Online Community Strategic Framework and Best Practices. Web 2.0 Sites, Social Sites, Online Community Sites... call it what you want, this framework will provide you with an approach that works for engaging your customers and nurturing your prospects.

1. ONLINE Community strategy framework Ensuring an engaged online community

2. COMMUNITY STRATEGY FRAMEWORK

3. COMMUNITY STRATEGY FRAMEWORK BUSINESS GOALS SOCIAL MEDIA LANDSCAPE MEMBER NEEDS

4. COMMUNITY STRATEGY FRAMEWORK BUSINESS GOALS LAUNCH PLAN Content Plan Event Plan Promotion/Outreach Plan Member-to-Member Interaction SOCIAL MEDIA LANDSCAPE MEMBER NEEDS

5. COMMUNITY STRATEGY FRAMEWORK BUSINESS GOALS LAUNCH PLAN Content Plan Event Plan Promotion/Outreach Plan Member-to-Member Interaction METRICS/ROI SOCIAL MEDIA LANDSCAPE MEMBER NEEDS

6. 1) Business Goal What is your business objective? Boil it down to one sentence that gets to the core of your objective. Increase Sales Increase Brand Awareness Decrease Cost of Customer Service Co-creation of New Products Establish Yourself as a Thought Leader Better Search Results Provide Additional Information Educate Customers Enable Customers to Collaborate and Share Knowledge

7. 1- Business Goal (communities need a reason) King Research, June 2007

8. 1) Business Goal The business goal of PD 360 was to raise student achievement . They accomplished a lift of 11.3% improvement in student achievement through an online learning community for teachers with on demand professional development .

9. 1) Business Goal …know who you are, what type of online community would you be?

10. 2) Social Media Landscape What is Social Media Anyway?From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia At its most basic sense, social media is a shift in how people discover, read and share news, information and content. It's a fusion of sociology and technology, transforming monologues (one to many) into dialogues (many to many) and is the democratization of information, transforming people from content readers into publishers. Businesses also refer to social media as user-generated content (UGC) or consumer-generated media (CGM).

11. 2) Social Media Landscape What does social media look like? Where are your customers having conversations? Online Customer Communities

12. 2) Social Media Landscape How is your brand or the competition’s brand represented in the social ecosystem, where are there gaps, and what is your plan to position your brand accordingly? Search for Brand Mention Blog Pulse Technorati Delicious Google Blog Search Monitor Activity Levels Facebook MySpace YouTube Ning Flickr LinkedIn Competitive Analysis and Tracking

13. 2) Social Media Landscape

14. 2) Social Media Landscape

15. 2) Social Media Landscape

16. 2) Social Media Landscape

17. 2) Social Media Landscape

18. LEARN

19. 3) Member Needs Analysis Share Knowledge: Explore ideas and participate in one-on-one private discussions or public group threads. Access actionable experienced-based solutions from like minds Connect With Peers: Network with one another to find exactly the individual you need who shares your passion. Combat isolation, share emotions and experience a sense of camaraderie. Access Tools:find resources that allow you to do your job better, shorten decision times, decrease risk

21. What member types or personas exist?

22. Predict their needs.

23. Do their needs vary?

24. What are they looking for?

25. How do they like to interact?

26. How willing are they to share openly?

27. Do they want exposure?

28. Do they want to influence others?

29. Do they want to shape the industry?

30. Are they time crunched?Prepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

31. 3) Member Needs Analysis

33. Invite members in a group to read relevant articles and comment

34. Invite members to participate in relevant webcasts or teleconferencesPrepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

36. LAUNCH

37. 4) Engagement Model What will you publish? Where will you publish? How often will you publish? Balance (content, events, 1:1, outreach) Integrate with traditional channels

38. 4) Engagement Model…strive to balance the elements

40. 4) Engagement Model…plan for active readers or ‘lurkers’ Make it easier to contribute.Netflix lets users rate movies by clicking a star rating Make participation a side effect.For example, Amazon's "people who bought this book, bought these other books” Edit, don't create.Let users build their contributions by modifying existing templates rather than creating new Reward — but don't over-reward — participants.Don't give too much to the most active participants, or you'll simply encourage them to dominate the system even more. Promote quality contributors.Give extra prominence to good contributions Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox, October 9, 2006

41. 4) Engagement Model …promote quality contributors and create ways to spotlight good contributions Prepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

42. 4) Engagement Model …active and relevant moderation engages members

43. 4) Engagement Model 3 Key Factors to Creating Community Atmosphere Quality, up to date content Clear objective value Strong moderation and facilitation The Host’s Role in Establishing Culture Recognize positive participation Solicit and respond to member feedback Communicate with members Takeaways Value statement Clear code of conduct Open lines of communication Host plays a visible role User experience/feature set tailored to audience Content – quality, relevant and up to date Acknowledge positive contribution Create welcoming culture. A welcomed member is more likely to come back, contribute and tell others

44. 4) Engagement Model …a moderator is instrumental in creating the culture Establish Rules Create Guidelines for Contributing Be Prepared to be a Bouncer at Times Prepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

46. Frequent Contributors

47. Former Speakers

48. Affinity Group Chairs4) Engagement Model…build your bench of hosts or “creators” Prepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

49. 4) Engagement Model…create awareness by highlighting members and promote/invite using traditional channels CIO Magazine has a monthly column highlighting interviews with their community members. This is a great way to drive membership and promote your community. Drive traffic from traditional channels to your community. Some members might want exposure. Prepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

50. 4) Engagement Model…facilitate ways for introductions Member profiles reflect interests, activities and needs New members need a place to introduce themselves Prepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

52. Events offer members a chance to come together

53. Online or offline, maintain variety, keep it fresh

54. Leverage existing assets

55. Monthly member-led webinars, save the recordings

56. Target webinars for each affinity group, Q&A via discussions

57. Local round table events

58. Content, articles, research, white papers, podcastsPrepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

59. 4) Engagement ModelCommunities Need Ways for Attendees to Pitch In Communities love to solve a problem They want to help, your community will give them a chance Prepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

61. Benchmarking Tool

62. Marketing the Value of IT Study

63. Running Start: How to Succeed in Your First 90 Days – collaborative project

64. Career Path Model – started as knowledge center content, then webinar

65. Business Continuity – started as knowledge center content, then webinar, then regional hosted event

66. Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) playbook, a how-to guide and resource to help CIOs better manage the SOX compliance processPrepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

68. Member-led webinars and teleconferences

69. Small group calls, intimate setting, like-minded peers

70. Collaborative projects and tools, showcase them at events

71. Member-hosted regional events

72. Annual meetings

73. Get interviewed for publication

74. Dedicated column in publication

75. Member spotlights

76. Awards

77. Leadership Development: video series on leaders

78. Develop a course taught by members

79. Speakers Bureau – introduce members to exposure opportunities

80. Newsletter – highlight new members, upcoming events, speaker opportunities

81. Enable members to display a measure of their experience - provides context and builds trustPrepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

82. MEASURE

83. 5) Success Metrics/ROI Build an ROI set based on your dimensions of value. Include a mix of qualitative and quantitative… you don’t need a laundry list like below. Pick a few relevant ones. Unique Visitors New Member Registrations Page Views Retention/Attrition Member Loyalty Member Satisfaction Most Active Members Top Searches Message Posts Conversion Advertising Performance Influencer/Evangelism Identification Member Lifecycle First Time Contributors Content Rating Ratio: Unregistered to Registered Visitors Ratio: Page Views per Post Reputation Changes Ratio: Post per Thread Content Tagging Comments per Blog Post Ratio: Searches Per Post Podcasts and Video (links, uploads) Member Blog Posts Size of Networks/Buddy Lists Sales Customer service tickets Cost savings for customer service Tech support tickets Cost savings for tech support Product feedback for R&D Product trial downloads Mentions on other sites Ratios of comments per post Forum posts answers Average response time Referrals to community Renewals and upsells Participation in online tools User complaints # of users leaving / deleting accounts Leads provided to partners

84. Wash, Rinse, Repeat

85. Online Community Takeaways Trust and Respect Moderation : critical to entice lurkers to participate Ecosystem: strive for balance (content, events, interaction, and outreach) Profile: understand your groups, predict needs, and communicate appropriately Create Atmosphere or Community Culture: provide forums for group collaboration and small group interactions (chats, calls, member hosted events) Plan:Goals, metrics, outcomes and monetization Organizational Buy-In: leverage corporate assets Share: communicate what you learn with the organization Variety:keep it interesting, fresh content on front page (news, articles etc.) Heroes:pick heroes to benchmark your community against, not necessarily in your industry Prepared by www.InnerCircleCommunities.com

86. Social Media Takeaways Listen first Be respectful, human, considerate and passionate What is in it for your customer? If nothing, don’t bother. Community before commerce It is a cocktail party not a lecture Tolerate criticism Encourage personalities People congregate around relevance and value

88. Do you feel socially fatigued? Bring it back to the basics Listen | Learn | Launch

89. 1. LISTEN

90. 2. LEARN

91. 3. LAUNCH

92. Thank you Lauren DeLong www.InnerCircleCommunities.com Private | Trusted | Relevant 207.752.7298 ldelong@InnerCircleCommunities.com