Sense of Community – Piper T Wilson

Bragging Rights

I finished Carrie Melissa Jones’ Engage Your Online Community Accelerator in the Spring of 2022.

From the site: This 9-month course cohort and community takes you on a journey from an uncertain, overwhelmed community builder to a confident and organized leader. Our only course that offers direct access to Carrie, the EYOC Accelerator, is a unique experience that takes you through the frameworks we use to build communities with our clients—and connects you with an amazing network of community-building peers.

The course was amazing, but the magic is in the community she created for her students. Everyone who takes the course is welcome to remain part of the community. We share our experiences with each other, ask questions, give advice, and celebrate our victories. We are a close-knit group. I am safe there.

Build a Community for its Members, Not to Sell Your Product to Them

Do not use your community as a sales or marketing funnel without your members’ knowledge or consent. In other words, don’t try to fool them into thinking you’re building a place for them when you’re trying to use them as a source of income.

It is possible to use a community to sell and market your product, but do not base your community’s purpose on those points.

How community managers build the foundation of an online community

In a TEDx talk, Mark Wills says, “online communities challenge our thought process of what we understand community should be.” And it’s true. When I was researching this post, I looked for definitions of community. Almost all of the examples I found referred to physical communities. But people in online communities are not connected by location. They are created by people with common interests, goals, or values and they share those qualities via online connections.

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