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Key things to think about when starting a new community or adding your groups to Communities on WhatsApp.
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103: How to Engage and Grow a Community

10 MIN READ

People join communities to access information, connect with like-minded individuals, be inspired, and work together towards a common goal. To grow your community, you should create a space that fulfils your members’ needs and enables meaningful and deep connections. Learn how to get creative in communicating information and content, and encourage members to get involved, interact, and contribute to a healthy, positive and active community.

Encouraging and managing active involvement

Communities thrive when members are active participants. As an admin you can influence how your members connect and interact by striking the right balance between creating regular, meaningful communication and overloading members with information that becomes spam or noise.

Let’s look at some pointers for growing and engaging your community.

A welcoming and positive community attracts new members to join and creates a healthy and supportive environment for all the members.
Think about how you might like to welcome new members. An individual welcome from a community admin or group admin can be very encouraging. You should also include information on the community's purpose and rules to help them to navigate, feel comfortable, and participate confidently.
As more members join, your community and group admins can also help build engagement by connecting individuals with similar interests to each other. At some point, these newly connected members may want to form another group within your community.
How to create and invite into a group
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To encourage participation, it is important that community and group admins are present, friendly, and approachable. Being social and interactive allows members to get to know you and helps to build trust. Once you have established this trust, it's easier for members to feel comfortable coming to you with questions or participating in the groups themselves.
Some members might need ideas about what to share or talk about. Asking easy, relevant, and open-ended questions is a great way to generate responses and increase participation. When group members do start responding, reply to them directly to let them know that their voice matter. Responding directly to members will make them feel heard and valued within the community.
Minimize noise and confusing messages within your groups and community to keep members interested and involved. Make sure that announcements are clear, relevant, and well timed. Also remind members regularly to use the “reply” function, to keep conversations in groups organised and on topic.
How to send message reactions
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The type of content shared depends heavily on the purpose of your community. Consider what your members hope to get out of the community and groups. If it’s to share information around a common cause, regular content on that topic will be valuable. If it’s for social support, admins could post resources or opportunities to connect.
Get creative with your community and group admins. Consider sharing content in different formats through text, videos, images, voice notes, GIFs, and more. Scheduled group calls can also be an effective way to encourage interaction and can be a welcome change from continuous messages.
It is important to make sure the groups are fit for purpose. Over time, groups may become too large for everyone to find the same content relevant. Sorting groups into smaller groups with more aligned interests, can deepen the conversations and assist you in deciding what information to keep within groups and what to broadcast across the community.
How to send voice messages
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It is good practice to seek feedback from your community regularly. Work with your group admins to ask your members what kind of information they find valuable, what they don’t, and what they would like more of.
If participation is dropping, it is important to understand what might have caused this. Are there any challenges preventing interaction such as information overload, negative and disrespectful comments, or misinformation being shared?
Some members like to comment and respond to everything, whereas others prefer to observe ongoing discussions without necessarily participating. Remember that the quieter members are still getting value from your community, even if they are not as active as others.
Finally, if members are leaving the community, it is a good idea to ask them for feedback. However, please remember to respect those members who leave and do not want to engage in further communication or feedback.
How to reply to a message

In summary:

Welcome all newcomers and share information about the community’s purpose and rules;
Interact with your community and groups while encouraging your members to get involved;
Get creative in generating content that is meaningful and beneficial for your members;
Seek feedback regularly to ensure you stay relevant to your members’ needs and interests.

What’s next…

Boundaries provide guidelines and set the limits for acceptable behavior and content. Understand how to manage and prevent misinformation, bullying, and other harm.

Back to 102: Being a Good Community Admin

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200: Establishing Boundaries and Maintaining a Good Community Atmosphere