A good online community can do more than just create a place for people with the same interest to come and interact with each other. Businesses with a good community can improve their brand loyalty, build trust with the customers, reduce service costs and drive sales. So let’s find out what makes a good online community.
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In This Article:
- Relevant User-Generated Content
- Engaging Content
- Crowdsourced Ideas
- Mobile Responsiveness
- Personalization
- Integration
- Gamification
- Performance Measurement
Relevant User-Generated Content
Smart brands recognize the importance of fostering an environment that encourages people to create meaningful and original content. User-generated content (UGC) improves community member involvement, which deepens a community’s ties and perceived value.
Communities with relevant UGC frequently have a large number of members and are constantly expanding. UGC is more likely to be believed and spread since it is written by real people for real people, therefore assisting the community in growing.
Engaging Content
Visually pleasing communities attract more visitors. Allow your customers to upload images and videos to their galleries and articles. Members of your community utilize photos and videos to interact with other members and your business, answer questions, and write feedback. The traffic generated by picture and video material helps to grow the community and its size.
Crowdsourced Ideas
Successful online communities leverage their platform to crowdsource ideas from their most loyal members. These collaborative ideas may be used by brands to enhance existing products or assess interest in new ventures.
If you want to collect product innovation ideas and feedback from your top consumers, make tools in your community that allows users to submit ideas, vote on them, and leave comments available.
Mobile Responsiveness
Over 50% of all internet users globally use mobile devices or tablets to access the internet. Websites were formerly created with solely desktop functionality and user experience in mind. However, as the number of mobile users grows, it is becoming increasingly important to create websites that are adaptable to all design kinds.
This also applies to online communities. Your online community must be mobile-responsive in order for all users to have a satisfying experience. The most effective online communities provide a consistent user experience for all members.
Personalization
Inspire and develop your community by providing members with a curated stream of information that is relevant to them, encouraging them to contribute more. Personalization elements in communities allow community members to be treated as individuals.
Individualized experiences are crucial for members of the community; 80% of customers are more inclined to conduct business with a firm that provides personalized experiences. Personalization may also benefit the bottom line by increasing the efficiency of marketing expenditure by up to 30% and sales by up to 8%.
Integration
When online communities are completely integrated with current systems, they provide the maximum value to businesses. This will enable your brand to deliver better customer service to community members while also collecting important data.
Integrate your online community with existing support procedures to ensure a consistent experience across all help channels. Connect your CRM system as well, so that unanswered inquiries are automatically escalated to direct support channels.
Gamification
The application of game-playing features to another area of activity is known as gamification. Outside of real games, one of the first locations where gamification appeared was in online brand forums. The concepts and methods that drive gamification in modern communities have developed to fit more with a sophisticated member journey model in which the user experience designer’s main job is to connect extrinsic incentives with intrinsic motivation.
Gamification encourages customers and workers to share more frequently and passionately. Automate game mechanics for daily tasks, such as giving badges the first time a member of an online community publishes, replies to a post, or praises another member’s post.
Performance Measurement
It is critical to be able to assess community health and take action to keep it at its peak. Concentrate on metrics that are important to you by including features that assess the following six health factors: traffic, content, members, liveliness, engagement, and response.
phpFox Helps Brands Create Successful Online Communities
PhpFox is an online community platform with built-in capabilities that can assist you in creating a social website for your business, organization, startup, or just your shared interest group.
Your social material can adapt flawlessly to every screen size, whether your audience accesses your community through a desktop computer, tablet, or mobile phone. It’s a snap to personalize your appearance and feel. There is no coding necessary! You may simply add, delete, or change any website component using our theme administration system.
Don’t hesitate to RING US up or leave a message at hello@phpfox.com.
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