with Alexandra Samuel, Social SignalNetSquared

May 28, 2008

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iTunes gift cards and more

great prizes!

Bringing Your Online Community to Life

Make your site’s participation explode when you....

Motivate your usersGet great content

Get buzz and links on other sitesHelp your users have fun online

An effective invitation...• Gives a succinct summary of your

community’s purpose

• Offers clear and compelling value for visiting

• Moves people quickly from viewing to action

• Nudges people to act with incentives

Session rules: option 1option 1• No computers.

• No repeating anything that is said in this session outside the session.

3.No side conversations.

• No giving prizes to people who haven’t participated.

• No interrupting.

Session rules:option 2option 2

• More wisdom: If the Net can help you bring more wisdom into the room, go for it. Feel free to peek over your neighbour’s shoulder to see what they’re exploring.

• More disclosure: Learned something? Share it via blog or twitter, and tag it N2Y3.

3.More sharing: if you and your neighbour have a great insight, speak up!

• More sugar: Enjoy your chocolate any time. Sugar highs may be documented with embarrassing Flickr photos.

• More talking: The more you talk, the more you’ll eat.

The role of rules

• rules as content: tone matters

• give dos, not don’ts

• engage your community in rule-setting

• make them fun

Ownership=interest

• Let your users drive

• Build from the assets you have

Effective animation

• Focus on promoting conversation

• Make it happen, don’t wait for it

• Connect like-minded participants

• Connect complementary threads

• Plan proactively, implement reactively

Gateway participation

• Provide low-threshold options like:

• voting

• rating

• reviewing

• commenting

Balance quantity & quality

• invite volume, promote quality

• renew participation with fresh invitations

• gently inhibit over-participation

Thank you

Alexandra SamuelSocial Signal

alex@socialsignal.com