Understanding and Motivating Members

He attains his expert status by having accumulated extensive knowledge on a specific topic, either through his position in the association or through personal interest. He now actively contributes this knowledge in the Member Portal. His connection to the association is less emotional than that of the Fan. It is based far more on factual interest in the association’s content-related issues.

Therefore, instead of heated discussions, he needs functioning knowledge management so that he can successfully share his knowledge with other members. To maintain his interest, he always hopes for new sources of knowledge and up-to-date analyses.

The Helper feels partly responsible for the success of the Member Portal. He tries to ensure that all participants understand the functions and advantages of the platform. For this reason, he gladly answers questions from other users and helps them with problems. He is important for a Member Portal, as his willingness to help relieves the community manager of considerable work.

To ensure the Helper never loses motivation, he occasionally needs recognition. Only then does he feel his work is appreciated and will continue to support you. He also needs interested and enquiring members so that he has something to do.

“Order is half of life!”, thinks the Organised One, and ensures in your network too that everything can be found in the right place. He uses platform features such as user mentions or topics to maintain long-term order in the Member Portal. In this way, he ensures that posts can be found via the search function and that the right members are reached. He also hopes for the same organised attitude from other members. Apart from his continual tidying activities, however, he rarely publishes anything himself in the network.

The Silent Reader visits the Member Portal regularly. However, most members are unaware of this because he very rarely joins discussions. Instead, he informs himself about all important content and dates in the Member Portal without taking part in any exchange. For him, it is crucial that all important information can be found in the Member Portal.

According to the 90-9-1 rule, the group of silent readers is often the largest on interactive platforms. Therefore, you should try to motivate this group to participate through questions and clear surveys. Direct approaches also help to turn a silent reader into an active member.

The Offliner avoids the Member Portal as much as possible. This can have several reasons. An Offliner may be a clear opponent of the platform. Often, however, an Offliner is not entirely averse to the network. He simply prefers the tools he is already familiar with. He receives summaries and recommendations by Email. It often takes a little longer to activate the Offliner in the network.

To achieve this, he needs interesting impulses that make him want to take part in what is happening in the Member Portal. Until he brings himself to participate in the Member Portal, the Offliner needs automated summaries. These ensure that, despite his lack of activity in the network, he always stays up to date.

Depending on the composition of the users of your Member Portal, you should involve them in what is happening in different ways. If you notice, for example, that a member is struggling with the functions of the network, you can refer them to the Helper. In many situations, it makes sense to tag power users such as the Fan or the Expert in posts. These types of members will certainly want to take part in most discussions. A certain over- or under-representation of specific types can also reveal problems in your network. If, for instance, there are too many silent readers among your members, resulting in barely any exchange, then there does not seem to be enough interesting content on the platform. In this case, it is sensible to identify potential power users and encourage them to share content. Once a minimum level of communication is in place, some silent readers will also participate more actively in what is happening.

The types presented here in the Member Portal are therefore not definitive. It may happen that the role of your members changes depending on their activity in the network and their interests. For this reason, it is worthwhile identifying the different types in the Member Portal and keeping an eye on them.