Growing online community with volunteer’s help

Course Curriculum

Chapter 1: Introduction

Lecture 1: Introduction

Lecture 2: Introduction to this course

Lecture 3: Recap of the essentials of online community management

Lecture 4: Recap of how to reach a critical mass of users in an online community

Chapter 2: Community growth

Lecture 1: The growth of communities is cyclical

Lecture 2: Three critical growth points: incoming traffic, new users, and engagement

Lecture 3: All activities on the platform should be carried out by the users

Lecture 4: Interim summary

Chapter 3: Asking for help: How to write posts about community initiatives

Lecture 1: How to write posts about community initiatives

Lecture 2: If it is worth communicating, it is worth a story

Lecture 3: The most important thing you want to share

Lecture 4: Narrowing the discussion

Lecture 5: Other tips and tricks

Lecture 6: Interim summary

Chapter 4: Designing activities yourself

Lecture 1: How things get done in online communities: Working with volunteers

Lecture 2: Be persuasive when inviting users to participate in initiatives

Lecture 3: Volunteers need to know what help is needed and how they can contribute

Lecture 4: The sufficient minimum to activate users

Lecture 5: Initiative must be seen as valuable by the users and the general public

Lecture 6: Explain the reasoning behind your requests when reaching out to regular users

Lecture 7: When reaching out to casual visitors, rely on heuristics

Lecture 8: Make the work of volunteers visible to the other users

Lecture 9: Ask specific people for specific help

Lecture 10: Fear and hate are the strongest activators

Lecture 11: Other advice

Lecture 12: Interim summary

Chapter 5: Helping users to connect and form groups based on the shared interests

Lecture 1: Help users to connect and form groups based on the shared interests

Lecture 2: Keep an eye on users’ interests and needs that can complement each other

Lecture 3: Create opportunities for joint activities

Lecture 4: Tell users about other users

Lecture 5: Interim summary

Chapter 6: Find leaders among the users and help them with the initiatives they propose

Lecture 1: Find leaders among the users and help them with the initiatives they propose

Lecture 2: Look for volunteers proactively

Lecture 3: Encourage users to become volunteers

Lecture 4: Make it so it is safe for volunteers to make mistakes

Lecture 5: Volunteers must be autonomous

Lecture 6: Recognize volunteers’ contribution to successful initiatives as much as you can

Lecture 7: If something goes wrong with an initiative, cover for the authors and volunteers

Lecture 8: Maintain trusting relationships with volunteers

Lecture 9: Volunteers are a community within a community

Lecture 10: Interim summary

Lecture 11: Interim summary (together)

Chapter 7: Community Goals

Lecture 1: Community goals

Lecture 2: Goals are what the community is currently working on

Lecture 3: Goals should activate and unite users

Lecture 4: Choose goals that are achievable, finite, and beneficial to the community

Lecture 5: Look for goals that users are interested in

Lecture 6: The interests of the users always have the highest priority

Lecture 7: Any goals are better than no goals

Lecture 8: Mission is an immutable characteristic of a community

Lecture 9: Interim summary

Chapter 8: Social norms and rules

Lecture 1: The only source of new rules is the real cases in your community

Lecture 2: Hosting public discussions of the rules makes the rules legit

Lecture 3: Users must understand and support the rules you create

Lecture 4: Keep the list of official rules short

Lecture 5: If one wants to change rules, they need to prove that the change brings benefits

Lecture 6: Maintain the culture of welcomeness and kindness

Lecture 7: Interim summary

Chapter 9: Final overview

Lecture 1: Final overview

Lecture 2: Overview of the first three courses of the Practical Community Management series