Have you ever noticed why we feel that some online forums are so happening while others are dry and inactive? In some forums, as soon as we post something, we get responses. Have you ever considered why some communities have large memberships, while for others, the memberships are dismally low with the administrator as the only member present? Why do we ' like ' some Facebook pages, while ignore others ? Why do we follow some brands on Twitter while we run away from them scared of their promotions ? When I considered this, I wanted to find out why we join an online community in the first place? After observing the activities inside few of the most happening communities in Orkut and the most discussed posts inside Facebook and Linkedin, I could list out the major reasons why an individual would consider joining an online community.
Cult value: If the community represents a cult brand, an individual would consider joining that community. This cult value serves as the eye catcher and the individual in his desire to be part of something bigger and more happening, joins the community. You might have observed why brands have huge community fan base in those geographic areas where the brand is not even available. A classic example would be a global brand like Ferrari Facebook community that has a membership of 3,306,631 as of January 06, 2010. Remember, India has no authorized dealer for Ferrari cars as per company’s official site.
Functional value: Online communities are also searched to be joined because of their functional value. By functional value, I mean, the direct benefits a member can draw by being a member or fan of a community. With the increase in the number of hours spent by an average online user in social media, brands are considering to come on board to directly interact with the audience. Examples include the activities of the leading mobile operator in India, Airtel on twitter. Airtel uses twitter to directly communicate with its subscribers and to identify various problems faced by them. While Pizza Hut page on Facebook is used again to interact with its pizza lovers and to take pizza orders from them. There are few other service providers who use Facebook page to give out tips to blogging like problogger.net. Individuals may subscribe and be part of these communities just for their functional values like learning new tips, news, information, get discounts, gifts and to take part in contests etc.
Social identity: With the increase in the number of hours spent by an average online user on the social media and on the internet, every individual has a social identity that is derived from his or her actions in the cyber world. To promote online social identity, every individual tries to showcase himself in different online forums or platforms, allows to be influenced by friends by acting the way friends or peers recommend and act, searches out and shares things that are cool, and buzzing just to get noticed. There is also a snob value involved in the actions online to promote ones own social identify. This social identity is particularly evident in the social media behavior of teens, tweens. Without the social value, why would suddenly save tiger campaign promoted by Aircel known as “Stripey the cub” on Facebook, get close to 400 thousand likers. While Wildlife Trust of India, that has been leading the efforts to protect the endangered species in India from the front has a fan base as little as 500. To contradict, several reasons may be pointed out related to the promotion and visibility of the campaign in the media, yet, it is undeniable that the social value derived by being a fan of the ‘Stripey, the cub’ is much more than by being a fan of Wild life trust of India on Facebook.
Force: Yet another reason, why people join a community or a group of people who act the same way, is force. This is especially true in the case of Facebook applications. There are several pointless applications on Facebook such as IQ tests and random “Which character from Star Trek are you?” These are quizzes that force the users to like and allow access to their personal data. Spammers can easily create applications to steal your personal data and all you need to do is to accept an invite. The catch is that you need to make the decision to allow access without knowing what the application will do with it and whether the application needs that information in order to function correctly. "Facebook applications are very popular and once all your friends have downloaded the latest must-have, it's very tempting to follow suit," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos. But he cautions, it is not always safe to have all the “must haves” for online social coolness. This ‘Forced liking’ is also used effectively to promote contests as well on Facebook.
Desire to connect with the likeminded: Yet another reason why one seeks out cool communities is the desire to connect with the likeminded people. This is particularly evident with Linkedin groups where users can join groups with their professional and career interests. Facebook has good hobby based groups and pages. These pages are usually initiated and managed by brands that have business interest in the specific hobby area. An example would be the activities of the brand Wild craft on Facebook. The company uses the page that has close to 500 thousand fans, to promote its own adventure and camping gear by allowing adventure and outdoor activity lovers to interact among themselves and by engaging with the brand. I am a member of this Wild craft adventure community because I love outdoor camping, trekking and adventure sports. I stumbled on this group not knowing the brand as such, but by searching for pages that match my interest. I came to know about this ‘then-a-startup’ company from Bangalore that has very little offline activities and does most of the promotional activities on Facebook and online.
Novelty factors: People also join a community for novelty reasons. This may be due to a funny or weird name or theme of the page. A classic example of this is “Kids Who Hid In Dep't Store Clothing Racks While their Mom Was Shopping” page on Facebook. It has 192790 fans as on Jan 06, 2011. The popularity of the page went up so high that the administrator of the page, Tory, had to disable the wall itself because of the spam cross promotions. Yet another interesting example would be ‘When I was your age, Pluto was a planet’. Tragedies and fake scary stories can also create the needed novelty factor to attract people to join or like a page. “This Girl Killed Herself After Her Dad Posted This on Her Wall” page would be an example.
Above mentioned factors can work alone or in tandem to make a community popular online. The awe or associative or even novelty factors may attract a user into a community. But, in the long run, only the benefits that each member derives by being a member of a community are what would make them stay within the group.
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