Community Archives - Page 15 of 143

14 Keys to a Community that Builds Your Business for You

January 4, 2010 by Liz

Last summer at AdTech, a VP at huge corporate brand extended her arms completely — way out in front her — and used her hands to gesture as she said something close to this about her goal for building a community:

I want to build a community in which peers are talking to peers openly.

I’m sure she didn’t mean it the way it looked … Her hands were so far away from her. — or sounded … peers talking to peers?

I couldn’t help thinking … Where will YOU be? Studying me? Is that what you think of me? I’m not a peer. I’m a person. I only do well in places where people “get” me.

Users. Consumers. Buyers. Customers. Leads. Eyeballs. Peers. Those are faceless, flattening labels. They come from the time of one-size-fits-all.

People are individual human beings complete with aspirations, intentions, ideas, opinions, habits, behaviors, thoughts, and emotions.

Which community would you join?

More Communities and More Time for Them

Online social communities aren’t a new thing. People have been linking and sharing via blogs since the 20th century. Organized social networking sites, such as Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn have become a part of our lives.

Our communities are becoming more about communicating and being creative about what interests us. It’s all about making it relevant to the people we want to attract.
We’re participating more. We’re spending more time in communities. We’re building more of them. How do attract people to the communities we’re building that are perfect for them?

14 Keys to a Community that Builds Your Business for You

A building is not a business. A community is not a collection of profiles or a page on Facebook. People won’t visit our community because it’s pretty. People come because it offers them something they value.

If they value what you offer enough, those same customers will lend their heads, hearts, and hands to helping your business grow. They’ll not only help you build your business, but they’ll also protect it.

What attracts and creates a community that will do that?

From two people to more than plenty, a community is a social structure that shares personal values, cultural values, business goals, attitudes, or a world view. What binds it is a culture of social rules and group dynamics that identify members. In the most concise terms, an online social community is a group of like-minded individuals connected by relevant interactions and protected by a high-trust environment.

A high-trust community is an agreement, a pact or contract, like love or friendship. We can’t order, build, or wish our way to one. What we can do is attract people who want to join what we’re doing. The only way to do that is clear passionate commitment, obvious generosity, trustworthiness, and a touch of intentional serendipity … which looks something like this.

Be a person (or people) who likes people. People work with, talk with, and relate to other people not a business.
Articulate a clear and passionate vision worth investing in. Live your commitment. Get your hands dirty.
Seek out people who would love what you’re doing. Find them where they are already gathering and talking. Join THEIR conversations. Get to know them.
Be a beginner, but keep the vision. Learn from everyone who’s been anywhere near where you’re going. Learn to sort wrong from unexpected or different. Ideas that jar you could be the best ones.
Invite everyone who “gets” the vision to help build this new thing. Look for ways to include their skills and their passions.
Keep participation efficient and easy. Curb the urge to add cool things that get in the way of conversation and sharing.
Let trust sort things. Model the standards of behavior. Keep rules to a minimum.
Be visible authenticity. Lean toward full disclosure, but avoid over-exposure. Most of us look better with our clothes on.
Protect everyone’s investment. Forgive mistakes. Ignore little missteps. Eradicate what is destructive. Know the difference by holding thing up to trust, values, and the community vision.
Stop doing what isn’t working. Be lethal about keeping things easy, efficient, and meaningful.
Promote your members … and honor your competition! Secure communities need both to thrive and get new ideas.
Encourage mutation. Let the environment change to meet the changing needs of the people it serves.
Celebrate contagion. Make it heroic to share what’s going on!
Be grateful and always about the people. The community wouldn’t be a community without them.

An online community isn’t built or befriended, it’s connected by offering and accepting. Community is affinity, identity, and kinship that make room for ideas, thoughts, and solutions. What Is a Social Community?

It’s not “If You Build It, …”

We create vibrant, high trust community by letting other folks raise the barn with us, by being their first offering trust and a passionate vision, and valuing the trust and energy they give us.

It’s not if you build it, they will come. It’s if they build it, they’ll bring their friends.”

What attracts you to a community? What keeps you coming back again?

-ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

Buy the ebook. Learn the art of online conversation.

Bust a Move: An Exercise in Community

November 24, 2009 by Guest Author

Todays guest post is from Ben Boudreau.

Ben Boudreau is a communicator at Halifax branding agency Revolve and maintains his creative side on his personal blog, No Ordinary Rollercoaster. He’s at his happiest when equipped with a laptop, latté and his puppies.

If you had suggested last year that a simple lyric from a novelty rap song would have been the catalyst behind the most exciting and inspiring work of my career to date, I would have laughed in your face. Not that I don’t appreciate the work of say…Sir Mix-A-Lot or the Fresh Prince, but they don’t immediately conjure up images of empowering communities.

Yet here I am…doing what I love to do, making a difference, floored by the power of an inspired community and constantly trying to get that Young MC one-hit-wonder out of my head.

Don’t just stand there…Bust a Move!

In the summer of 2009, I was tapped to work on launching a signature breast health fundraiser like no other. On January 30, 2010, up to 1,000 participants will raise a minimum of $1,000 each to complete six hours of consecutive fitness including dance, aerobics, Pilates, and one hour with the King of Short-Shorts himself, Richard Simmons.

This one-day event in Halifax, Nova Scotia will launch two attempts to break or set new Guinness World Records and every cent raised will help purchase new digital mammography equipment that will instantly increase Nova Scotia’s screening capacity by 75%.

The prize at stake here – 75% more women getting screened every. single. year. – is one too powerful to be ignored especially when you consider that Halifax currently has the worst wait times in the province for mammogram screenings – the only source of early detection that can improve a woman’s odds against breast cancer.

That being said, we couldn’t just show up, ask people to exercise for longer than your average marathon on top of spending weeks raising money, and then go out for job-well-done nachos. Far from it, actually. We needed to be sensitive of other fundraising initiatives, respectful of the many people who are so passionate about beating this disease, and let the community – on whom we are relying to make this event a success – define how we will get there.

You want it? You got it!

As we began genuinely reaching out to others for support and suggestions we found, more often than not, that people truly adopted this cause as their own. Dancers and choreographers met in secret to rehearse a flash mob dance; the Halifaxchicks – influential bloggers and Twitter users – entered a team and took Bust a Move to a whole new level online; avid fundraisers and volunteers rallied to ensure their involvement; local students got to work on developing promotional content.

Step by step, all the pieces fell into place for an incredible launch week that saw over 100 participants and 100 volunteers registered, 300 new members to our Facebook group, over 500 mentions on Twitter. Not to mention that in the 48 final hours, we gained over 20,000 views of our flash mob.

While the numbers are all lovely, the best part of this experience is getting to watch communities come together to create a genuine movement that will benefit us all. We still have a way to go before the big day but those days are already booking up with pancake breakfasts, bake sales, gift-wrapping services and many more fundraisers in support of better breast health services in Nova Scotia. We couldn’t be more thrilled.

Now if we could only stop jamming to that song…at least while out in public….

http://bustamove.ca/

http://blog.bustamove.ca/

http://youtube.com/bustamovehfx

http://twitter.com/bustamovehfx

http://www.facebook.com/#/group.php?gid=132055509226

Reaching through the Screen

November 17, 2009 by Guest Author

Thanks to Richard Reeve for supplying today’s guest post.

Richard Reeve is an administrator at the Family Foundation School, a
candidate for Analytical training at the C. G. Jung Institute of New
York. He blogs at Catskill Cottage Seed.

“And the Master said unto the silence, “In the path of our happiness
shall we find the learning for which we have chosen this lifetime. So
it is that I have learned this day, and choose to leave you now to
walk your own path as you please.” Richard Bach, Illusions, pg.23

Liz recommended Bach’s book to me last month when we shared a coffee
at Blogworld. The tale that emerges from the soil of that Holyland
called Indiana has much to offer folks committed to creating content
streams in the new media.

Social Media gives us ample opportunity and leeway to play. Our
activity, the specifics of our various moves (all of which can be
boiled down to this simple fourfold way: search, save, post, ignore)is
a useful way to think about our social media practice.

But what do we do, those of us who have found our commitment, if we
are looking to deepen our practice:

Identify your passion(s).

Often folks are in the ballpark of their interest, and if we take the
analogy seriously, they might even have season tickets. The goal here
is to get out of the stands, put on the “uniform” of the player, and
step up to the plate. Or perhaps one needs not to pick up a bat, but
instead the ball and walk out to the mound. The point I’m driving at
is simple. There’s a huge difference between being “around” your
interest
And going out onto the field of your passion and being a player in the game.

Consider typology within your audience.

By this, I’m picking up on the marketing technique of having a
customer profile, but trying to push it a bit further along the lines
of psychological typology. Producing different types of content for
different types of people leads to a surprising range in the content
one produces and/or shares. Thinking types have a very different
appetite for information than the feeling types. The same can be said
of intuitives and sensates. Exploring these preferences in others can
open options you might not have otherwise considered.

Avoid ruts at all cost.

Invest in rut insurance. Anytime I’m struggling with my practice I
review this imaginary policy which states: nothing will be lost if one
lessons one’s frequency of participation, takes a hiatus, or stops
using any of these tools.

Be an individual.

We add more by walking through the world in our unique way than by
copying anyone else. I dare you to live this fact through your
participation in social media (just as Liz did with me by suggesting I
read Illusions…

…and wishing you, Liz, the speediest of recoveries.

Going It Alone as an Entrepreneur

October 27, 2009 by Guest Author

Guest Post by Debba Haupert

debba-haupert-girlfriendology-founder-sq

It’s somewhat ironic, I know. But I write a write a blog and run a business about female friendship — all by myself. In theory, I should have started Girlfriendology LLC with a girlfriend (or two) and collaborated in building the brand and company. I should have women who share the work load and assist me in creating a business around women supporting each other. However, the reality is that I’m a passionate entrepreneur and I didn’t know anyone else crazy enough to start it with me, so I jumped in the entrepreneurial pool alone!

As entrepreneurs, we’re often alone. We typically work long and strange hours from home or finally get dressed to have occasional meetings in coffee shops. We wake up with ideas and do the research to explore them. We create and market products and solutions, and we generally are accountable to only ourselves. That’s a great scenario if you’re self-motivated and prefer not to deal with group decisions. It’s also a wonderful arrangement if you’re creative and dedicated to seeing your dreams become reality.

Self-motivated, creative and dedicated I am, and I’m very thankful to be that way. But that doesn’t mean I HAVE to go it alone. I have received amazing support from other entrepreneurs in several groups that I’ve started or joined. For example, I’m working on eCommerce for Girlfriendology.com (to sell girlfriend gifts). I knew of several other women in town (Cincinnati) who sell products online. I also tweeted about it. Two weeks ago seven of us met to talk about our online stores, what worked/didn’t, technologies, trends and prep for the coming holidays. We plan to do this on a monthly basis as well as feature each other on our websites. I’m also part of an entrepreneurial group, LegacyConnection (www.legacyconnection.com) that shares resources for entrepreneurs as well as keeps us accountable in weekly group calls.

In addition to these groups, I am blessed with great girlfriends, supportive guy friends and a wonderful husband. My girlfriends share feedback, connections and ideas; my guy friends often look out for opportunities for me and my husband, who is a writer, has edited copy, helped with events and had many brainstorming conversations where we strategize on my business as well as his.

So, I don’t feel so bad that I “should have” started Girlfriendology with a girlfriend. I have the support and assistance of a “village” of friends who care about me and my business. As I share on Girlfriendology, if you need a friend, you to need to be a friend. The same goes for us entrepreneurs. Reach out to others, get to know their businesses and collaborate. Life (and business) really is better together with the support of friends and family.

How do you go it alone, but do it together as an entrepreneur?

——–
Debba Haupert is founder of Girlfriendology . She considers herself a ‘marketing mutt’ based on her 20 years of corporate marketing (from designing consumer products, studying trends in Europe, to writing an award-winning book, selling products on QVC and being a bank VP). She founded Girlfriendology LLC in January 2006 as a way to support and inspire women. She is a passionate entrepreneur and student of social media with over 850 blogs, 150 podcasts/BlogTalkRadio shows, 15000 Twitter followers (primarily ‘girlfriends’), and 1000 LinkedIn connections. And she loves Liz Strauss and is honored to call her a girlfriend! (-;

——–
Thanks, Debba. The respect, admiration, and friendship is mutual. I’m grateful to have met you.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

Buy the ebook. Learn the art of online conversation.

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Happy 4th Birthday to SOBs Everywhere!

October 24, 2009 by Liz

All Weekend It’s a Party!

Today is Successful-Blog’s fourth birthday.

On October 24, 2005, I wrote my first blog post on Successful-blog. That week began the story and the wonderful relationships this blog has made. Some facts about what that has been:

That first blog post was written on WordPress 1.5.
The SOB Awards started the same week. Over a thousand SOB badges are out there.
Open Comment Night, which started on May 9, 2006, preceeded Twitter’s birth by 5 months.
The first SOBCon — SOBCon07 — grew from the comment box on this blog.

As of this writing, Successful-blog has 87,872 approved comments, over 1.6 million spams caught, 3,714 published posts, and more friends than I might ever count.

Thank you everyone who has stopped by to read, leave a thought, be a part of this blog and my life.

It’s Like Open Mic Only Different

Here’s how it works.

It’s like any rambling conversation. Don’t try to read it all. Jump in whenever you get here. Just go to the end and start talking. EVERYONE is WELCOME The rules are simple — be nice.

There are always first timers and new things to talk about. It’s sort of half “Cheers” part “Friends” and part video game. You don’t know how much fun it is until you try it.

Help Celebrate!! Bring a Link! Bring a Link!

That’s right, you’re invited to bring a link to your most successful post. When you leave the link, please write a comment about how you chose the most successful post to bring.

Bring a link to a page, a picture, a post that demonstrates, celebrates, illuminates your success and outstanding-ness as a blogger.
Or bring that ebook, that manifesto, that photo, that priceless work that you want to offer as a birthday gift to everyone.

I’ll compile a list like this when the party is over.

Stopping to Celebrate! 100+ Party Links that Mark Our History

C’mon in and get to know us! There’s free beverages and snacks in the sidebar. Join the party. See who you meet. Stay and come back again. Happy Birthday, all of you! Thank you for making what we do meaningful! –

–ME “Liz” Strauss
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