Here at Socious we have been refining our approach to building successful online communities since 2002 and we have seen what works and what doesn’t. The one constant we have seen with all successful online communities is having good content. Ideally you want the content to come from your members, at first it rarely does. However, buy having a good content and communication plan, over time you can foster the content generated by users to create an engaging and valuable online community. Here are a few things you can do to get the content flowing:

1. Have Goals- Many groups don’t have a firm grasp of what they are trying to accomplish with an online community other than “engage members”. An online community can do so much for virtually every department of your association. By having clear goals for your online community it will direct your efforts in what type of content your members will find valuable. It will also help you choose which online community technology will bets fit your needs.
   
   
2. Have a Plan- If you don’t know who will write content for your online community, when they will write it and what you will do with it when you get it, your online community will never get off the ground. Build a plan for the roll-out and for the first 3 months of the site’s life. Listing for every day, what will be posted, where you will post it and who will do the posting. Take into account the benefits that Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter can offer in helping to drive people to your private online community. At the same time, your private online community can help drive postings for your outpost sites to assist in marketing of the association. For a sample content and communication plan, please email me at pschneider@socious.com. I will be happy to share one with you.
   
   
3. Determine who is Responsible- One thing we have learned is that launching an online community will take a lot of one persons’ time or a little of a lot of peoples’ time-but it will take time. The online community will become the main way your members communicate, so give it the attention it deserves. Make sure the success of the online community is tied to a staff members’ job description.
   
   
4. Measure- You don’t know how far you have come if you don’t know where you started. Determine what actions you want your online community to cause within your membership and potential membership. Many systems like ours will give you great analytical tools to see if those things are happening. If not-make adjustments. If they are working, you will know you are on the right track.

The idea that associations will create an online community and people will just start using it has been shot down. You will get out of an online community as much as you put into it. Getting people to utilize the site will happen slowly and over time, it won’t be a mad rush. However, we have seen first-hand how these sites can take on a life of their own. Once you get your members to think of your online community as a resource, you will be amazed at how it can take off.