Who usually has to build community in opensim?
Define the job of the Community Manager Social Media free tool for the Community Manager Facts about Social Media Pictures speak a thousand words Create your social network weekly plan Scoop.it |
Good morning Virtual Community Members. Today I will take some time to discuss:
1. how we go about building our opensim communities, 2. Some new ideas on how we can go about building communities 3. And innovative methods using new and old resources. Before we do that - I would like to identify who, in virtual worlds, is tasked with building communities. Usually it becomes the role of the estate owner. He or she may have one idea about what the world should be and what type of person should be there. Or they will appoint some trusted volunteer to the role of a sort of Moderator - slash - "Social Manager" that recruits, enforces policies and interacts. But for the most part, that method usually does not result in large enough numbers to create effective daily activity. I define "Effective Daily Activity" in Opensim as activity that attracts new accounts to immerse themselves in the existing community. _________________________________________________________ The murky role I just described has, over the last few years, become more clear to the corporate world. We have seen development of the role of the Community Manager. Community Strategist Connie Bensen defines The Community Manager as the voice of the company externally and the voice of the customers internally. The value lies in the community manager serving as a hub & having the ability to personally connect with the customers & provide feedback to many departments internally. ________________________________________________________ Some more key activities of a community manager are on the slide behind me as they are listed at conniebensen.com. Large corporations usually can justify the funds needed to create a salary for a Community Manager. But usually there are no salaries available to develop communities in Opensim. But estate and world owners can compensate an effective part-time Community Manager with free land and other incentives. It's best to spell out the details of the barter deal so everyone is on the same page. ________________________________________________________ Now we know WHO should build communities. But what tools are available to the Community Manager to do so? This is where social media comes into play. Because we usually have a budget of ZERO available to us in opensim, social media is the perfect resource. It's free, massive, easily molded to the user's abilities - and did I mention it was free? ________________________________________________________ Let's go over the numbers: 1,802 women, ages 18 - 29 internet users were surveyed. 67% of those surveyed use Facebook. 16% use Twitter. 15% use Pinterest 13% use Instagram and 6% use Tumblr. Source: Pew Research Center's Internet and American Life Project Post-Election Survey, November 14 - December 9, 2012 _________________________________________________________ · 1 Million websites have integrated with Facebook · 23% of users check Facebook 5 times or more daily · 34% of marketers have generated leads on Twitter · Google’s +1 button is used 5 million times a day · Over 5 million pictures are uploaded to Instagram every hour _________________________________________________________ Keep information about your community on social media. I like to publish at least 3 times a week using different mediums. You don't want over-saturate your social networks (then people block you). But you want to be visible. Publish pictures of your community member's activities on social network image sharing sites. When you post the images, be descriptive and always post links so people can access the content. The idea is to draw people into your community. Also set shared themed image groups that community members can add to. Touch signage in-world that takes them directly to the picture-sharing site helps to get people involved in the image sharing. Another idea is to turn those images into an curated in-world exhibit. It is a good way to thank those that shared their photos, encourage others to participate in the future and, once you advertise for the exhibit, you will continue to market your community to your social network. _________________________________________________________ When you decide to publish on your social network at least three times a week - you should map out your Social Network Weekly Plan. I like to start out with a blog entry that includes some images from my community. _________________________________________________________ Then I move that to Sccop.it. Scoop.It is a great tool because others outside of your social network may pick up your story and share it with their social network also. But I mostly like using scoop.it because it makes your story look more like an legitimate news item once you share it out to Facebook, Twitter, Tumbler or Wordpress. Story ideas for your Social Network could be:
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