What makes a good community?

Remember when you were a child and wanted validation for every little thing? That joy of being appreciated and cared for?

That’s kinda what we all want from each other. And so, for a successful “community”, it would be important serve 4 basic human needs from “people”:

1. Upward mobility
   I’m growing because of my association with this set of people. This is my ideal tribe.
2. Appreciation
   When I do something amazing, it gets noticed. Someone cares to applaud for me.
3. Breadcrumbs
   Someone is “follow”ing or watching my footsteps. I matter. My journey is recorded and outlasts me.
4. Give back
   I feel good helping others from my tribe. I’m doing my bit by giving back to my tribe.

We are surrounded by communities in some shape or form, be it groups on social networks, fitness communities, B-schools, alumni groups, spiritual groups etc. One question I wonder about is - what would make a great and healthy community product for professionals? So what does this mean for community products? Two things:

1. A network that inspires.
   As a member, I must feel inspired to take the shots. This could be by way of inspiring content, peer to peer inspiration, opportunity for connection, visualisation of a good end state and celebration of the “right” behaviours.
2. A net that works:
   As a member, I feel safer because of my tribe. The community minimize my downside when I fail by providing a safety net — a set of people to bank on, a nudge during a slump, a ladder when there’s no way forward.

Core tenets for modelling a good community product:

When building such a product, a 3 tenets to keep in mind:

1. Immediate and future benefit
   What can I get by being a part of this right away? How do my contributions and benefits compound into a long term value?
2. Member as advocates
   Member advocacy is the greatest success. Have you noticed how Apple users always seem to sell Apple products? It’s a great case of member advocacy from the Mac “community”. Incentivise direct referral and design around shareability.
3. Exclusivity
   It is tough to get in? Members should feel that they “earnt” it to be a part of a great group. This can be established through approaches such as peer to peer whetting and high entry cost. Peer whetting is often deployed by top B-schools.