In the digital marketing world, brands can have a huge advantage over competitors if they build a community where people can engage, share and work towards one common goal.
Those people are bound by similar interests and thoughts. They may not necessarily your product consumers, as they can also be a group of people who share the same belief, or of course, a follower of your brand.
As companies that work to provide a platform for communities, they are essentially nurturing and community to benefit all parties involved. This can create a group of brand advocates, who can defend you in bad times, and empower your brand even more during good times.
What you need to know, there is big difference between audience and community.
An audience is one-way interaction. It's not interactive, and not at all social because people are just watching or reading. It's also passive because audience doesn't participate, or share things with others. On the other hand, a community is where two-way conversation happens. It's extremely interactive and very much social.
So here, we can see that a community has a lot of advantages, if compared to just audience.
Further reading: A Sense Of Community, A Sense Of Common Sense
Below is a few tips on how to create your own community:
- Target Emotions
One of the biggest advantages of having a community, is allowing people to follow your brand, voluntarily. When they join your community, they weren't forced. They decided to follow you because they either love your brand, or just love how the community is giving back to others.
These people can be brand ambassadors who champion your causes. For this reason, you need to address their concerns and complaints. If they ever get upset with your brand, you need to welcome their insights, and hear what they have to say.
Remember that by having good community engagement, you will help your brand grow.
- Educate People
Having a community means having you in giving back to the people that help you get to your height and success.
One good strategy to educate people for the good cause, is to not about your brand. Instead, educate your followers about their need for your product. If done right, people will associate whatever knowledge the community has, with your business, without even you mentioning your brand.
- Hear What They Have To Say
Community is all about conversations. And in any dialogues, there can be ideas blooming.
Besides hearing for people's feedback and complaints, you should also make sure that you take actions from their suggestions. Remember that if you have a community, that community is part of your brand, and it's best for you to make them part of your brand.
Community insights can be a gem to your business. Considering people's opinion, you can come up with new product ideas, experience, merchandise materials, and more.
To ensure that your community stays active, you need consistency and contents.
Contents here is not for the audience only, but with the community in mind. Start a conversation about things related to your business, making them educational, inspirational and/or entertaining.
The next thing that should come in mind, is having your platform designed to share. Here, it will enable the community to share contents among the community itself, and also to the world. At least, make posts easy to share on most popular sites out there.
You should also be active on social media if you're looking for an active community. From sharing the content, answering questions and more. You need to connect with relevant people, and to always listen to what people have to say.
This is to leverage engagement and caring. By having a community, you should understand that you're not anymore alone.
Conclusion
Because branding and marketing should work as one, community is a way to welcome your followers and fans. From good people to the bad, and allow a room for engagement and discussion, so everyone can learn from each other.
It can be a great way to foster your brand's growth. While some companies are focusing on products, others are building communities which will help get more people to their contents.