Are you tip-toeing down a path towards utilizing social networking in your business? Here is some food for thought before you adapt from a tip toeing thinker to a full on dashing community sprinter. Make sure you have the resources in place to support it and make sure those resources have a clear understanding of what you want to accomplish.
When you build a community, understand that it has nothing to do with how many members you have and everything to do with how many of those members are contributing. In order to spark contributions you need content to light the fires of thought, and to ignite those fires you need resources! As handy flame thrower if you will! That flame thrower is a committed community manager- somebody who believes in the community’s ability to map to business success.
Be sure to have these three resources before you run on community pavement:
- A committed Community Manager - If you have to spend the flow to hire someone to do this, then bite the bullet! The business intelligence you will garner from a thriving community will be worth the investment. Look at the manager as part of investment you already made in social communities!
- A host of content providers - Make sure you have a list of content providers both in house and outside of your walls to either provide content, or share content that is pertinent to your community. You should strive to have new blogs, white papers, videos/podcasts, discussions, polls at least every work day.
- A community provider that will map to your business objectives – There is a difference between working with a tools provider and a social networking provider. Make sure you provider is thinking about your companies best interest when mapping out your initiative. It shouldn’t feel like you just bought software. It should feel like you just made a best friend and are about to embark on a business journey in a partnership.