FreshNetworks Blog

A number of speakers at the Marketing 2.0 conference (including myself) made analogies (explicitly or implicitly) to games or gaming when talking about their social media strategies. I think that this is a good analogy and very relevant to understanding what we do when we are building and managing online communities at FreshNetworks, and how to motivate people to take part in them.

Most social media strategies, and indeed most online communities that we build, hope to increase a consumer’s engagement with (and exposure to) the brand. This can often mean trying to increase the amount of time spend on site, or increasing the frequency and recency of visit. We see all three of these increase in our online communities (often quite substantially) when compared with other territories that the brand controls online. But to achieve this we need to offer the consumer something compelling, and to some extent enter into a game with them.

This may be in a very traditional sense, and some of the best online support communities that I know of are powered using a similar techniques to those you find in games. Rewarding those who give valuable answers to lots of questions with access to special parts of the site, new challenges to take part in and special avatars so that others can see their position. But in most other online communities this very overt application of gaming techniques would not be as successful. However, there is still much we can learn.

We want to engage people, increase the amount of time they spend with us and the benefits they receive. They want to be entertained, to share their thoughts, to learn and to be heard. To satisfy both sides we can take an influence from games and gaming:

• Provide people with new activities to do – Games are based on levels, when you complete one set of activities another opens up, keeping people involved and engaged. The same should be true in an online community. When somebody completes a task we should be providing them with something else to do. If they have uploaded a photo we should be showing them a forum discussion to tell us more, or a set of photos they might be interested in commenting on. We can show them something they might want to do and a new challenge to take part in.

• Reveal the community slowly – In a game, as people progress through levels the features available to them increase. In an online community, this approach is also successful; we don’t want people to see all that the community has to offer at once. They may be overwhelmed by the variety of things to do and it can be easier to release content and features more slowly to new members. But it is also good for members to feel a sense of discovery, to find new features the longer they spend on the site and to feel to some extent rewarded each time they come back.

• Allow people to play at their own level – Some of the best games are so successful because people can play at their own level. If they are expert gamers or just amateurs, they can enjoy and feel rewarded by spending time with the game. The same is true in an online community. Some people are never going to start a new conversation or propose a new idea. But they may want to vote for a video they like or answer a poll. Allow people to engage with the brand on whatever level is appropriate to them and allow them to benefit from this engagement, at whatever level it is.

• Make it fun – Games are fun and online communities should be too. They should be diverting and provide stimulation and excitement for those participating. When you’re building and managing you online community always ask yourself: how are we making this a fun place to be?

Read all of our posts based on the Marketing 2.0 Conference here.

Some more reading

• Digital Habitats: Stewarding Technology for Communities (beth.typepad.com)
• Social media and B2B marketing (nevillehobson.com)

For the final in our series of Five things to do in 2009, I thought we’d go back to basics. Today we’re going to look at five ways you can engage your customers in 2009. One of the real benefits for brands of using social media or of building an online community, is that it can build sustainable engagement with your customers. Here are five ways to get this engagement.

1. Be active about asking your customers for their opinion

Too often firms don’t ask customers what they think. They may give ways for them to contact the brand, tell them their opinions or call them with compliments or complaints. But this is all very passive. Brands need to be actively asking their customers what they think. You need to go to them, not the other way round. For the customer, being asked what they think makes them feel special, part of our organisation and valued. A simple task such as calling your ten top clients in the first week in January will give you new insights into what you are doing right (and wrong) and will make ten more loyal customers. You then need to think about how you do this long term and on a much larger basis.

2. Make it easy for customers to complain

There are many ways that customers can raise their complaints about you and your products. They can tell you directly, post their thoughts on their blog, write to a newspaper, talk to all their friends…the options are endless. As a brand you should be able to feel in control of these complaints. Nobody likes to hear that their customers are unhappy, but it is much better for them to do this in a space where you have right or reply and you can even learn from these complaints. If you don’t provide a way for people to complain they will still do it, except you won’t know where and won’t be able to respond.

3. When you ask your customers something, make sure you respond

There’s nothing worse than being asked for your opinion and then not hearing what people think about it or if they are going to do anything having heard it. When you ask customers questions, or ask them to complain you must respond. Closing the feedback loop will make them feel valued and make them realise that you are actually listening to what they are saying. This will encourage them to continue to engage with you and, by knowing what and how you think, it will make their contributions more focused and productive from your perspective.

4. Deal with customers in public

Only some of your customers are going to want to talk to you and give you their opinions, and an even smaller proportion are going to want to complain. But all of your customers will want to know that you are an organisation that listens and responds. They want to know that if they were to have an idea or some feedback, that you would take it on board; and if they were to have a complaint that you would deal with it. There is a huge benefit to engaging with your customers openly and in public. If they can see you resolving a customers problem they will have greater respect for you as a business that cares about it’s customers. If they see you giving feedback they will know that you’re an organisation that listens to and focuses on the needs of its customers. Respond, and respond publicly; this is where an online community can really pay dividends.

5. Realise that engagement is not a campaign

Unlike other activities, engaging your customers cannot be run as a campaign. It is not about creating a number of advocates for a product launch or about having a conversation with some of your customers for two months. Engagement needs to be ongoing; sustained and sustainable. Once you start to listen to and close the feedback with your customers you must keep doing this. Of course, the benefits you get will be vast and wide-ranging, so most brands won’t want to stop engaging!

Read all of our Five Things to Do in 2009 posts

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Some more reading

• Criticism Is Good
• Big questions for social media strategy
• Success Beckons the Social Media-Driven Enterprise
• Five things your brand should ask about social media in 2009