Comments on: Natural Evolution of a Web Community (& how to beat it)

By: Mike Feiman

Mike Feiman — Sat, 03 Dec 2011 01:23:12 +0000

Lisa, I sure wish you’d turn this into an infographic so I could post it on my site. I can do it the old fashioned “right click/save/post with link ref” way, I suppose, but I do hate that eversomuch. There’s a certain online community in my industry that is currently at Stage 8 and since the owners read my blog, I’d love to point this out to them. ;-)

By: Rufus Dogg

Rufus Dogg — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 20:02:03 +0000

Lisa, are you secretly reading my blog about dogs that isn’t really about dogs but we called it DogWalkBlog so that you would think it is about dogs and then get you hooked before you realize it isn’t really about dogs?

You were. I can tell by the way your jacket pockets are stuffed with plastic bags, just in case.

By: Erika Napoletano

Erika Napoletano — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:39:43 +0000

Nope – thank YOU. If it weren’t for my readers and people who shared my stuff, I’d just be a crazy lady with a keyboard. You’re the reason I get to do what I love and I do my best to NEVER forget that. Unlike Netflix.

By: Lisa Barone

Lisa Barone — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:31:53 +0000

Thanks, Michael. Glad the post helped. :)

By: Lisa Barone

Lisa Barone — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:31:32 +0000

Love it! I also love that you use the phrase you “earned your community” because that’s such the truth.

I think where a lot of bloggers or community owners go wrong is they believe that everyone is equally important to the success of their site and they don’t want to alienate people. But your blog isn’t for everyone. And catering to anything that doesn’t do right by your community is self destructive.

Thanks for the comment and for the awesome post yesterday!

By: Lisa Barone

Lisa Barone — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:29:02 +0000

Yeah, I’ve watched a lot of good communities die simply because the old users weren’t very welcoming of new people coming in and would essentially chase them off or talk in in-jokes that only established users would have any clue what they were talking about. It’s not a healthy thing and it’s your job, as the community owner, to kill it dead.

By: Michael Dorausch

Michael Dorausch — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:28:35 +0000

Perfect timing. Just had to settle a rant fest by two users and I learned some great things here for setting community guidelines (or updating our existing ones). You’ve done it again Lisa, I raise my glass to you.

By: Lisa Barone

Lisa Barone — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:28:11 +0000

You’re mocking my smiley faces, aren’t you? I think you are. That’s not very nice. ;)

It can be really interesting to watch how someone hacks your product to use it in ways you wouldn’t have thought of. Twitter always comes to mind – users invented ReTweets. That wasn’t a Twitter thing. Users decided that’s how they wanted to share content…and then twitter adapt technology to let them do just that (even if I’m not a fan of their implementation of it). You have to listen because your community will push you in all sorts of directions you wouldn’t have thought of yourself.

By: Erika Napoletano

Erika Napoletano — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:14:21 +0000

Thanks for mentioning my post from yesterday, Lisa. Here’s what I’ll add from my perspective about community building: I’ve earned a community through and through that understands they can agree/disagree/agree to disagree with anything on my site. The only rules? Do it with RESPECT and SHOW YOUR FACE. There are no anonymous comments allowed on my blog. Why? Because you can’t walk into a dinner party, punch the hostess, and walk out without someone being about to draw a police sketch of you. The internet is no different. Own. Your. Words. Because of this, the people who comprise my community have gotten to know one another and, on occasion, talk more with one another than with me! Each day I wake up, THAT is what I’m thankful for, as (1) your blog isn’t for everyone, (2) if you build it for the people who will love it, they’ll stay, share, and thank you, (3) trolls come and go, but it’s up to you to put down a big ass foot – in business AND in your personal life – and say “eff this noise – yer outa here!” if you don’t like it.

Unicorns and jalapeno poppers…

Erika

By: Jon Cooper

Jon Cooper — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:07:14 +0000

Great post! Aggressive commenting can really turn off new audience members and can make old ones leave, so I totally agree with addressing this as a serious problem. If you’re not ivol Ed with your community then your audience members start thinking of it as a free for all forum type environment (which you mentioned).