Community engagement
Definition
Community engagement, in a nutshell, is all about crafting a coherent set of processes to nurture the members and investing in member development.
This boosts the number of active people are in your community. An active community builds more value and helps members create stronger relationships.
Encouraging community engagement typically requires effort during the early stages of growth. But as you gain more members, engagement may occur organically.
Why is community engagement important?
If community members don’t engage with your content, they are unlikely to keep coming back which can affect your growth rate. Communities with high levels of engagement are likely to have high retention.
How to encourage community engagement?
The best way to encourage engagement is to ensure your community has a clear, worthwhile purpose. If this is the case, engagement will often occur organically.
Beyond this, community managers can encourage engagement by seeding content and organizing AMAs, webinars, or discussions. Good moderation also helps, as it ensures conversations stay valuable and on-topic.
For more engagement ideas, check out our list of over 70 tactics.
How to measure engagement?
You’ll get a good idea of community engagement just by monitoring your community. But there are plenty of metrics that provide a more in-depth view.
Consider tracking the number of users, new posts, and repeat visitors to see how people are interacting with your community. See a full list of
community metrics here.
Related terms
A brand community is a space where customers and people interested in your brand can interact. These people are brought together by a collective interest in your company, its products, and your values.
Community flywheel is the idea that by introducing customers into a community, they become central to your brand’s growth efforts.
