The Network Power of Online Communities: Social Networking and Beyond

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The Network Power of Online Communities Social
Networking and Beyond
www.tinyurl.com/2008comcon
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Online Communities Workshop

• Types of communities/groups
• Brief survey of platforms
• Designing the ultimate collaboration space
• Building community through e-mail communication

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Types of communities

• Message boards (topical, affinity groups,
  asynchronous)
• Lurking communities. Content to draw people in
  to discussions.
• Targeted group (rostered leaders). Whats the
  next step to expand.
• Activist network
• Congregational leaders network (e.g. stewardship

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Types of communities

• Private work groups
• Self-selecting, motivated audiences
• Public social networks
• Sharing photos, videos, bookmarks, status,
  searches, travel plans

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FaceBook Concepts/Applications

• Page
• Group
• Cause
• Events
• Network (city, workplace, school, region)
• Organization (has fans)
• MyChurch (church, denomination, ministry)

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Types of Community Platforms

• Web forums
• Discussion lists
• Collaboration spaces
• Sharing Photos, Videos, Links, Status, Searches,
  Travel

• Social Networks
• Blogs
• Wikis
• Virtual Worlds
• Mashups

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Ultimate feature set for ongoing groups

• E-mail enabled
• Web enabled (choose)
• Anyone can start a group
• Notification of new groups
• Files area
• Links area
• Live Chat
• Member profiles
• Group calendar with reminders
• Group scheduling
• Group member status

• Single log-on
• IMAP support
• HTML support
• Searchable archives
• Blog for group promotion using selected notes
• Data collection (surveys, polls, registrations,
  grading)
• RSS support
• E-mail attachments
• Advertising-free

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Building community with e-mail

• ELCA Advantage Constant Contact
• E-newsletter with submissions
• Survey feature to collect orders, registration,
  feedback, article submissions, gather info from
  exhibitors

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