Philip Wride – Social Media Marketer and Community Manager

OK, so the title can be a little misleading and should probably read “Become A User Of Other Communities To Gain Perspective” but that’s a bit on the long side. Regardless though both still ring true and becoming a user of other communities has more impact. Simply being a user and CM of the same community means you see and experience everything with a jaded view (or rose-tinted glasses potentially).

However, joining other communities (whether based around a hobby, sport, favourite car or anything else) means you have to go through the process of registration, completing your profile and starting to interact with a completely new audience and pretty much throws you in at the deep end. This can be a real eye-opener in terms of experiencing how other communities operate and the trials new users often go through when joining communities for the first time. Analyse your experience though and reflect on your own community; which one has the easier registration process and is there something you can learn? How easy was it to start interacting with other users and what did this process consist of? What sort of atmosphere was there in the community? Was moderation apparent and clearly visible? Were things clearly sign-posted to aid new users?

All of these are valid questions and will hopefully give you the chance to see things from a new perspective and go back to your own community with a clear head and the drive to analyse every aspect of your community in a bid to make it better and easier.