Head of Community @ Auth0
@ul
- 10+ years in Community/DevRel
- Community/DevRel Consultant
- Unable to do tricks @ulend
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@ul
- Values
- Personalities
- Expertise
- Interests
- Humor @ulend
@ul
- Collaboration is a necessity @note[Whether you're building a simple mobile app, or a website or mobile for a large corporation, there is a constant need for ongoing support, regular updates, and continuous improvement - and that means collaboration is now a priority and a necessity. This can take on different functions (D2D, B2C, B2B, etc.) and forms (social, forums, etc.)]
- Traditional marketing less effective @note[Marketing has its place, but nowadays, people (and especially developers) are less interested in being advertised to, preferring instead to receive unbiased recommendations. In other words, if someone loves a particular product, they’ll likely spread the good word with or without an incentive to do so.]
- Big orgs/companies embracing communities @note[There are plenty of case studies out there which detail the ROI that companies are getting from their community outreach - companies like AmEx, Roku, SendGrid, Walmart, Starbucks, Subway, and more.] @ulend
Note: Lately we have seen a growing need for communities amongst many different apps, companies, groups.
@ul
- 5x more valuable
- Spend 2x+ more @note[Good for those developing under a freemium model]
- Spend 3x average over lifetime
- Larger social reach @note[Typically reach more people via social media than you each time they advocate for a product or service]
- More trusted than influencers @note[Customers trust advocates more, usually their family members, friends, or friends of friends, than they do "influencers". Their loyalty is longer-lasting, and their passion is obvious. Simply put, customers trust other customers.] @ulend
Note: Companies have begun to understand the importance of brand advocates or SuperUsers. Research conducted a few years ago by multiple groups found some interesting statistics around brand advocates/superusers vs "influencers".
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- Inception @note[In the INCEPTION phase, you'll be inviting members to join, starting discussions and get participation in them, and build the relationships needed to make the community viable.]
- Establishment @note[When your community becomes ESTABLISHED you'll be writing content, organizing events, talks, etc., analyzing statistics about the community, deal with conflicts/disputes, etc.]
- Maturity @note[Community MATURITY will see the influence of the community growing, volunteers growing; goals and vision will be streamlined, refined, and widely adopted.]
- Mitosis @note[MITOSIS is when a cell splits into new nuclei - or in this case forms more-focused sub groups in your community. Communities can be thought of as organisms. Organisms are born, they grow, they mature, and then some split and replicate themselves elsewhere. But there's another aspect of communities that isn't often talked about - sometimes they die.]
- Death @ulend
Note: Feverbee, a community-consulting company, has come up with 4 stages in a community's lifecycle, with each having their own steps and/or tasks to get to the next stage.
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- Inception
- Establishment
- Maturity
- Mitosis
- Death
Note: The four cycles above are natural, and if they aren't doing this, they're already dead - and with communities it is a real thing - and so I am adding DEATH.
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Note: As I mentioned, each stage has some specific steps that you will perform which is shown in this graphic from Feverbee.
"If you can enable an environment in which people can share, they will and the benefits will entice others to join." -Susannah Fox, Pew Internet / American Life Project
Note: Vibrant, awesome communities foster a "sense" of connectedness, and then combine the ability for people to contribute and add value - these become tremendously rewarding places to be a part of.
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- Identify target devs / where they hang out @note[Places like SO, StackExchange, Hacker News, Reddit, etc. are the biggest, with places like Microsoft's MSDN targeting devs on specific MS platforms and tech partners.]
- Identify their interests and motivations @note[Building the personas in your community is important to be able to craft ways to get them participating. Putting together swag with dogs won't work if your developers like cats.]
- Remove barriers to adoption @note[Remove every barrier which prohibits easy adoption of your platform/product. Make sure that your onboarding to participation in the community is as straightforward / simple as possible.] @ulend
Note:
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- Make them feel welcomed and comfortable
- Give specific, simple steps to get started
- Don't overwhelm with too much info/tasks
- Over time interact in multiple ways @note[don't just use email to interact]
- Convey the culture and voice @ulend
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- Help to receive help
- Increased recognition
- Make an impact
- Connection with others in community
- Belonging @ulend
Note: It is important to understand the different reasons that people participate in communities. A few of the different ways are:
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- Recognition and status boost @note[Being recognized for the things people do within the community, or boosting their status (sometimes both)]
- Access to more info, tools, resources, etc. @note[giving more tools, resources, or information;]
- More capabilities and control @note[more capabilities or control;]
- Swag. Cool stuff. @note[and swag (I mean who doesn't like swag?) These are all are ways to bring about more participation. It's essential to figure out what works best for your community - there isn't one size / fits all. Strongly encourage more intrinsic rewards vs extrinsic - how you get them is how you'll keep them.] @ulend
Note: Understanding why people would want to participate in your community is essential, but it is not enough to stop there - you must provide incentives for them to participate and move through the different stages of participation.
Our Story
Note:
- Where we started
- Where we went (Zendesk and Answerhub)
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Note: Our community became a Q&A community, where someone would ask a question, hope for the answer, and then go back to doing what they were until they had another question. I commonly refer to it as...
"Real community is so much more than just basic customer support..."
Jeff Atwood, StackOverflow creator
Note: Jeff Atwood, creator of Stack Overflow, said that "Real community is so much more than just basic customer support, it’s listening to your customers, talking to them in public, folding in their feedback, talking to your own team in public, watching customers give pro tips to other customers, and generally just walking alongside your customers in their journey with your product."
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- Building leaderboard
- Incentivizing participation
- Internal incentives
- Our first developer community survey
- Creating superuser program @ulend
- CHAOSS: Community Health Analytics Open Source Software - http://chaoss.community
- Art of Community, Jono Bacon, http://artofcommunityonline.org
- Community Pulse Podcast - http://communitypulse.io/
- DevRel Weekly Newsletter - http://devrelweekly.com/
@IAmJerdog
https://jmeiss.me
jeremy.meiss@gmail
Repo: http://bit.ly/dcberlin18repo
Slides: http://bit.ly/dcberlin18slides