From Audience to Community
You worked hard to build an audience. Now you have an opportunity to turn that audience into the foundation of a participating community.
Your followers do not need another reason to buy something from you. They need reasons to stay connected, discover opportunities, save, earn rewards, support businesses and organizations, attend events, and become part of something useful.
The Lesson 4 Shift
Old model: Grow followers → promote → sell → start over.
Coordinator model: Grow followers → invite participation → build relationships → create community activity → attract more followers.
And it can begin for free.
What You Will Learn
Lesson 4 teaches you how to change the relationship with your audience and begin building a participating community.
Reconnect
Move away from constant promotion and give followers a new reason to stay connected to you.
Activate
Invite people to participate, discover, save, earn, attend, support, refer, and become involved.
Expand
Keep growing your followers because every new relationship can become another doorway into the community.
Your Followers Are People, Not Inventory
The first step is changing how you think about the audience you already built.
Many creators and influencers have spent years introducing products, brands, sponsorships, affiliate links, and offers to their followers. That can create income, but repeated promotion can also create fatigue. Followers may begin to wonder what they are being sold every time they hear from you.
Your first job as a Community Coordinator is not to sell your followers something else. Your first job is to give them a different reason to stay connected to you.
Your followers are consumers, employees, parents, business owners, service providers, independent sellers, event organizers, volunteers, supporters, and members of local organizations. They have relationships throughout their communities. When you begin helping those people participate instead of simply asking them to purchase, your audience can begin becoming a community.
Start With A Free Invitation
Do not immediately monetize your audience again.
The Old Conversation
Buy this. Try this. Use my code. Click my link. Here is today's sponsor.
The New Conversation
Come participate with me. Discover opportunities. Save. Earn rewards. Support businesses and organizations. Get involved.
Consumers can begin participating with Webigo for free. Businesses and service providers can also begin for free. That allows the Coordinator to lead with value and participation instead of another sales pitch.
Coordinator principle: Webigo should give you more things to talk about, not one more thing to constantly sell.
The Audience-To-Community Flywheel
Participation creates activity, and activity gives you useful stories and reasons to communicate.
The goal is not to stop creating content or stop growing followers. Your content now has a broader purpose. New businesses, service providers, rewards, events, Discovery Paths, community stories, schools, nonprofits, charities, savings opportunities, and member accomplishments can all become useful content that helps the community grow.
Lesson 4 Supporting Articles
Use these five articles to learn the complete audience-to-community process.
Your Audience Is More Valuable Than You Think
Recognize the relationships, trust, contacts, knowledge, and opportunities already inside the audience you built.
Read Full ArticleStop Selling. Start Inviting.
Learn how to change the conversation from repeated promotion to free participation and shared value.
Read Full ArticleTurn Followers Into Participants
Show followers how to discover, save, earn rewards, attend, support, refer, and become involved.
Read Full ArticleGive Your Community Reasons To Stay Connected
Use ongoing community activity to create useful communication instead of another stream of sales messages.
Read Full ArticleGrow Your Audience. Grow Your Community.
Keep building your follower network because every new follower can expand relationships, participation, and your Coordinator portfolio.
Read Full Article
Lesson 4 Key Takeaways
Remember these principles as you begin changing your audience relationship.
Do Not Start Over
Your existing audience is the starting point. Use the trust and relationships you have already built.
Participation Before Monetization
Invite people to begin free and give them reasons to participate before thinking about upgrades or revenue.
Keep Growing
Your current followers are not the ceiling. Continue creating useful content and expanding your network.
Action Exercise
Start mapping the community that may already exist inside your audience.
Identify people already in your audience or personal network who may fit into these groups: consumers, local businesses, service providers, home-based or independent sellers, event organizers, schools, nonprofits, charities, and community leaders. Then write down three ways you could invite them to participate without asking them to buy anything.
Knowledge Check
Answer these questions to reinforce the Lesson 4 foundation.
Lesson 4 Complete
You now understand how to begin turning an existing audience into a participating community, while continuing to grow the follower network that can expand that community.