Where's Your Online Community?

"Build a community and you're building a business." That's the new and proven business model in cyberspace.

Hotmail.com, Geocities.com, ICQ.com. The list goes on and on. These companies (and thousands like them) have built thriving online businesses based on that model.

It's quite simple really. If enough "netizens" gather at your site, finding a way to create revenue is easy!

You can sell them your products or services. You can invite others to market to them and take a percentage. You can collect advertising dollars. You can even invent your own revenue model. The whole idea is this: when you create an online community, a solid customer base simply comes along for the ride.

Now, let's scale things down a bit. I realize that, like myself, many small business owners do not have the type of capital it requires to create their own Hotmail or Geocities business model. But that's not to say you can't take advantage of the community building model!

Here's a prime example....

Visit http://bizweb2000.com/wwwboard and you'll see one of these "scaled down" communities. That URL is the address of my "CyberMarketing InfoBoard". It is simply a self-propelled community where anyone and everyone can go to learn about Internet marketing. Got a question? Ask it there. Got a solution to someone else's dilemma? Post your answers there.

Perhaps a bulletin board would tie in nicely at your site? After all, a "Q & A forum" fits in well with just about any subject matter, and it makes for a nice community! If you're looking for repeat visitors to your site, you won't find a better way to get them.

Before you jump right in though, here are a few tips to consider before setting up a bulletin board at your site.

1. Wait until you have a decent flow of traffic to your site before you open your board for business. A very slow board can be worse than no board at all. If visitors stop by your board and there are just a handful of posts over a long period of time, they may not return.

2. Choose a simple bulletin board interface like the one I use at my board. Not only is it easy to navigate, it is simple to moderate and remove posts as necessary. (More on selecting an interface on the next page.)