I just want to say that all the other “talk” that you mention is all there for a reason. They have a lot of tips that are helpful even when you are starting a new community site from scratch – and they do already deal with exactly some of the challenges that you mention here.
There are a couple of things:
- content is king
- try to model behaviour that you want to see — actively engage with anyone who posts on your site
- it takes time for people to form a habit to regularly check your site
The best resources are these blog posts especially:
Content is king & Model the behaviour you want to see
Discourse encourages you to launch with a few topics and posts (I think around 5 topics and 30 posts)
Aside from videos — which do sound informative but can take longer to watch — there also has to be replies and posts which people can respond to.
If you have other 1-3 contacts who are also interested in the same things you are for your site, it might be helpful to invite them to your site. So they can also make posts and have conversations with each other on the site, which encourages others to do the same, rather than it just being a video commenting site.
You can see more tips here from the first blog post:
Build some interesting discussions to launch with
- What comes up often in your internal emails? Are there common themes that tend to come up again and again with your fans, customers, users, patrons, teammates, coworkers, subscribers? Try moving those discussions out of private email silos into your public (or private) discussion area.
- If you find an interesting article on the web you want to discuss, quickly start a new topic by pasting a link into the topic title. Try it!
- Have some open-ended getting to know you topics for people to share their opinions, experiences, stories, or pictures. An “introduce yourself” topic is always fun, and you should go first!
- Where have you seen interesting, thoughtful discussions recently? Can you bring the spirit of those discussions to your site? Imagine what a model user you would love to see on your site would do – and then try doing that yourself. Invite friends or coworkers to post example topics and reply to them so visitors can browse the existing conversations to discover what your community is about.
- Send personal invitations to your staff, power users, or friends, to log in early and reply to your initial topics to generate activity. Send one-click email invites via your Discourse invite page (it’s on your user profile page). You can also send bulk invites to many email addresses at once.
- Generously like any and every post you enjoy! What type of content gets liked is a major part of your community’s culture. Set an example by frequently liking posts in the early days of your forum. Seeing liked posts also encourages people to reciprocate in kind, and come back for more.
- Actively seek the help of power users and early adopters in your community. There’s a built in feedback category titled “site feedback” for discussing organization and governance. Let your most avid users have a say in what your community does, how the site works, and what your community becomes.
It takes time to form a habit
You mention “irrational resistance”
It takes time for people to adjust when moving from their existing sources of information and any other platforms they use frequently. People have talked about it extensively around here – whether the popular software of the day is Facebook, Twitter, Discord or you name it:
Also another part is the “empty restaurant” effect where if a site looks empty, new people won’t want to join.
From the second blog post:
I often describe Discourse as an interesting dinner party.
Think of categories as rooms, topics as tables, replies as conversations. Your goal, as the dinner party organizer, is to found your own successful restaurant with Discourse, a place where the entertaining dinner party never stops.
The worst thing you can do is open with a blank site. That’s like trying to get people to sit down at an empty restaurant!
To combat that:
Those initial topics are critical:
- To further explain what your community is. The topics you see on the front page right now? These are the kinds of conversations that happen here. This is what we tend to generally talk about. This is what our community is.
- To provide examples of the sort of content you want. To let everyone know that yes, topics like these are welcome on our site. Create more discussions like these!
- To invite participation. Have some getting to know you topics for people to share about themselves, and some topics that are open ended and encourage replying with opinions, stories, or pictures.
Recruit friends, recruit colleagues, recruit power users, do whatever it takes to build out an initial solid base of content. Send out invites! You can’t launch your community without it.
Who’s here?
Leadership comes from the top. The presence of staff speaks volumes about whether your community is alive and thriving. Don’t just say you believe in this community, demonstrate that through your personal participation and enthusiasm. Lead by example. Reply to questions people have, help your community learn the ropes, gently guide and shape the community as you go.
If you are lucky enough to have celebrities on your staff, or in your community, take advantage of that! When someone notable – the owner, the sponsor, the founders, the developers, the artist, the author, the MVP – pops in and responds, that is a huge draw. It says this community is important because it’s on the radar of cool, interesting, busy people too! Even a little participation by celebrities goes a long way, so try to schedule that.
Half of any community is showing up regularly. There’s no substitute for simply being there, each day, every day. Welcome and respond to new users as they arrive. Listen to their feedback. Encourage everyone else to do the same over a period of months and soon you’ll have a core of regulars that form the heart of your community – maybe even a few members so engaged they could eventually become community moderators.
Imagine a restaurant with a bustling, visible, helpful staff, where the owner periodically checks in from table to table to make sure everyone is having a good experience. That’s the kind of place that, over time, earns repeat customers … maybe even fans.
