COMMUNITY SITES

Community sites are undoubtedly contributing to the success of SEO and brand awareness campaigns. Many companies understand the benefits of running community sites. It's true that it takes a huge amount of discipline, commitment and time to run successful community sites. So, why so many companies have embraced them and are running them as part of their link baiting techniques and brand awareness campaign? 
 

Community sites:
 

• Drive traffic to the company website
• Drive repeat users to the website
• Invite users to become engaged with the brand
• Allow the company to dialogue with its audience
• Contribute to the company branding through brand advocates

 
It's also true that community sites are not about the technology, they are about the people. Technology can however help companies achieve their goals. The site's functionalities will encourage users to become part of the community and to visit the site on a regular basis. An environment where users want to spend time needs to be created. Appealing design and the availability of cutting edge functionalities and tools will contribute to create this environment.
 
It goes without saying that a great community environment will not guarantee the success of a community site. Once set up, resources should be allocated to:
 

• Respond to the users
• Encourage users to participate to forums
• Post discussions
• Encourage users to upload relevant content that will trigger discussions (podcast, etc.)
• Respond to live chat (if sufficient resources can be allocated for this functionality)
• Create surveys & polls

 
Brand users want to have the opportunities to provide feedback on the brand services and products. They want to contribute to the future of the services/products. Companies know that the conversation about their brand will happen, with or without them. It is therefore to the companies own interest to run community sites.