Online Communities Creating A Lot Of Interest

By Doug Caverly

Participate and customers will come?


Type, type, and type some more if you want, but content creation isn't everything. In fact, new data - although it isn't quite the same as the results of comprehensive survey - indicates communities might be much more important to people.

Anita Campbell thought to compare the phrases "online content" and "online community" using Google Trends. In terms of search volume, that first phrase showed up at a much lower rate; it tended to underperform in terms of news reference volume, as well.

So what does this mean? Well, it's possible everyone is just thinking about how the recession could kill off all the Facebook and MySpace wannabes. What seems more likely, though, is that there's a genuine interest in online communities. Our own David Utter hit on some of the ramifications.

Creating a community from scratch would be a big undertaking, of course, but you can always become more involved with existing sites. Create profiles, groups, and whatever else seems appropriate while trying to form genuine connections and not just spamming everyone in sight.

Campbell wrote, "Small business owners and entrepreneurs have learned that you can develop relationships online and those relationships do lead to real business. It's not just a theoretical nice idea or an excuse to justify wasting time online. Money is changing hands as a result of online relationships."