Changing your tools to meet your online community’s needs
If I’ve learned anything from a decade of online community management, it’s that you cannot teach people how to use your community “correctly.” Your members will use the tools you make available the ways that suit them, and time spent trying to convince them to use them differently is just a waste of moderator energy. Your tools MUST match the needs of your community — if your members are not using the tools the way you intended, then you need to reassess the tool.
This situation gets even more complex because the needs of a community shift as it matures. A tool that might have been awesome at one era of a community’s development might be completely pointless during another era. You can’t get attached to your tools, because if your members aren’t using them, they’re useless.
Ok, ok. Less vague-blogging. Let me give you a very specific recent example from the Offbeat Bride Tribe: the killing of the Primal Scream Therapy section.
The 24-Hour Reply Rule
Stating the obvious here: dealing with drama when you work with an online community can get a little overwhelming. Whether it’s moderating comments, moderating forum content or internal blogs, or just dealing with contact from readers or members, there is a lot of potential for being in a situation where you’re dealing with really unhappy people. This is why I have my 24-hour rule…
Liberal bullying: Privilege-checking and semantics-scolding as internet sport
You might ask yourself, “Hmm, what’s the biggest challenge the Offbeat Empire deals with on a daily basis?” You might ask yourself, “Is it complaints from advertisers who are offended by the content?” (Nope: that’s happened exactly once in almost six years. Our advertisers work with us because they like our content.)
“Is it angry comments from conservative readers who are offended by the content?” (Maybe once a month, we’ll get a drive-by hate blast from someone who thinks gay marriage is awful, or breastfeeding is gross, or family cloth is disgusting. But really, it’s pretty rare.)
So, if it’s not advertisers or conservatives, what’s the biggest challenge we deal with every day? The challenge that has my editors second-guessing every post and quaking in fear, just waiting for the awfulness to begin? It’s attacks from our fellow progressives.
Small, focused, and yes, exclusionary community sites flourish
Recently, I ran some numbers and realized that traffic on the Offbeat Bride Tribe (the private community component of Offbeat Bride) was down… like, significantly down. Down by half from where it was at this time last year.
As a publisher, of course my first reflex was OMG TRAFFIC DOWN = BAD BAD BAD! But as a community manager, I’m keenly aware that the Tribe is functioning and behaving better than it ever has…