Expert Series: Danielle Maveal on Building Community

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Your first question is not what platform
should I use, which is the number

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one question everyone asked me when they
want my advice. That's the wrong question

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to ask. You don't know yet. You really need to get to know

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your people and figure out what kind
of work do they want to do together,

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what kind of conversations do they want
to have? How often do they

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want to show up? I'm Elina
Seah Briani and this is Lane Jane,

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a show where I talked to guests
about making radical transitions in their careers.

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Today is another installment of our expert
series, which features tools, ideas and

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resources that help individuals transition into becoming
a creator. Today we're talking to community

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builder Danielle Mvelle. Danielle started out
as a creator as a Goldsmith, owning

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her own small business before she fell
into the tech industry, joining Etsy as

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their twelve employee. At etsy,
she ran the community education team. She's

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since been on the founding team at
bark box and built and launched community content

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and communication programs at Air B and
B and lift. I'm excited to chat

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about the power of creating an engaged
community and how, among other things,

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it can give you a competitive edge
whether you're an individual creator or a brand.

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Thanks for joining me today, Danielle. Thanks for having me on.

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I've been listening so I'm excited to
be here. Awesome. Well, I

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really wanted to start by just having
you introduce yourself and talk a little bit

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about how you became a community manager. A little about your story. Sure.

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So I started as a Goldsmith and
I was learning. I was an

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apprentice and learning from, you know, a Master Goldsmith, and it's a

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really secretive, close knit community and
I was helping other goldsmiths run their studio

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and also making jewelry for myself and
trying to see if I could develop my

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online and I had found etsy and
put a few items up on Etsy and

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they sold right away. So I
thought, Oh, this is there might

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be some magic here. So I
put up more and more items. I

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happened to just come up with a
way I could produce a bunch of pieces

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at a time and put them on
the site and they sold immediately and I

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climbed to one of the top sellers
on Etsy and it was just so inspired

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by the community and how open everyone
was. They shared pricing strategies, they

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shared marketing strategies and it was just
a different world than this really secretive goldsmithing

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world that I was in. And
I ended up launching to voluntarily run communities

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for Etsy, one in Detroit for
artists and makers and Detroit who were selling

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on Etsy, and another one for
Goldsmith's, metal smiths, metal workers,

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and they were incredible. We would
have pop up sales, we got attention

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from the press. We would have
et see wide sales based on a tag

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that we would tag all our items
on and ets a notice. All this

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work I was doing to bring people
together and educate each other and support each

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other and market each other's work.
So they invited me to come on as

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one of the first employees there.
So that was my first foray into tet,

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the tech world, and I grew
with etsy. It was a wild

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ride ran. I ended up running
community education. I really am not someone

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who loves running a forum, although
I have done it. I like running

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programming that brings people together and like
pushes them through some kind of transformation.

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And since then I worked at bark
box. Actually I quit tech all together.

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I was helping to run an animal
rescue and bumped into the bark box

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founders and we just really loved each
other and so I joined that team.

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Ran A customer service there, which
was kind of cool because we had all

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these customer service back end tools that
I never had running a community. How

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are we measuring conversations, tagging them, thinking about response time, thinking about

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themes that are bubbling up? So
it was actually really fun. I might

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be one of the only people to
say was Super Fun to run a support

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team, but it was. And
then since then I've been working back in

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community. I worked at AIRBNB,
being dropped on a bunch of problems that

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we needed to scale and operationally create
new systems for, and then my last

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big role was outlift, running the
driver Advocacy Council, which was a lot

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about community and feedback loops. So
what were influential drivers saying, thinking,

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feeling and how do we bring these
key insights back to the right team members

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so that we could make change to
lift? I love that and it sounds

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like you know over time you've actually
migrated in a sense to these problems of

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scalability and measurement and I want to
definitely dive into that a little bit later,

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but I wanted to start by just
kind of understanding what constitutes a community

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versus, for example, an audience. I think when people are starting out

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there's definitely this desire to attract more
eyeballs and I think it seems like there's

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some sort of distinction between that and
creating a community, and I wanted to

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see if you could talk a little
bit about that. Yeah, I like

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to think of it as an audience
can be a type of community where they're

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connected to you. So you are
the central hub and all the nodes go

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out to your audience member. So
there's a a one. We're a two

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way sometimes loot between you and your
audience members. When I think about community,

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I think about a web of bonds, so they're not only connected to

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you, but they actually start to
be just as connected to each other.

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And community work is really it happens
one conversation at a time and you're connecting

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people to each other and you're building
on those bonds and these people should show

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my favorite definition is from Carrie Melissa
Jones and Charles Wigal, who have two

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books on community, and they say
community members should show mutual care and concern

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for each other. So I will
say even with a web of bonds,

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you could have a network which is
great. They are really strong networks out

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there, but you might not have
true care and concern for other members in

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your network. Community goes even deeper, like we are showing up as our

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true selves so that we can really
accept each other and take care of each

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other. I love that and I
think it's so important. I think we

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talked a lot about community as just
being something that we need a during this

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covid time. I'm curious, from
the point of view of, you know,

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having also built communities for different brands, what's that business case or what

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helps people understand why investing in community
from the get goo versus just building out

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an audience is important? Yeah,
I think you know, if you're really

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trying to disrupt and shift the way
we behave, the way we do,

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something which a lot of startups are
doing and a lot of creators are doing,

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they're just trying to influence people in
a new way. It's so powerful

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to do that with community. You
can amplify and bring superpowers to the work

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you're doing to transform people's lives,
and that's really hard to sort of put

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a metric on or a dollar sign
on. There are lots of other business

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cases for community, but I always
come back to this mission driven transformational work.

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That is really hard to do if
you're just leaning on one person or

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a small team. But if you
can get people to do this in groups

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and support each other in these niche
groups and move towards transformation together, it's

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just faster, it's more powerful,
it's more long lasting. But yet there

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are other things that can be really
helpful with customers, success teams, finding

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insights, really understanding your users.
They're talking freely in your community spaces.

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You have so much rich data there
to understand what they're really interested in,

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what the hot topics are. Can
Be very helpful for marketing and ambassador programs.

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But to me the heart is like
when you can plug your community into

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your mission at all, beyond that
path together. I love that and you

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know it's strikes me. Initially I
was going to ask you what's the difference

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between, you know, a startup
or a brand starting a community and a

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kind of Solo preneur or a creator
starting a community? And in certain ways

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I think you've almost answered that,
where there's something about making it more sustainable,

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like you know, as I imagine
as a creator, if you're the

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touch point for everything that's happening.
It's it's really hard to keep showing up

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and there's something about creating a community
around you. But maybe you can speak

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more to this. Yeah, I
think if you really pull yourself a bit

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back from being the center of attention
and instead put your mission in that place,

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community work will be much easier for
you to sort of shift your mindset

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from having to be that point person. And I say the same thing to

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brands, like what is your mission? Why are people going to gather and

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show up week over a week in
your community? I mean it's actually we

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have so many tools to build communities
now, but it makes it actually a

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little bit harder and you have to
be more direct and really understand what your

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mission is, or else people can
go and build a community. Anyone could

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go build a community right now.
They can launch a facebook group, they

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can launch a slack channel. So
why are they showing up for you?

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So I guess it's where with creators, I would ask them, where are

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you trying to go? What is
your mission, and how can bringing people

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together be more powerful than everyone doing
it alone? Are there times when you

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think like hey, it doesn't make
sense for you to have a community.

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Yes, we I I'm running a
community course right now and I've seen this

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term a few times. We call
it an MVC. So in product world

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it's a minimum viable product and we
have thought about what if you could launch

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a minimum viable community. So maybe
it's just a short event series and really

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test out. Do you like this
work? Does it bring you energy?

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Are there insights that are coming from
this work that you want to roll with,

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that you want to throw resources at? And if it doesn't bring you

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energy and enjoy and it's really tough, I don't think you have to do

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it. I know a friend of
mine WHO's an incredible brand marketer. She

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had a VC come to her and
say everyone's building community first. You should

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build community first. I looked at
her dead in the face and I'm like

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no, you are an incredible marketer. Build your marketing first and I can

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help you plug community and after.
But this stuff is like natural to you.

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You shouldn't just go do something that's
not supernatural. You're going to have

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a really hard lift doing it and
doesn't really spark joy for you right off

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the bat. You should really lean
into your strengths and where you get energy.

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That makes a lot of sense to
me. I mean almost as a

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life lesson, not necessarily just relation
to community, in terms of just leaning

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into your strengths and what actually energizes
you. Yeah, yeah, you know

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I love your newsletter. I Love
I mean you recently launched a community course.

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I'm really curious if you could talk
a little bit more about the process

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of creating your course for community builders
and what that's looked like and whether kind

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of the educational communities are different in
some sort of way than maybe other types

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of communities. It's been super fun
running this course. I'm running it with

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a handful of other people, which
I really love collaborative work, as messy

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as it is. I think I've
been doing stuff solow for the past year,

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so being able to do things as
a team has been really energizing and

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it kind of brings me back to
my roots. When I was at Etsy,

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I ran courses, I had daily
news are, weekly newsletters, daily

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articles, online events, so this
sort of brings me back to that kind

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of work. How did we think
about it? I think it was fun

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because we each have our own followings. Were kind of different community builders.

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I'm more of a brand community builder
and building with Rosie Sherry, who has

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really built grassroots communities and Deverell communities
from the ground up. So we bring

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different skill sets. I can talk
about how we thought about building the course,

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but really this is a big old
experiment for all of us. We

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were like, let's just put something
up on gum road, promote it,

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see who is really attracted to this
kind of course. We wanted it to

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be lightweight and fun and not as
expensive and intense and exclusive as other community

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courses. We really wanted to bring
anyone together who could was thinking about building

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a community and help them get those
off the ground. We've created a slack

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channel for this group, but even
more, you know there's activity in the

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slack channel, but we have twitter, live twitter chats. We had a

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twitter live audio chat. We had
a clubhouse chat, I didn't attend that

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one, and a ton of different
live events, workshops and ice breakers and

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claudation sessions. You might tell in
my stories that I love events, so

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it really is an event gathering focused
course. I know that you all,

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as fellow community builders, you brought
an audience or you brought a following to

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this, this awesome thing that you're
putting out, but I want to talk

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to you a little bit more about
people who maybe are starting out, maybe

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they're building a course based on information
that they know, or maybe they're doing

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something else and they're starting out really
from scratch. They feel like, I

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don't have a community, whether that
is possible or not, I don't you

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know, I don't have people to
attract to this and I yeah, I

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wanted to just from your perspective.
How does someone get started? You're probably

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building community around something you're passionate about, so you have connected with people in

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this realm before. So who are
those people? You can go back to

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old contacts, go through your networks
and see who might be a good fit

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to join you on this community.
There's other things you can do, like

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come through reddit forums, facebook groups
and just do an audit and see.

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I always say look for who the
helpers are. Think often when people are

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building new things and they want to
attract people into their communities, they look

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for the influencers, they want the
most important, exciting people. I look

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for the helpers, like who are
the people who aren't asking for anything in

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return and are helping in other nascent
communities that are out there, and just

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reach out, let them know what
mission you're on and what role they could

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play and what attracted you to them, and give them a like a really

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specific thing, like I'm gonna have
a group chat about this next week at

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four PM. Can you make it? And you really want to just try

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to get four or five, six
people who are interested and you build that

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initial founding membership out of a handful
of people and you grow from there.

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I mean, I've been running this
community for six months and we probably have

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eight people, and to me that's
fine. I don't want to grow super

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fast. I really want us to
like be able to lean on each other.

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We're a bit like an accountability group, and my goals aren't to attract

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everyone who does community, but to
attract people who are really serious about it

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at this isn't new to them and
they want to grow their careers and their

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skills together. So started starting small. Don't put too much pressure on yourself,

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don't set really intense goals. You
really want to find the right people

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who are going to create long lasting
bonds with each other. I mean it

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touches on two things that you've written
about in the past, both thinking about

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how you see it a community and
who those initial people are and also having

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kind of an events first strategy,
and I wanted to see if you could

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kind of talk more about both of
those. Yeah, we seeting. I

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mean I talked about the helpers,
but you also when you go out into

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the Internet spaces to look for community
members. You can look for the people

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who are starting to build bonds,
but they might not have a dedicated space.

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So like a subgroup within a group. Maybe we are all moms who

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are also interested in product manage and
we're in a product management slack but we

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don't have our own channel yet.
Well, what a right of great opportunity

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to create a subcommunity for them.
You can look for people who are hand

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raisers. They've want it, they've
suggested a project and you notice that the

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community organizers have not put fuel or
resources or energy into that. Grab them

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because they are waiting for someone to
see that they have an idea and they

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probably just need some confidence really and
a little bit of resources to help them

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complete that and organize that with you. Oh, just you know, we

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talk a lot in the course about
building in public and really just being public

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with what you need and what you're
doing and what your mission is and attracting

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people that way, and that could
take time if you don't have a huge

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following. If you can consistently tell
people what you're doing and where you want

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to go, give them the opportunity
to plug in. Yeah, the second

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piece was thinking about events first strategy. Okay, so with events first,

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community building. You're not. Your
first question is not what platform should I

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use, which is the number one
question everyone asked me when they want my

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advice. Should I use slack?
Should I use a facebook group? Should

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I use circle? That's the wrong
question to ask. You don't know yet.

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You really need to get to know
your people and figure out what kind

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of work do they want to do
to get there? Were kind of conversations

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do they want to have? How
often do they want to show up?

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You might have like a really busy
subset of folks and you're not going to

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want to put someone who's super busy
in already and twelve slack channels into another

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slack channel. So I always think
about events first. One for the reason

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that you don't know what your community
members want and to it's actually a really

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powerful way to make those initial connections. So you could have a group on

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slack for six months that could get
to that same place of connection and three

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to four weeks of meeting weekly and
working through something together. I've heard about

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a slacker group who had a couple
hundred members. It was like a little

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lackluster. This community then had a
full day conference and after that the slack

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blew up. Engagement was through the
roof. People were joining and engaging at

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record rates, and that's because you
gave them a chance to come together and

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really show up as human beings and
build those connections with each other. And

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then they can go to the you
know, online chat room and they'll know

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what to talk about, they'll know
who's there, they'll feel a little bit

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more comfortable in that space. That
makes so much sense. There's something about

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connecting that actually deepens people's not just
engagement, but their stake in the game.

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You know, as you're talking about
creating those events or creating those times

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for people to actually have face to
face engagement, how do you think about

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fostering a space or fostering a particular
kind of culture for people to be present

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and able to engage? Well,
the biggest shift, and this even for

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me, and I know this instinctually
now in my bones. I've been doing

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this for so long, but when
I launched my community which was events first,

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I had these rich agendas where every
minute was calculated and I'm like,

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okay, we're going to talk about
this, we're going to learn this,

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we're going to go through this,
and I put so much work into being

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this educator, almost entertainer, and
the sessions. And I think when the

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real community stuff happens, when you
sit back a little bit and you allow

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for serendipitist conversations, you put people
into breakout rooms and you can't be in

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every break at room, so you
won't know what every conversation is, but

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you really have to sit back and
listening is super important as well. In

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the early stages of this community group
that I started, someone sort of whispered

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we should have a what's up channel. So then you really had to go

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with that. Okay, let's throw
up what's up channel and see what happens.

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Somebody sort of whispered, oh,
I wouldn't mind sharing next week X,

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Y and Z, and you just
have to listen really carefully for people

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who are wanting to help and take
a little bit of responsibility and shift ownership

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some of your events time. Another
thing I talked about a lot is equal

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sharing of air time. And if
you're doing most of the talking and you

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only give people ten minutes at the
end to each have one minute and and

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give an update, will that community
is going to be all about you.

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So you really kind of have to
visualize the airtime amongst the group. I

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even have one of my community guidelines, which I review every week at the

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started sessions, is we all share
this space equally and we're all responsible to

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make sure we don't take up time
and that we are supporting the other members

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and noticing if they want to chime
in but aren't being noticed by the group.

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So it's all of our responsibility to
share this space equally and to call

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me out if I happen to not
do that. I love that. I

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want to touch on this thing that
you mentioned, community guidelines, and the

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fact that you come back to these
guidelines. Can you speak a little bit

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more about what does that look like? Is that something that you develop as

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you start to have more events,
or do you think about those guidelines before

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you even start your community? Yeah, you should definitely think about them before

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you even start, but be open
to them shifting and evolving and ask for

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feedback from your community on these guidelines. But being super intentional at the start

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will help meet the basic needs of
your community members. And if you don't

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meet the basic needs, you're not
going to have engagement. So a lot

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of people show up to events with
anxiety and if you tell them exactly here's

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what we do in the space,
here's what we don't do in this space,

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here's how we behave. So beyond
guidelines that even share an agenda and

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let people know when they'll need to
chime in, when they won't, if

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they should have their webcams on,
if it's okay if they don't. So

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the guidelines are part of setting the
structure that helps people relax a little bit

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and also behave in a way.
I mean, even though I say share

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responsibilities distribute ownership, you should be
the one that is making sure this space

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is accessible, inclusive and, you
know, aligns with your mission, aligns

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with your values and is a great
space where people are going to feel safe

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showing up and being their true self. If you just open it up,

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people don't know how they should act, who's here, what shared values they

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have. Things could go off the
rails. Really easily. Well, I

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see two things happen. One is
everyone's super quiet for a very long time

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because they don't know how to behave, and the other way is just going

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off the rails. You'll have one
person that's maybe a strong personality that starts

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to set norms that you didn't want
set in your community. You've talked about

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having a little bit of a vision
through and creating those kind of guidelines or

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guard rails almost, and structure through
your guidelines, when thing that I feel

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like I've encountered quite often in communities
is there are communities where you're not necessarily

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like coming into be totally vulnerable and
authentic and real. I'm, you know,

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part of a community and I know
this is the useful community. I

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have to pretend like I'm someone else
and be Super Overconfident and tell my story

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continuously. And then there are other
communities, including the community that you run,

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where it's all about sharing the realistic
ups and downs that people go through,

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and I'm curious what are some of
those? I don't know tips and

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tricks to to actually fostering that sense
of people being honest and open and really

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committed. The biggest tip is that
you have to go there first. So

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in early on in that group that
I started, I told them, Hey,

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I'm actually pretty anxious because I haven't
started a community from scratch in over

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ten years. So I think this
will take some learning. We might have

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some sessions that are not as dynamic
as other sessions, and I'm feeling a

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little anxious about this and I kind
of felt the room like kind gonna lean

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back a little bit, like okay, if you're showing up and really bringing

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your true self and telling us how
and being vulnerable and telling us that you're

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a little bit afraid in the space, then we can also show up in

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that way. So that's one thing
you can do. And the second is

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you really want to recognize you know, when someone in my spaces is vulnerable,

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I publicly say wow, like that's
incredible that you went there and that

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you trusted us, and how awesome
is it that you that we are able

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to see this real piece of you
and help you out. You know,

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you always have to recognize the behavior
you want the rest of the community to

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adopt. I think you definitely do
such a good job setting the stage for

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the kind of vulnerability that then you're
able to foster around you. Even in

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my writing I try to share the
biggest mistakes I've made in hopes that people

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understand that this work isn't all sunshine, butterflies and rainbows. It's hard work,

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it's grueling work and it's it never
stops once you watch a community it

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it's not like you can just turn
it off. So I like to be

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vulnerable in my writing as well.
In these online and event spaces. Yeah,

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that's often where people also get to
learn the most from from people being

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courageous enough to really put their mistakes
out there and be honest about what's actually

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going on. This is why I
push the gathering first community, the meet

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up community, because it's lower time
investment. It's, you know, one

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day a week I've got to show
up and then maybe we have like a

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Oh whatsapp group, and if that
really is not that much, it's not

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going to take that much from me
to run a single channel group like that.

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So I would hang on to that
model for as long as you can,

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until you're really ready to launch an
online channel that needs to be monitored

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every single day. And I have
seen community managers who are are one and

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only community manager, you know,
share a photo of their family in the

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group and say I'm taking the next
three days off and I'm going to hang

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out with my family, so I'll
see you all on the other side.

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And the community responded really lovefully,
like they said, okay, we're going

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to hold it down for you.
We promise won't go off the rails.

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We'll see you in a couple days. So it goes back to like being

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open and honest with your community and
letting them know, you know, I

359
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need a break and taking that break. And of course, if you have

360
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shared responsibilities and you have leaders who
can check in and help you and support

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you while you're out, that's,
you know, another great way to do

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that. And you know, selfcare
is a huge topic in the community space

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because this can be really emotionally draining
work. So really taking care of yourself

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and taking those breaks. You know, I see a lot of new community

365
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managers really respond to threads as quickly
as they can and as many as they

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can and sometimes if you let a
thread or a conversation play itself out,

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it's less emotional work for you and
the community really learns to lean on each

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other and work through stuff. And
if you've set strong guidelines and promoted,

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you know, really great norms.
They should be able to start working things

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out on their own. One thing
that you have kind of touched on,

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I think, multiple times in our
conversation, is this idea of sharing ownership

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and kind of inviting people to participate
in a community where you don't have to

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be the absolute center. And you
mentioned you know, you've started this community

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in the last six months, but
before that you've been really doing so much

375
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scaling of communities. What are some
of the ways that you actually start thinking

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about other people as you scale your
community? Yeah, if you're doing something

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particularly awesome, you are on a
mission. You are attracting people with shared

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values. They are actually going to
want to help and follow. I always

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tell people just follow the energy.
So allow anyone to suggest an event,

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to suggest a slack channel, to
suggest some kind of activity, and give

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them the resources and support to do
that, and that stuff can grow into

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a true volunteer community leadership program or
Ambassador or evangelist program and you really can't

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scale good community work without that.
It's kind of wild to me. I

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see some really huge communities that don't
have leadership programs and I wonder how the

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heck they do it. I think
we're really leaning in two more niche micro

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groups, and that is where true
community and true connections can be made.

387
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You cannot have as many micro groups
as your community needs without distributing ownership and

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really having leaders who are going to
be the host of those groups. All

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community needs hosts. It shouldn't be
completely wildly run. You need someone who

390
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is welcoming new members, who's setting
the norms, who's keeping an eye out

391
00:32:23.839 --> 00:32:29.880
for people who are breaking norms,
who they're gathering insights from their micro groups

392
00:32:30.150 --> 00:32:34.470
and sharing it back to you and
the rest of the team. So distributing

393
00:32:34.630 --> 00:32:39.910
these activities and ownership and even gathering
stories and insights it's so important. You

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won't be able to scale without them. I can imagine. How do you

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actually select ambassadors? What do you
do? How do you on board them?

396
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What are the playbooks for running this
community? I think I know that

397
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that's an entire field that you have
an enormous amount of expertise in. I

398
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want to just reflect a little bit. I feel like community as a term

399
00:33:06.250 --> 00:33:10.410
has become a really hot topic in
it. You know, it's definitely become

400
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a buzzword even within the startup world. I think people have started to think

401
00:33:15.319 --> 00:33:22.119
about it as like a competitive edge
for a lot of companies, like hey,

402
00:33:22.319 --> 00:33:24.519
the moat or your competitive advantage now
is the fact that you have a

403
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community versus someone else doesn't. And
I guess I just I want to hear

404
00:33:30.549 --> 00:33:37.230
your thoughts on like what does that
actually mean? Yeah, it's interesting for

405
00:33:37.309 --> 00:33:43.819
me because I have been building brand
communities and man, I love a grassroots

406
00:33:43.859 --> 00:33:47.900
community. Like there's some queer design
club or people who have just said no

407
00:33:49.019 --> 00:33:52.859
one like this in my industry who
has a place, like let's build this

408
00:33:52.059 --> 00:33:59.529
together. Even now, I like
lean towards learning more from these very mission

409
00:33:59.569 --> 00:34:07.970
driven grassroots communities and the trend of
brand communities right now, even though I've

410
00:34:07.970 --> 00:34:12.559
always worked in it, man,
it gives me pause because I think we

411
00:34:12.679 --> 00:34:15.920
don't realize how much work that goes
into it. And we've already talked about

412
00:34:15.920 --> 00:34:22.960
this sort of long term work that
goes into building communities, meeting your community

413
00:34:23.000 --> 00:34:30.150
members basic needs, really making sure
everyone feels supported, can be themselves,

414
00:34:31.150 --> 00:34:35.670
can contribute in some way. Like
this is hard work and you need a

415
00:34:35.750 --> 00:34:37.510
team to do it and need a
lot of resources and support to do it,

416
00:34:38.099 --> 00:34:45.460
and I think we see people excited
about community work because it's fun and

417
00:34:45.179 --> 00:34:52.969
it really kind of turns an audience
into a more sort of living organism and

418
00:34:52.130 --> 00:34:55.409
it can build build a mote for
your brand, for sure. I mean

419
00:34:55.489 --> 00:34:59.889
people are less like likely to leave
a group of people that they love then

420
00:35:00.489 --> 00:35:05.449
one solo brand that they love.
But what I fear is that, you

421
00:35:05.570 --> 00:35:07.960
know, back in the day,
you know, everyone was talking about going

422
00:35:07.000 --> 00:35:10.960
viral and we're going to hire a
social a young hip social media person,

423
00:35:12.400 --> 00:35:15.400
and we're gonna are one person and
they're going to make stuff that goes viral.

424
00:35:15.440 --> 00:35:17.760
I feel like that's what's happening with
community right now, where people are

425
00:35:17.760 --> 00:35:21.869
like, I'm going to hire one
community manager. They're going to have no

426
00:35:22.230 --> 00:35:27.150
experience, but maybe they're extroverted and
great up bringing people together and we're going

427
00:35:27.190 --> 00:35:30.550
to have them launch and run our
community. And it's just not enough.

428
00:35:31.030 --> 00:35:38.539
And you know, communities, strong
communities, can form in spite of you

429
00:35:38.900 --> 00:35:42.659
and turn against you, and we
have seen a lot of that. I

430
00:35:42.739 --> 00:35:49.380
mean, if you saw recently the
New York Times of food recipe community that

431
00:35:49.579 --> 00:35:53.130
has like eightyzero members and it's just
gone off the rails because they had like

432
00:35:53.289 --> 00:35:57.969
one person running it part time,
this facebook group, and now the New

433
00:35:57.969 --> 00:36:04.760
York Times is abandoning this group.
I mean, community can really become a

434
00:36:04.920 --> 00:36:09.800
beast and as powerful as they can
be for your brand, if they're basic

435
00:36:09.920 --> 00:36:15.679
needs are not met, it can
really be a destructive force. That makes

436
00:36:15.719 --> 00:36:22.389
a lot of sense and you know, it almost feels like it also goes

437
00:36:22.510 --> 00:36:27.190
back to another, I guess,
hot topic within the realm of community,

438
00:36:27.389 --> 00:36:32.059
which is moderation. And obviously we
have so many different social media platforms right

439
00:36:32.059 --> 00:36:38.579
now that have faced a lot of
backlash for either their lack of moderation or

440
00:36:39.500 --> 00:36:45.500
their lack of being proactive, all
kinds of different gaps, and I guess

441
00:36:45.539 --> 00:36:51.530
I'm curious. Yeah, what are
your perspectives and what does moderation mean within

442
00:36:51.650 --> 00:36:55.050
a community? Well, I'll say
moderation is not my specialty. I ran

443
00:36:55.610 --> 00:37:00.010
the forums that etsy for about six
months before I lost my mind. So

444
00:37:01.639 --> 00:37:05.320
there are some people who are really, really good at it and have a

445
00:37:05.360 --> 00:37:08.199
lot of experience. And what I
fear and what I see is like a

446
00:37:08.360 --> 00:37:16.789
lot of new social platforms not investing
in trust and safety and moderators. You

447
00:37:16.869 --> 00:37:21.309
know, this is the stage where
norms are set, whether you're starting your

448
00:37:21.349 --> 00:37:25.030
own community. The first few members
set the norms for everyone else and any

449
00:37:25.150 --> 00:37:29.750
cracks that are formed at the beginning
of a community or the beginning of a

450
00:37:30.099 --> 00:37:32.980
new platform, they're only going to
grow like a very hard to patch up.

451
00:37:34.059 --> 00:37:38.980
Things that early on just become set
norms. So thinking about trust and

452
00:37:39.059 --> 00:37:45.010
safety and moderation is super important in
the beginning. I suggest getting an expert.

453
00:37:45.050 --> 00:37:50.289
I mean, we've been building online
communities for over twenty years. There

454
00:37:50.289 --> 00:37:52.889
are people have been doing this a
very long time and are really good at

455
00:37:52.929 --> 00:37:59.000
it and we're kind of I'm seeing
new platforms ignore that and ignore all the

456
00:37:59.079 --> 00:38:05.360
lessons that we've had to learn in
very hard ways and that have hurt a

457
00:38:05.519 --> 00:38:09.199
lot of groups of people who are
vulnerable. So I don't know, it's

458
00:38:10.519 --> 00:38:15.309
I complain about it a lot on
twitter, if you're interested in following that.

459
00:38:17.590 --> 00:38:21.630
But yeah, it's scares me.
We have learned a lot of lessons.

460
00:38:21.710 --> 00:38:25.150
When I see new platforms launching that
aren't really there, are learning them

461
00:38:25.190 --> 00:38:30.579
all over again and Um, it's
wild to me. What would you like

462
00:38:30.820 --> 00:38:37.380
to see when you think about let's
say new platforms launching that are fundamentally community

463
00:38:37.460 --> 00:38:42.170
based? What's what's kind of what
do you envision? Yeah, I think

464
00:38:43.570 --> 00:38:50.570
we lean on the technology to give
us these incredible powers to communicate, to

465
00:38:50.969 --> 00:38:57.000
share content, to connect with each
other, and we forget how important it

466
00:38:57.159 --> 00:39:04.519
is. This is a human experience
and you need human beings who are,

467
00:39:05.400 --> 00:39:09.389
like I said, the helpers,
the moderators, the people who are gatekeepers,

468
00:39:09.590 --> 00:39:13.190
like in a good way, like
here's what we do here, here's

469
00:39:13.190 --> 00:39:16.269
what we don't do here. WHO's
invited into the space? WHO's not invited

470
00:39:16.309 --> 00:39:21.110
in the space because it's not doesn't
make sense for them to be here.

471
00:39:21.949 --> 00:39:25.900
You know, human moderators and figuring
out, like to me, scale is

472
00:39:27.019 --> 00:39:31.820
not just how big can this audience
get, but scale is how many,

473
00:39:32.179 --> 00:39:38.530
how many deep real connections can we
make between this group and growing strong connections

474
00:39:38.650 --> 00:39:43.849
versus just growing in audience size,
when, you know, a lot of

475
00:39:43.929 --> 00:39:47.530
these platforms talk and say their community
platforms, but really their audience platforms.

476
00:39:50.329 --> 00:39:54.800
So, yeah, thinking really thoughtfully
about scale and growth and then having hum

477
00:39:54.920 --> 00:40:04.079
human beings involved in these spaces and
being really thoughtful about who's there and who's

478
00:40:04.920 --> 00:40:09.550
hosting these spaces. That really touches
in many ways on this question of like

479
00:40:09.789 --> 00:40:15.550
what is success look like within a
community and even what are you measuring within

480
00:40:15.630 --> 00:40:20.429
a community and and what you've just
described of you know, how many connections

481
00:40:20.550 --> 00:40:24.820
is this community truly authentically fostering?
I think is really, really important and

482
00:40:24.940 --> 00:40:34.579
I think it's the conversation is about
measuring not just the numbers but measuring other

483
00:40:34.699 --> 00:40:38.969
qualitative features. I think that's a
really important thing to note. Yeah,

484
00:40:39.809 --> 00:40:45.449
I've done things like create a sense
of community index and and what kind of

485
00:40:45.489 --> 00:40:50.639
questions can we ask our members on
a regular basis to really understand their experience?

486
00:40:50.920 --> 00:40:55.159
And is there a return on engagement
for the members and for the brand

487
00:40:55.199 --> 00:41:02.760
or organization or Creator? Engagement for
engagements sake can really go off the rails

488
00:41:04.199 --> 00:41:08.389
and also kind of waste everyone's time. Can you give me an example,

489
00:41:08.510 --> 00:41:16.429
like what is engagement for engagements sake
mean? Well, I think about facebook

490
00:41:16.670 --> 00:41:24.179
and the political divide that it's caused
for engagement's sake. It's it's not for

491
00:41:24.300 --> 00:41:30.699
the good of our society, it's
for ad revenue, you know. And

492
00:41:32.449 --> 00:41:37.210
if we keep recreating this model,
I know a ton of people have what

493
00:41:37.329 --> 00:41:40.289
facebook, but if we recreate this
model on other platforms, I mean,

494
00:41:40.369 --> 00:41:46.050
what have we learned? So it's
just so once you start looking at metrics

495
00:41:46.090 --> 00:41:52.440
of engagement and not really looking at
okay, well, what happens after people

496
00:41:52.519 --> 00:41:55.480
have engaged? How do they feel? They feel connected? Are they having

497
00:41:55.719 --> 00:42:00.280
like do they feel more trust with
each other, with the brand or the

498
00:42:00.320 --> 00:42:08.150
organization, or they just engaging because
they're pissed off or raging or wanting attention?

499
00:42:08.630 --> 00:42:12.429
You know, all those things,
like what is the what are we

500
00:42:12.510 --> 00:42:16.059
doing this for? That makes perfect
sense and I know we've been speaking a

501
00:42:16.099 --> 00:42:22.699
little bit broadly in terms of,
you know, brands, social platforms,

502
00:42:22.739 --> 00:42:30.010
etc. But I think in a
way this to take this back to kind

503
00:42:30.050 --> 00:42:37.730
of individuals or creators who are starting
communities. You know, I think this

504
00:42:37.889 --> 00:42:42.929
question of why am I doing this? Why am I trying to get people

505
00:42:43.210 --> 00:42:49.079
to connect with either what I'm making
or the information or the thought leadership that

506
00:42:49.159 --> 00:42:53.880
I'm putting out, I think is
a really interesting and really important question to

507
00:42:54.000 --> 00:42:58.989
be asking when people are thinking about
building a community in the first place.

508
00:42:59.030 --> 00:43:01.829
Yeah, you know, you could
really spin your wheels. I have a

509
00:43:01.869 --> 00:43:07.829
lot of people ask me. You
know, my slack is an engaged as

510
00:43:07.869 --> 00:43:10.309
other slack channels. I'm in like
okay, well, you could spend a

511
00:43:10.349 --> 00:43:15.099
lot of time increasing engagement in your
slack channel. But what is the albom

512
00:43:15.179 --> 00:43:20.420
there? What is the goal?
Why? Why? If people are to

513
00:43:20.539 --> 00:43:24.900
me, I like to look at
direct messages, like if people are connecting

514
00:43:25.019 --> 00:43:32.929
with each other and building bonds and
helping each other transform and helping each other

515
00:43:34.170 --> 00:43:40.960
through your course. The fact that
there aren't a ton of Super Engaged slack

516
00:43:42.519 --> 00:43:45.519
threads to me is like a waste
of time and energy. So it really

517
00:43:45.639 --> 00:43:51.960
thinking about your goals and what where
you want people to be in the journey

518
00:43:52.000 --> 00:43:57.670
and how they can support them each
other. Getting there not always about engagement

519
00:43:57.949 --> 00:44:02.710
in a forum or chat room.
It's can sometimes be. Do they show

520
00:44:02.750 --> 00:44:07.269
up to an event and keep their
Webcam on and do they not leave when

521
00:44:07.269 --> 00:44:10.300
you open break out groups because they
trust each other and want to learn from

522
00:44:10.300 --> 00:44:16.019
each other? Are they on twitter
having conversations without you like that's like.

523
00:44:16.380 --> 00:44:22.780
Seeing people start to build connections and
subgroups without you is like a better signal

524
00:44:22.900 --> 00:44:29.530
to me than a Qa or Ama
slack thread. You know, these things

525
00:44:29.530 --> 00:44:32.489
are great. You Shoul always have
activities and people should have things to talk

526
00:44:32.489 --> 00:44:38.239
about, but there are other aspects
and ways to think about success. I'm

527
00:44:38.360 --> 00:44:45.039
curious just in your experience are there
any examples, of course, creators or

528
00:44:45.639 --> 00:44:53.230
newsletter writers or other creators that you
think have really done a great job thinking

529
00:44:53.269 --> 00:45:00.590
about community relative to what they are
putting out there in the world? Two

530
00:45:00.909 --> 00:45:07.110
ones I always refer to and really
love. One is nest labs and they

531
00:45:07.179 --> 00:45:12.300
are they have a ton of events. They have online space for their community,

532
00:45:13.019 --> 00:45:16.139
but just a ton of events that
are sometimes run by community members.

533
00:45:16.340 --> 00:45:22.050
And what I like about what they
do is I'll have like an event every

534
00:45:22.090 --> 00:45:25.969
other day in their community and so
that means they'll be less amount of people

535
00:45:25.969 --> 00:45:30.210
at the event and more connections can
be made versus having like one big blowout

536
00:45:30.730 --> 00:45:36.639
per week where there's like all three
hundred members show up. So I would

537
00:45:36.639 --> 00:45:42.679
check out nest labs. And the
other is Lenny's product community. Started with

538
00:45:42.760 --> 00:45:45.519
a newsletter and now he has a
slack channel and he's done a really good

539
00:45:45.559 --> 00:45:52.989
job at creating strong feedback loops and
selecting insights from his community through the slack

540
00:45:54.030 --> 00:45:59.750
drowing a question up there and seeing
how people respond and then using all the

541
00:45:59.909 --> 00:46:07.099
different fast experiences and in product management
to create new content. I think that's

542
00:46:07.099 --> 00:46:09.940
super cool. It's like what we
should be doing. I mean it kind

543
00:46:09.980 --> 00:46:14.139
of bums me out when I show
up to an event or a slack channel

544
00:46:14.139 --> 00:46:17.690
and everyone's leaning on one person's expertise
and like wow, we all have these

545
00:46:17.730 --> 00:46:22.690
awesome experiences to share and stories to
share and wins and fails and we can

546
00:46:22.730 --> 00:46:25.849
learn so much for each other.
And often we're just staring at one person

547
00:46:25.889 --> 00:46:31.960
and all these brilliant connections and stories
are not being exchanged. I feel each

548
00:46:32.079 --> 00:46:37.840
and my skin. Sometimes a man
happens. So really like opening up your

549
00:46:38.039 --> 00:46:45.079
communities and creating these spaces where people
have the airtime to to share their stories

550
00:46:45.119 --> 00:46:50.590
with each other be so powerful.
I love those examples because it's really an

551
00:46:50.670 --> 00:46:57.070
example of something being powerful, not
only because individuals get to connect and have

552
00:46:57.309 --> 00:47:04.539
those transformational experiences, as you've called
them, but also because that act of

553
00:47:04.659 --> 00:47:10.980
connecting feeds almost like a loop back
into the content that someone is creating or

554
00:47:12.099 --> 00:47:17.690
the product that someone is creating and
really becomes kind of this full circle conversation.

555
00:47:19.690 --> 00:47:23.409
Well, you know, I want
to start wrapping up and I just

556
00:47:23.570 --> 00:47:28.929
want to kind of get a sense
of what are you working on? How

557
00:47:28.969 --> 00:47:34.719
can people support what you're doing?
Yeah, I know you're you're a woman

558
00:47:34.800 --> 00:47:42.079
of many talents, yes, I
I'm big into serendipity and what presents itself

559
00:47:42.119 --> 00:47:45.429
in my life. I will and
gives me energy. I will work on

560
00:47:45.389 --> 00:47:52.309
so I'm in this transitional phase right
now and work in creating content through my

561
00:47:52.389 --> 00:47:59.420
newsletter and the community course and doing
a bunch of consulting some things that are

562
00:47:59.699 --> 00:48:06.780
mixing product and community. So I'm
really interested in using my community programs tool

563
00:48:06.820 --> 00:48:14.090
kit that I've crafted over fifteen years
towards tech and product and how do we

564
00:48:14.170 --> 00:48:22.530
actually create community focused products where we're
really thinking about not just the human experience

565
00:48:22.690 --> 00:48:25.769
but the sort of group experience?
That's something I'm playing around with right now.

566
00:48:27.440 --> 00:48:31.000
And if people wanted to check out
your newsletter or if they wanted to

567
00:48:31.079 --> 00:48:36.199
check out your community program where could
they do that? Yes, you could

568
00:48:36.199 --> 00:48:39.440
follow me on twitter where I tweet
about these things. My handle is Danielle

569
00:48:39.599 --> 00:48:49.070
xo and my news letter is Danielle
xo Dot sub stackcom and the course is

570
00:48:49.150 --> 00:48:57.300
rosy dot land. Awesome. Are
there any final thoughts for future community builders

571
00:48:57.420 --> 00:49:01.460
and Creator based community builders? That
that you think everyone should keep in mind?

572
00:49:02.019 --> 00:49:06.019
Yes, if this gives you anxiety, because we did talk about some

573
00:49:06.179 --> 00:49:12.250
of the anxiousness of building communities.
I always tell people just start by gathering,

574
00:49:13.050 --> 00:49:15.369
you know, could be three,
four or five people, and have

575
00:49:15.889 --> 00:49:22.289
a group call and share your vision, share your mission and ask them what

576
00:49:22.449 --> 00:49:28.199
could we do together that wouldn't be
possible alone? That's such a powerful question

577
00:49:28.320 --> 00:49:30.519
to ask. I'm going to leave
it at that. Yeah, what can

578
00:49:30.599 --> 00:49:36.079
we do together that wouldn't be possible
alone? I love that. Thank you

579
00:49:36.199 --> 00:49:39.150
so much, Danielle, for coming
on today. This has been wonderful and

580
00:49:39.230 --> 00:49:44.429
I know it's going to be so
valuable to people who are listening. Thank

581
00:49:44.510 --> 00:49:54.739
you for having me. You've been
listening to lane change. Our show is

582
00:49:54.860 --> 00:50:00.860
hosted and produced by me Elna Serebriani, with editing help from Steve Woodward.

583
00:50:00.380 --> 00:50:05.739
If you like what you've heard,
please consider leaving a review or visiting lane

584
00:50:05.739 --> 00:50:08.530
change podcom to learn more. Till
next time,