Community, know thyself

Recently a board member emailed me to ask about the Web site stats for one my online communities. In her response to the low number of Web site visitors she asked if maybe people were just Facebooked-out... Here is part of my response:

People congregate online where they feel there is community, and especially where they feel benefit from interacting. The benefit may be social or financial or something entirely different, but there must be a return on time investment before time is re-invested. The community this Web site has attracted to date does not seem to congregate. They don't have a physical space where they come together and they don't seem to come together online either. You need to decide if you want to shape the community and teach people to congregate online, or be shaped by the market and recognize that the community infrastructure we have built is simply not a priority for the intended participants--that the other list of things they need to accomplish in a given day precludes the individuals from having the time to congregate.... or of course it might also be a combination of the two. Throwing more technology at the Web site won't make any difference...instead you need to find out what the community is willing to participate in (not what they say they want or need, but rather what are the activities they are willing to donate time towards on an ongoing basis).

The idea of really knowing your community has been a theme of mine for a while. I've compiled a series of five articles I wrote for Full Circle Magazine into a single page called Making Change Happen and right now I'm finishing up an article for Linux Pro Magazine on how to run your own community conference.