It has been recognized that the strength of community participation within a virtual community is in direct proportion to the size of the community so a new small community will have far less participation than a larger one. As the virtual community grows and members increase in numbers so will the desire to contribute and add content by members.

It is important that creators of networks recognise this slow growth because it can become very easy to feel disillusioned by the lack of participation and give up before the community has a real chance to grow. Comparing growth to the growth of a flower is a great analogy. When we plant a seed we wait patiently for the seed to sprout then nurture it to ensure it grows. At first the growth will look slow and then suddenly almost overnight it will seem as If the plant is now fully grown.
More participation begets more participation and the majority of this participation in the new days must come from the network creator.

In “The Economies of Online Cooperation: Gifts and Public Goods in Cyberspace” Peter Kollock (1998) conducted research into what motivates someone to contribute to a virtual community and came up with three distinct motivations that fulfuill the “what’s in it for me” outlook of the large majority of contributors: they are anticipated reciprocity; increased recognition; and sense of efficacy.

Anticipated Reciprocity

A member will contribute to a network, provide valuable help and support, add their knowledge and expertise through blog post and continue to be a useful member of the community in the hope of gaining some reward. That reward will be different for each member. If the network is a business one they may work towards showing their expertise as a way of gaining new clients. They may also be hoping to get help in return so that when they ask a question they need answering other members will go out of their way to help.

Increased recognition

For some members being recognised for the contribution they make to a virtual community is extremely important, not only from other members but also from the community leaders. Other members in this category will be after the prestige of being recognised especially if the leader is a well respected authority or expert in their field. Being noticed by them because of their contribution will play a huge part in motivating and keeping them motivated.
A forum that highlights their most active participants will find that those motivated by recognition will spend more time adding and replying to posts just for the thrill of seeing their name as one of the top contributors.
Sense of efficacy

Members motivated by efficacy will contribute to a community by providing valuable and highly regarded information. They will be recognised for their contribution because what they add to a community has a positive impact on the whole network, which in turn supports their own self image as a effective and useful person.

For the majority of people their motivation for being in a virtual community will be as simple as enjoying a sense of community, leaving behind the feeling of loneliness for those at home alone or without active friendships.

Being able to create a profile as well as read the profile of other members, write interesting discussions and have other members leave a response. Respond to interesting discussions and enjoy the interaction that comes from taking part. Uploading photos and having other members comment on them. All of these factors contribute to creating a sense of community and will be a major motivating factor for many members.

All communities whether offline or online go through a cycle of participation that will see the network activity peak, slow down, rise again, peak again, slow down again – on and on.

New members who join an online group will go through the same initiation process as a person who walks into an established offline group – they will be expected to go through a period of getting to know the members, contributing to discussions and adding to the community before they will be fully accepted.

This is why advertising a business as a new member of a network really doesn’t work. Yes, virtual communities offer a fantastic opportunity to promote what you do and earn a living but not when you join an established community and immediately begin to advertise what you do in a form of “look at me” behaviour.

Giving is paramount in any situation and it is no different online. Giving to receiving, providing value first, sharing what you know – as a participant of an online forum or network this is essential if you want to make a difference and create an impact.

Participation will also be dictated by the facilities available – a blog on it’s own can provide a primary means of connecting with users and giving them a space to air their opinions. A blog with a forum attached now opens up the possibility for members to contribute by adding their own content (commonly known as user generated content) and a blog with a social network provides a safe space for those who want to read and lurk (all communities have their lurkers who do not want to participate actively but enjoying reading) as well as upload more personal items such as video and photos.

Different types of member participation – a life cycle view

In 2000 Amy Jo Kim proposed a life cycle for members of virtual communities. In this cycle it states that

• Members may start off as visitors/lurkers, people who want to take a look at what the community is about.
• Once comfortable they will join and are now new members of the community or novices and begin participating in community life.
• After a sustained period of contributions they become regulars and if they continue to maintain their current level of participation they become leaders.
• Leaders who continue to take an active part in the community move on to become elders.

This life cycle can be applied to any virtual community and it is very common for regulars and leaders to stop contributing for a while before returning – sometimes to their past status and sometimes not.

Another model that highlights the life cycle of a virtual community can be taken from the works of Lave and Wenger who suggest that there are five different model types when it comes to member participation

Peripheral (i.e. Lurker) – This person remains outside the group and is anonymous
Inbound (i.e. Novice) – A new member who has joined and is looking at becoming active in the community
Insider (i.e. Regular) – A regular contributor to a virtual community who will add and take part in discussions as well as join groups.
Boundary (i.e. Leader) – Maintains membership participation, monitors interaction between members and is critical especially at the beginning of a new social network to ensure the virtual snowball effect takes place.
Outbound (i.e. Elder) – A member who has contributed to the group for many years and who will always remain an important member.

There are also members who are ready to move on because the group dynamics have changed, maybe the community has moved in a new direction or has changed the way it operates.

Joining & Non Participation

It is very common for new people to join a network and not take advantage of the services on offer. For some there may be barriers to participating in a social network that makes it difficult for them to join in or time constraints, meaning they join but never get round to coming back and actively taking part.

If you have a small group and the large majority of members find participation difficult this will obviously stunt the growth of your network, and learning aids like video tutorials can make a huge difference.

If participation is an important part of the value system of your organisation then you will want to spend time discovering what causes the lack of participation from each member. The only way to overcome this issue will be to contact each member individually to discover what you can do to help.

While there are a number of motivations for contributing to virtual communities there are also barriers to participation that mean some people will never evolve beyond visitor status, reading posts without the need for replying, maybe even looking through profiles if the network allows and others will join and never really become fully active.

Some of the reasons people visit but never join a network (also know as lurking) include:

Their concerns about the internet and sharing their information

Many people are still concerned about adding their name, photo and other personal information into a virtual community. They will be worried about identify theft and online security in particular the ability for someone to take their details and commit fraud.

Never having participated in a forum

For people who have never participated in a forum they may believe they have nothing of any value to contribute, they may be stopped by the closeness of a community if it has been running for some time or they will have some other limiting belief that makes them feel that contributing just isn’t something they can do.

They are gaining everything they need from visiting

If a potential member finds whatever information they need from what is available without joining then they will have no particular motivation to join and will continue to lurk – this happens in particular in forums.

Unfamiliarity with technology

There are still many people who have never used an online group or forum, will not know how to do things that more experienced members take for granted like uploading photos or writing a blog post and they will need support to become more active members.

Unfriendly group dynamics

When you bring a group of people together it is inevitable that there will be those people who do not get alone or who vary in their opinion on particular topics (religion, sex and politics being the biggest three!) and how this is handled by leaders will have an effect not only on those who are visiting but also new and more established members.

I belonged to a popular online business networking group and eventually became affected by some members who would add insulting comments on forum and blog posts. Eventually I made the decision to no longer contribute and eventually I left because I refuse to spend my time in a network where this behaviour is not managed. Potential visitors can decide not to join if they see other members being “attacked” for expressing their point of view or if they take a hard stance that a potential member does not like.

There may be other reasons that people choose not to actually join a virtual community but instead choose to remain outside as visitors but the above are five common ones that a virtual community will need to be aware of when they start.

The snowball effort within virtual communities is the ability for a community to grow quickly. The creator of a new community will have to spend days or even weeks inviting people to join, participating in the forum and ensuring that lurkers become members by providing quality, informative and educational material.

Eventually as new members enter and invite others the community will then begin to grow but this will only happen if that new member believes that this is a community worth promoting.
If two members invite two new members every day exponential growth will be experienced by the network as 2 becomes 4 and 4 becomes 8 and 8 becomes 16.

To ensure this happens quickly it helps if the following happens when starting a virtual community

• It is started by someone with a large network of people who know, like and trust him/her
• The network has an established group of offline members they can invite to take advantage of their online community
• The “what’s in it for me” factor is very obvious for members e.g. you allow them to start their own blog, advertise their business, work together as a mastermind and help each other etc
• The network creator knows a large number of “sneezers” – people who are sneezers have their own large group and will happily invite their members to join your network when you ask them. If you approach 5 sneezers who run groups with 600 members each then you have the potential of reaching out to 3000 potential members.

There is nothing worse than a computer with only two members on the inside or a new community that contains only 3 members in the last 4 weeks!

This is why having a clear plan about why you are starting your virtual community, who will benefit from being a member and how you will work towards bringing in your first 100 members is vitally important.

A virtual community – also known as an online community, social network, e-community or online network – is a group of people who have come together to interact online using blogs, audio, video, voip services such as skype, instant messaging (Windows live), forums and other forms of online communication more commonly known as web 2.0

The term virtual community is attributed to the book of the same title by Howard Rheingold, published in 1993.

The main identifying factors that constitute a virtual community include

• Interaction takes place online from the members home computer/laptop
• People who have come together do so because they share the same professional, educational, charitable, community based,
  campaigning or similar purpose .
• They may serve as a secondary mode of communication for people who meet offline – e.g. networking groups, mastermind groups
• Members can be part of a local community or can include worldwide participation

Thanks to web 2.0 and the advent of social networks like Myspace and Facebook the way we communicate, advertise and express our thoughts/opinions have changed. Everyone has a voice no matter where they are in the world as long as they have a computer and the internet.

Complete strangers come together because they have a passion for a particular cause, connect and begin to build relationships.

Examples of virtual communities

• Football teams who run a blog and/or forum to reach out to other supporters and keep everyone in touch with what’s happening with their team.
• Social networks that bring together a complete community (e.g. Caribbean community, dancing community, faith based community etc) and allow each member to connect and express themselves and share stories.
• Groups that are set up on popular social networks like Myspace that people can join and connect.
• Fan pages and business pages on Facebook where people who love a particular product, company or person can show their support by joining the fan page.

Significant socio-technological changes have come about as a direct result of the impact of virtual communities. Governments and public sector bodies can no longer afford to ignore what is taking place. Websites are no longer a sufficient medium for participation and involvement.

To be successful a virtual community is heavily dependent on its members to not only remain active but to also invite new members.
If all members accept their responsibility in helping a network grow then it flourishes and grows. Networks depend heavily on an unwritten social contract between members and the biggest contributor of any network – especially at the beginning – must be the network owner.

Viritual communities may have started as a craze of the young adult and teen but has now been recognised as an important trend for businesses as more and more of them take advantage of the opportunity to advertise their brand for free! You will find Dell computers on Twitter, future presidents on Facebook and politicians on Mashable!