Session one at the unconference was led by David Terrar and looked at building web communities – after his experience building one for the Institute of Chartered Accountants of England and Wales (ICAEW).

Some interesting thoughts around "why to build communities". I pointed out that in fact we were discussing why to build online communities. Comments around managing organisations with aging populations and online communities being a way to retain knowledge with moving resources.

Need to find new measures – the 1-9-90 rule. Need to find entirely new measures for online communities – not page views or visitors….

community-participation-pyramid

How to "encourage" commitment and contribution – you can’t force it (and if you try it will fail)

  • Users won’t just come
  • What is the purpose?
  • What’s in it for me?
  • Who are the champions
  • Need teamwork
  • Coherent technology framework
  • Prepare to lose control
  • Moderation guidelines
  • Community manager needed

The more CONTENT you have the more MEMBERS you will get but the more MEMBERS you have the more CONTENT you will get – keep things balanced. Don’t focus on the technology focus on the users.

Ben Kepes

Ben Kepes is a technology evangelist, an investor, a commentator and a business adviser. Ben covers the convergence of technology, mobile, ubiquity and agility, all enabled by the Cloud. His areas of interest extend to enterprise software, software integration, financial/accounting software, platforms and infrastructure as well as articulating technology simply for everyday users.

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