand-your-customers-social-behaviors

Who to Invite   Beta-Testers (Producers and Commentators)

–  Member involvement –  Kick the tires –  Creators feed initial content

  Early Adopters (Commentators and Sharers) –  Commentators –  Will round out your community

  General Members (Watchers)

Introducing Your Community   Rolling out Change

–  Manage the change –  Ongoing enhancements –  Directory Groups Blogs Wikis

  Reward for Action –  Prizes for completed profiles –  Onsite recognition

What to Communicate   Benefits

–  Better Networking –  More Immediate Content –  Next Generation Listservs

  Desired Actions –  Complete Profile –  Join a Group –  Contribute

Promote Online and Offline   Online

–  Your Website –  eMails and eNewsletters –  Event Registration Websites

  Offline –  Magazine –  Postcard –  Conference materials

  In-Person –  Meetings and Conferences –  Networking Events

Leading Your Community “Leadership and learning are

indispensable to each other.”

John F Kennedy

“Nobody wants to be part of a community built around shoddy content.”

SmartBrief on Social Media at Blogworld Expo

Building a Successful Community

  Know Your Audience   Create a Content Plan   Establish a Community

Manager   Measurement   Process

Create a Content Plan   Topics that your members are talking about   Existing Content

–  Repurpose and Republish   Upcoming Content

–  Annual Meeting Sessions –  Articles in your publications

  Other Ideas –  Surveys –  Expert Blogs –  Video Updates

15.1%  

66.6%  

11.2%  

5.3%  1.9%  

None  

1/4  to  1/2  

3/4  to  1  

1  1/4  to  2  

More  than  2  

ThePort – NonProfit Social Network Benchmark Survey, April 2010

Staff Time Allocated to Private Networks

2/3 of organizations allocate ¼ to ½ of a full time person to monitor their private social networks.

The Community Manager   Community is #1

Priority –  Manage Content –  Engage Members –  Makes it Real

Understand  Social  Media  

Good  Project  Management  

Skills  

Understand  the  Larger  Vision  

Needs  to  have  Proper  Authority  

Old/Young  does  not  maMer  

Metrics   Identify what is important

–  Active Members –  New Posts and Comments –  Downloads –  Active Groups

  Measure and Report

Create a Process Find  Good  Topics  

Find  Thought  Leaders  

Plan  and  Publish  

Monitor  Results  

Listen Launch Lead

Q and A Ray van Hilst van Hilst Communications ray@vanhilst.net Twitter: @rvanhilst 703.439.1990

http://blog.avectra.com www.vanhilst.net

Thank You!