it was a miss.
A year ago yesterday in Los Angeles, the world shut down. My good buddy Emmett Armstrong (OnRamp Data – also a company of one, by design!) and I reconnected and naturally began brainstorming how we could come together to support one of our shared industry verticals – motion designers and agencies.
The big idea was to create a free remote-first community now that the world was seemingly all virtual. As we both have been virtual ourselves for many years, the big shift of 2020 thankfully didn’t have a drastic impact on our workflow. It seemed like a no-brainer that we could help others ease into the transition!
Although we had every intention it would become a success, it was a total miss. 😳 We ultimately put things on hold indefinitely.
However looking back to our “failed” experience – we learned SO much about what it takes to launch and maintain an online community.
Note: Emmett and I have similar and yet complimentary disciplines. It was really natural divvying up the work. There was no ego. It was one of the most pleasant work match-ups I’ve ever had.
IMO, the value of our learnings far outweighs the miss. So here’s my take on it:
We lacked a clear goal for the group
We got caught up in the “remoteness” – this simple identifier became the end-all to our messaging.
Now don’t get me wrong, the preliminary beta marketing was great (some would say mysterious, which created a lot of FOMO)! We had almost 400 members from our short launch efforts and 20+ people from around the globe (literally, up at 3AM to join us West Coasters) attended our Zoom Launch Party 🎉
We failed to think long-term on how the group would be sustainable if we were not continually leading events, adding new members, and hosting the “party.”
We prematurely thought that if we brought all these peeps together in one virtual sandbox, that they would naturally have conversations and help one another (gigs, advice, tools, etc.). But against our better judgement, we experienced that the community consist of mostly CONSUMERS, not HOSTS.
But, that’s not the member’s faults! We didn’t create clear enough objectives that aided our community to want to take the reins as a party HOST themselves. We sort of just assumed them to be from Day 1… and you know what they say about ASSuming… 😉
🔑: Don’t start creating until you have a solid direction on the short and long term goals. Sure, magic happens while in the thick of production… but that’s purely icing. You gotta have the goals outlined to keep you (and your team) in check.
We were jazzed by features
50% of our efforts pre-launch were designing/creating a custom website. I haven’t made Photoshop mockups for a website in YEARS, but here I was getting my Adobe nerd on.
Cut to the fun part – we ended up TRASHING the entire site shortly after discovering Mighty Networks. 😆 It had almost every feature we mentioned in our brainstorms and more.
A couple months later, I shared Mighty Networks with my client who has a super niche community. The UI, built in pay-walls for premium groups and courses, as well as notifications/mobile app made it super simple to get the heck off Facebook. I can’t say enough good things about it. (If you want to check it out and end up using it, feel free to use my Mighty Networks referral link).
🔑: If you’re not looking to get into the business of developing platforms… steer clear on putting all your effort into custom features. There’s an infinite amount of platforms out there (ready to go with some minimal tweaks/branding updates) for you to test your beta concept.
We were not able to deliver on a BIG need
Roughly 80% of the members in the community were freelancers (~20% agencies). Many of which were looking for work. Our aspirations of matching these people/teams together was a quest much bigger than ourselves. Alas, by not defining these goals from the get-go, we were not prepared.
🔑: If you’re looking for a motion design/artist gig (or want to hire top talent)… our buddy Neil Berkeley has got you. Booq connects freelancers with studios. Get in on the beta testing here: https://app.youbooq.me
We were not consistent
#LifeHappens. Our intentions were to support this niche-community, but we let our clients and personal lives take priority.
It was around late-spring/early summer when a wave of opportunity hit my inbox. Emmett has his first baby 👶. I got engaged to my LOML 💍. Because we chose to focus on other areas (rightfully so), we were not consistent with this community.
🔑: Managing a social community requires you to go ALL in. I discovered that as much as I love hosting IRL parties, I couldn’t maintain a virtual one that needs TLC 24/7. Defining the goals, creating the strategy, and consulting on social media communities and overall communication is way more my speed and something I’ve done for years. So if you love it, great! But if you don’t and require a team to take the load off your hands, you might want to read this first.
💕If you were in this community and are reading this now, I’m sorry we dropped off the map last year and were not able to support you. It means so much to both of us that you join and participated in our events while they lasted!
…The list goes on, but we will call it right now for today’s already-too-late-to-send-Friday-email-but-gonna-do-it-anyway 🙃…
FINAL GOLDEN NUGGET
Strategy/marketing people are no different than YOU when it comes to developing, launching, and maintaining a thing.
To be honest, we’re worse because we know better. We’ve just come to the realization that we find more joy in doing it for other people so we can avoid it ourselves. Ok, maybe that last tidbit is just me. 🤣
No matter if it’s in your personal/biz life, on/off-line, with a client/friend/family member, we all create and experience total “misses.” Yet, it doesn’t have to be the end of your story. Own up to them, embrace your learnings, and do better next time.
Here’s to unpacking and celebrating your “misses!”