Download this document here: https://www.demandmetric.com/content/online-communities-technology-overview Online Communities and Social Networks have transformed the Marketing landscape in the last ten years. From pioneers such as Myspace to the behemoths of Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, Online Communities have become digital neighborhoods, hangouts and intersections of commerce. Marketers have found the global Social Networks to be both a benefit and a challenge. The benefit is the ability to reach millions of prospective customers with the click of a mouse. The challenge is be seen and heard in a growing cacophony of marketing noise. Increasingly, marketers are finding that the answer is to create private or company-owned Online Communities set apart from the social mainstream and dedicated to the needs of their unique customers. Company-owned online communities are websites that act as engagement engines. They enable companies to create social relationships with customers and prospects and to foster peer-to-peer relationships that drive engagement with the company, brand, product or service. Activities include blogs, forums, Q&A, groups, contests, Gamification, SEO, and Social Media integrations. Increasingly, companies are using these communities for crowdsourcing and ideation to drive innovation and new product development. Online Communities are also useful for identifying potential advocates who can be further engaged using the Advocacy and Loyalty platforms. In this report, we examine company-owned Online Communities rather than the large social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Our Online Communities Vendor Landscape provides a detailed look at the landscape, vendors and solutions for Online Communities. The goal is to enable Modern Marketing organizations to make effective investment decisions about the private Online Community platforms and tools that best fit their broader Customer Engagement strategy.

1. ONLINE
COMMUNITIES
TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW

2. Table of Contents
1 3
2 5
3 8
4 10
13
12
Executive Summary
Online Communities Overview
Online Communities Vendor Landscape
Evolution of the Landscape
Analyst Bottom Line
Technology Overview Methodology
About Demand Metric
ONLINE COMMUNITIES
Technology Overview
14

3. Executive Summary
ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW

4. 4EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Online Communities and Social Networks have transformed the Marketing
landscape in the last ten years. From pioneers such as Myspace to the
behemoths of Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, Online Communities
have become digital neighborhoods, hangouts and intersections of
commerce.
Marketers have found the global Social Networks to be both a benefit
and a challenge. The benefit is the ability to reach millions of prospective
customers with the click of a mouse. The challenge is be seen and heard
in a growing cacophony of marketing noise. Increasingly, marketers are
finding that the answer is to create private or company-owned Online
Communities set apart from the social mainstream and dedicated to the
needs of their unique customers.
Company-owned online communities are websites that act as engagement
engines. They enable companies to create social relationships with
customers and prospects and to foster peer-to-peer relationships that
drive engagement with the company, brand, product or service.
Activities include blogs, forums, Q&A, groups, contests, Gamification, SEO,
and Social Media integrations.
Increasingly, companies are using these communities for crowdsourcing
and ideation to drive innovation and new product development. Online
Communities are also useful for identifying potential advocates who can
be further engaged using the Advocacy and Loyalty platforms.
In this report, we examine company-owned Online Communities rather
than the large social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.
Our Online Communities Vendor Landscape provides a detailed look at
the landscape, vendors and solutions for Online Communities.
The goal is to enable Modern Marketing organizations to make effective
investment decisions about the private Online Community platforms
and tools that best fit their broader Customer Engagement strategy.
Executive Summary
For a review of those networks and the platforms that support them,
please download our Social Media Marketing Solution Study.
ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW
SOCIAL MEDIA
MARKETING
Solution Study
Insights, Landscape & Vendor Analysis
V I E W R E S O U R C E

5. Online Communities
Overview
ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW

6. 6ONLINE COMMUNITIES OVERVIEW
Demand Metric defines Online Communities as website and private Social Networks that enable members to interact in a controlled setting and are
created and maintained by a company or group to foster communication among peers or likeminded individuals. Online Community platforms include
the processes, technologies and tools that enable a community to be built, managed and measured for growth, revenue and profits.
Online Communities Overview
ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW
The Power of Online Customer Engagement
We now know that the buyers travel up to 75% of their
journey before directly engaging with the company in
consideration. Equally, we know that most of the journey
takes place online. While off-line Customer Engagement
still occurs, it plays a decreasing role in the buyer’s journey.
Instead, new Customer Experience or Engagement
platforms that offer Personalization and Advocacy and
Loyalty capabilities enable vendors to reach customers
through other channels with customized offers while
they are physically in the store or shopping online.
The trend is obvious even in the B2B space where due to
the nature and size of the transactions, sales teams are
more personally and directly involved. Today’s sales teams
are more likely to rely on tablet-driven, cloud-powered
presentation tools and apps to provide the prospective
customer with the best experience.
Increasingly, companies are using these communities for
crowdsourcing and ideation to drive innovation and new
product development.
Online Communities are also useful for identifying potential
advocates who can be further engaged using the Advocacy
and Loyalty platforms.
Demand Metric’s State of Online Communities
for Support study found that for organizations
that have an online community as part of their
support process, half report a moderate or
significant contribution to revenue.
50%

7. 7ONLINE COMMUNITIES OVERVIEW ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW
The Future of Online
Communities is Private
While the global Social Networks continue to grow
exponentially, a revolution is happening with consumers,
companies and brands: the private Online Community is
displacing the public network for many groups and activities.
Private Online Communities give marketers and brands
much more control over information and social interaction.
They offer customers more privacy, a higher level of
interaction and stronger trust in both the community and the
content provided. They can be precisely tuned to the needs
of a specific group of customers. Private Online Communities
can have levels, such as newcomer to VIP, be gamified and
are more secure than the public networks.
Members love them because they can cut through the
clutter and get exactly what they need while sharing their
passions and insights with others who will most appreciate
them. They get their questions answered by members with
more experience and expertise in the subject at hand.
In analyzing this market, Demand Metric has found
that among members trust is higher, loyalty is
stronger and people are more engaged and willing to
participate.
Demand Metric believes that companies and brands
will increasingly shift marketing and advertising spends
away from the global Social Networks and toward
private Online Communities.
Learn what the customer support landscape looks like and how
effective crowd based, self-service support channels are working
within our State of Online Communities report.
V I E W R E S O U R C E

8. 8ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEWGAMIFICATION
Online Communities
Vendor Landscape
ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW

9. 9
Online Communities Vendor Landscape
Download Demand Metric’s Online Communities
Vendor Matrix to review the key vendors for this space.
Vendors are detailed by target industries, key offerings,
unique strengths and current customers.
ONLINE COMMUNITIES VENDOR LANDSCAPE
As previously mentioned, this vendor landscape focuses on private Online
Communities.
Solutions from Online Community vendors range from basic web
community-building platforms, such as Disqus and Ning designed for
forums, chat blogging and commenting, to sophisticated Social Community
platforms with web content management, intranet collaboration and
detailed analytics from vendors, such as DNN, Lithium, Vanilla Forums,
Salesforce Community, and Higher Logic.
Marketers should expect an Online Community solution to provide at a
minimum a fundamental set of community-building capabilities. These
include forums, blogs, chats, reviews, Q&A, badges, contests, photos and
videos, and social widgets.
From that basis, vendors’ solutions focus on specific requirements such
as eCommerce, intranet/workplace collaboration, social curation and
storytelling, and social advertising for media and advertising.
ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW
105
V I E W R E S O U R C E

10. 10ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEWGAMIFICATION
Evolution of the Landscape
ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW

11. 11EVOLUTION OF THE LANDSCAPE
The early days of private Online Communities were characterized by
forums, bulletin boards and chat rooms for Q&A and idea sharing. The
marketers’ role was mainly Social Listening and Monitoring to understand
customer behavior with dialog moderation.
A second stage emerged as Online Communities became destinations
where people went for higher trust information via reviews, tribal-based
knowledge, email and community support, special-interest blogs, and
photo and video sharing.
The third stage, which has emerged over the last five years or so, is
the development of true eCommerce communities. These communities
are designed for Marketing, Sales, and Customer Care Enablement.
They are built specifically for Advocacy and Loyalty applications, include
sophisticated Gamification engines, are connected to Web Content
Management systems and integrate with Enterprise CRM and Marketing
Automation systems.
They also include Social Network channel integration and offer a range of
analytics from visitor profiles to advanced analytics for tracking customer inter-
ests, behavior and sentiment. Rather than being “attached” to the company
website as a separate area, they are becoming natively integrated so that
moving from the visitor-based website to the community is seamless.
The future of private Online Communities is clear. Private Online Commu-
nities will increasingly become the company or brand’s primary website
and engagement point with their customers, a virtual “settlement.” Initial
entry will be via a simple intro landing page or portal for basic information
gathering and customer qualification.
That will be followed by a fast push into the community where deeper
engagement, VoC/Feedback, Loyalty and Advocacy platforms will
enable Marketing, Sales and Customer Care teams to create more
sustainable relationships for measureable customer lifetime value.
Evolution of the Landscape
ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW
ADVOCACY AND
LOYALTY
TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW
V I E W R E S O U R C E
Our Advocacy and Loyalty Technology Overview highlights
the advocacy and loyalty technology space at a high-level.

12. 12ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEWANALYST BOTTOM LINE
Analyst Bottom Line
Private Online Communities are a key component of Customer
Engagement providing a destination and a virtual settlement
where customers can have the best possible experience with the
company, product and service.
Market trends in the global Social networks are making it more
difficult and expensive to reach and engage with customers
through public channels.
It is imperative that marketers build private Online Communities
that will enable them to provide a unique, highly tailored
experience for each customer and lay the foundation for creating
measurable and profitable Customer Engagement.

13. 13TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW METHODOLOGY ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW
Technology Overview Methodology
The Modern Marketing landscape is an ever-changing, ever-evolving
environment in which new strategies, technologies, vendors and
products appear continually.
Demand Metric Technology Overviews provide marketers with a
focus on a specific technology solution set or focus area so that
they are armed with the knowledge, information and tools they
need to development effective strategies for their organizations.
Each Technology Overview involves hours of analyst research
(mainly publicly available information), is for a specific technology
solution, and is usually accompanied by several practical tools.
Our Customer Engagement series includes Technology Overviews on
Online Event Marketing
Advocacy and Loyalty
Gamification
Our practical tools are designed to provide marketers with the tools
and templates they need to plan for an initiative in a given focus
area, analyze the vendor landscape and select the best vendor for
their organization.
We provide a comprehensive overview of Customer
Engagement in the companion report – Customer
Engagement Best Practices Report.
V I E W R E S O U R C E

14. 14ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEWABOUT DEMAND METRIC
About Demand Metric
Demand Metric is a marketing research and advisory firm serving
a membership community of over 120,000 marketing profes-
sionals and consultants in 75 countries.
Offering consulting methodologies, advisory services, and
500+ premium marketing tools and templates, Demand Metric
resources and expertise help the marketing community plan
more efficiently and effectively, answer the difficult questions
about their work with authority and conviction and complete
marketing projects more quickly and with greater confidence,
boosting the respect of the marketing team and making it easier
to justify resources the team needs to succeed.
To learn more about Demand Metric, please visit:
www.demandmetric.com

15. 15ONLINE COMMUNITIES: TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEWGAMIFICATION
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