A community starts on a specific tool. It is then decided it’s the wrong tool (we can easily come up with a list of features that we have to have and core to the success of the community). So the community is then migrated to a new ‘community tool’.
I’ve even seen communities return to the original tool after the migration didn’t work.
But this gets me thinking…if a community doesn’t work in one set up, does that really mean the community isn’t meant to be? Was it doomed for failure from day 1 for other reasons?
I feel like you can see inside my mind . I sometimes feel like Goldie Locks and the Three Platforms. We need to move again and it’s because I went away from our roots.
When we started, it was 100 people who knew each other IRL and tech (Facebook Group) was simply a way to keep the conversations flowing. Then we moved off Facebook to Slack. It was pretty good and got us through the pandemic but added friction because the event calendar was completely separate to the main “platform.”
Then we invested in the bells and whistles which caused even more friction from a community perspective and made my life as a solo-founder + community manager hell. Last year we moved to yet another platform but our focus had also changed. So instead of a social community we are very much a community of practice where people are learning together first and foremost and community is a happy by product.
Having said that, whilst we’ve reduced in size we’ve increased in impact and what people want from us has changed. Basically, we help people make money so they don’t have time to chat online like they did in the early days. But speed, psychological safety and good advice is key. Which is why the platform we’re on now feels too big and impersonal.
So we’re testing a beta whatsapp group and yeah, what was the question again …
It’s hardly about the tool. Most communities take a while to find their groove – experimentation and iteration are what helped me find my groove with data beats. I can blame the tools I used early but I’d be fooling myself.
It’s a royal pain in the ass that Slack doesn’t have an easy way to share events, it frustrates me so much that I’ve wanted to move platforms because of it, haha.
. I sometimes feel like Goldie Locks and the Three Platforms. We need to move again and it’s because I went away from our roots.
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