Make your group come alive !
At APSense, groups can be very useful. There are all kinds of groups, some for general information on a topic, some for promoting a specific program or product, others for giving information on getting success with a particular form of marketing.
There are groups that are created then forgotten. In some cases, I joined groups to find there were no subjects!
Now that is weird. Why create the group in the first place? If you want APSense members to join your group, give them a good reason to stay in it.
Also, I suggest you write clearly the group's purpose in the About section. That way, if a member creates an irrelevant subject, you can tell that member to go create that subject elsewhere. If the member doesn't react or respond, you simply delete the subject.
In order to not alienate the member, I will send a PM signifying my intentions. It might happen that the member won't answer the PM. Give him/her a few days. Life happens, he might be away for some time, she might be going through a personal situation.
What I do when t get no response is, I take the time to copy the content of the subject on my PC. Then I delete it. I tell that to the member. That way, you show your professionalism. It might even be good for the relationship, as you showed total respect for the person.
Here are some ways to make your group come alive.
Promote it!
Yes, use some of your credits, launch a campaign. APSense is first and foremost about building relationships. Think long term. That campaign is an investment in your business.
Add subjects regularly
That one should be obvious, right? Well, I see some groups who haven't had a new subject in months. Loss of interest by members of a group is one thing. Loss of interest by the creator is a sad thing. Of course, we all go through changes in out focus and interests. But if you believe there might still be spark somewhere, ignite the fire by adding content.
Add RevPages and Resources
I think many people don't realize how interesting it can be to showcase RevPages that are relevant to the group. Also add resources, which are links to sites relevant to the group's purpose. You'll see tabs for both RevPages and Resources. Add as many as you can. Also, create subjects to tell members to go see the new RevPages and Resources you added recently. Update those subjects by adding "update xxx" where xxx is the date of the latest change.
Stick the most interesting subjects to the top
Doing that will allow the group members to see what the most interesting subjects, or the most entertaining.
Create a subject called TOC, i.e. Table Of Contents
If a group is very active, after some time, there will be many subjects, too many to stick to the top. Well, creating a TOC and sticking it will help to discover the older subjects without having to go through all the pages of subjects. In the TOC, you simply copy the subject titles from the subject tab, the link will be there automatically. It takes some time, but it's worth the effort to get show your dedication.
Add moderators
They will help you with all the tasks mentioned, i.e. adding RevPages, Resources, sticking subjects, maintaining the TOC. A moderator can also police the content of the subjects if any member sees something not relevant to the group.
Write articles and add the link in a subject
This technique will give more shelf life to an article, since new group members will go to read the subject and so will click on the link to read the article. This way, you see comments from all the APSense members who read the article, since it was not limited to the group members.
Write an article that points to a subject
This technique allows you to get more members to join the group. They have to, if they want to read the comments. Also, they might not have known the existence of the group.
Add recommended groups
Chances are, other groups at APSense will talk about topics that are related to your group's purpose. You can add 5 of those groups in a section specifically for that. Other group links can also be put in the Resources tab.
Here's a video about using group features efficiently.
There are other videos like this one here.
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