How Community Strengthens Your Association’s Offerings
With association growth and evolution come expansion of offerings to their larger community. While membership, certifications, and events continue to be a core offering within these organizations, we also see new products that offer learning and skill development as a different way to engage prospective members or to respond to changes in the market. And while adaptation is necessary to an association’s evolution, it’s also important for you to think about how you gather feedback and voice of the customer insights as part of that.
Relying on surveys and emails or generic inbox to understand whether what you’ve built is useful, what features are desired by users, or what’s working help, but only to an extent. The fact of the matter is, if you are putting something out to the market for consumption (product, certifications, etc.), it’s beneficial to provide a space for those using it to have their voice be heard. Online communities are spaces to ask questions, share knowledge, find solutions, and connect. All things that are integral to product development, as well. Companies like Samsung and Fitbit rely on community to ensure that their customers are getting what they need out of their products, that they can connect those customers and allow them to share their experiences, and to develop a relationship with those customers that garners trust. And while associations aren’t solely product-focused, that doesn’t make this any less important.
Community feeds innovation
Whatever you have put out to the market – whether that be a new certification, a new eLearning course, or new product – those who are utilizing it expect to be able to quickly provide feedback, make suggestions, and look for solutions. As the person owning that product/service/experience, you’ll want to know that information sooner rather than later and be able to have friction-free exchanges with your users, especially if there is an issue. Online communities are an easy way to enable those exchanges and gives you a glimpse into things you may not have been thinking about while you were building. Community members use these spaces to be candid about what they love, what they don’t love, and what would be helpful in the future. This is a great way to feed your development roadmap for the future.
Solutions abound
The great thing about communities is that the people who engage in these spaces are largely motivated to help one another – to contribute for the benefit of the whole. Users often share solutions they’ve uncovered already by contacting customer support or reporting issues through other means. What this translates to is less calls to customer support, less emails that are waiting for replies, and faster time to solution for your users. This not only improves the user experience, but positively impacts the business and the relationship that people have with your association overall.
Surveys will only get you so far
Surveys don’t build relationships. Surveys don’t allow you to get deeper feedback without some level of intentional follow-up. They are a great way to baseline whether you are moving in the right direction and can provide some key information to help you move forward, but many times the context of that feedback is missing. Online communities give you a direct connection to real-time data and insights and give people direct access to the people building something on their behalf. It provides a necessary exchange that helps ensure that their voices are heard and that you are connected to your user base. Surveys are helpful but are not the only means of getting the feedback that you need.
Conclusion
Associations build communities in a multitude of ways but think less about community building when it comes to products and services. This is a big miss, and it doesn’t have to be daunting. Strategically including it in your larger community strategy gives you a larger picture around engagement, connection, and meeting organizational goals. The opportunity is there when we don’t silo the experiences and points of connection.
How have you used community for product development in your association? Tell us in the comments below!