Kickstarting Online Communities: Con Edison Case Study

PROPRIETARY & CONFIDENTIAL
Kick Starting Online Communities:
Best Practices to Engage Audiences Through the
Power of Community
Case Study: Con Edison
May 22, 2013
Sandra Fathi
President, Aﬀect
sfathi@aﬀect.com
@sandrafathi
WOMM-U, Chicago

OVERVIEW
KICK STARTING COMMUNITIES
1.  Is a Community Right for You?
2.  Choosing Your Technology
3.  Planning & Launch
4.  Driving Membership & Participation
5.  Maintaining & Measuring Engagement
6.  Case Study: Con Edison’s Power of Giving Online Community

•  Is your target audience active online? (e.g. social
networks, forums, blogs etc.)
•  Is your brand active online? Do your followers
regularly engage with you?
•  Do you have a steady stream of unique content to
communicate?
•  Does your brand have customer/employee
advocates that are eager to engage?
•  Do you have the internal resources to manage a
community on a daily basis?
IS IT RIGHT FOR YOUR BRAND?

Before deciding to launch a new community, remember to :
•  Look Before You Leap
•  Deﬁne Goals & Objectives / Desired Business Impact
•  Experiment With Engagement Through Social
•  Assign Internal Resources
•  Understand Your Technology Options
•  Think About the Future (Long-term vs. short-term impact)
IS IT RIGHT FOR YOUR BRAND?

CHOOSING YOUR
TECHNOLOGY
1.  Build It
2.  Buy It
3.  Rent It
4.  Hybrid
1.  Analytics
2.  Cost
3.  Time-to-Market
4.  Resources
5.  CRM
Tech Options Requirements

EXAMPLE:
NING vs. LITHIUM
1.  Simple Customization
2.  No CRM Integration
3.  Fast and Easy Launch
4.  Standard UI
5.  Lower Cost/No Cost
1.  High-Level of Customization
2.  Integration w/ Salesforce
3.  Time Consuming Build
4.  Customizable UI
5.  Higher Cost (based on
requirements)
Ning Lithium

EXAMPLE: NING

EXAMPLE: LITHIUM

If you build it, will they come?
PLANNING & LAUNCH

LAUNCH TOOLKIT
1.  Community Usage Policy
2.  Administrator Workﬂow Plan
3.  Content Strategy
4.  Community Response Map/FAQ
5.  Technical Recommendations
6.  Internal/External Communications Launch Program

•  Utilize a well-designed, easy-to-use interface
•  Create a content plan/editorial calendar
•  Identify and train internal community admins
•  Identify and train customers, partners, inﬂuencers
(exclusivity sells)
•  Schedule launch promotion – hit users on their preferred
channels (e.g. social media, traditional marketing, PR)
•  Pre-populate the community with content
•  Determine KPI’s to measure success
PRE-LAUNCH TIPS

Once you’ve built it, how do you keep them coming back?
DRIVING MEMBERSHIP &
PARTICIPATION

DRIVING MEMBERSHIP &
PARTICIPATION

•  6 Month Promotion Plan that includes:
•  Weekly communication with current users
•  Monthly promotion to non-users
•  Ambassador activation strategy
•  Employee engagement strategy
•  Oﬄine promotion strategy (e.g. marketing collateral)
•  Content refresh schedule
•  Weekly measurement/KPI’s
ENGAGEMENT TOOLKIT

•  Be consistent and creative with promotion eﬀorts, don’t
give up!
•  Promote new community content externally to drive
traﬃc
•  Ask ambassadors to share expertise on topics of their
choice, use incentives/contests to drive participation
•  Include a call-to-action in posted content to drive
conversation and engagement
•  Hold back on over-promoting your brand and services –
focus on third-party content (e.g. articles, infographics and
statistics) – use the 80/20 rule
MEMBERSHIP &
PARTICIPATION TIPS

You built it, they came. But did it impact your business?
MAINTAINING & MEASURING
ENGAGEMENT

MAINTENANCE &
MEASUREMENT TOOLKIT
1.  Community Engagement KPIs
2.  Technical Tripwires
3.  Formalized Measurement Template
4.  Expansion Strategy (to be implemented aer 6 months)
5.  Communicate Success to Leadership
6.  Big Ideas to Maintain Engagement

•  Keep the community fresh by incorporating multimedia
(e.g. videos, photos, executive insights)
•  Consistently identify new prospects to join the
community, ask current members to recruit their network
•  Promote the community across all marketing channels,
online and oﬄine (e.g. tradeshows/events, social media)
•  Track qualitative and quantitative metrics on a monthly
basis to see community growth and value. Examine
business impact (e.g. web traﬃc + quality of conversion)
MAINTENANCE &
MEASUREMENT

SAMPLE METRICS
1.  # of New Visitors
2.  # of Returning Visitors
3.  # of Registered Users
4.  % of Active Members
5.  # of Engagements
6.  # of Member Posts
7.  # Leads Generated
1.  Content Popularity
2.  Language & Tone
3.  Sense of Community
4.  Quality of Engagement
5.  Relevancy of Content
6.  Speed of Replies
7.  Inﬂuencers/Ambassadors
Quantitative Qualitative

Case Study: Con Edison
Power of Giving Online Community

Con Edison operates one of the most complex electrical
power systems in the world, serving New York City and
Westchester County.
•  3.3 million customers
•  Population of over 9 million people
•  660 square mile service territory
•  Hundreds of strategic partners
POWER OF GIVING
ONLINE COMMUNITY
CASE STUDY: CON EDISON

Con Edison’s Power of Giving Program provides ﬁnancial or
in-kind support to hundreds of organizations whose activities
advance strong, vibrant and stable communities.
The program extends beyond cash grants and is enhanced by
a strong and loyal corps of employees, a robust board
participation program, partnerships and collaborations and
an education matching gi program.
POWER OF GIVING
ONLINE COMMUNITY

STRATEGIC PARTNERS

•  Enhance non-proﬁt partners’ access to Con Edison and
strengthen communication
•  Build and improve partner support and satisfaction
•  Strengthen connections and communication between Con
Edison partners, empower them to share resources to
promote collaboration
•  Reputation management during times of crisis (e.g. natural
disaster, power outages etc.)
POG ONLINE COMMUNITY
GOALS & OBJECTIVES

•  30-day launch
•  Simple customization
•  Easy-to-use technology, must support Google Analytics
•  Ability to manage community with 1-2 team members
•  Ability to access community from mobile devices
•  Ability to send communications directly to members
•  Forums/discussion boards for users
•  Ability to upgrade UI/customization as community grows
REQUIREMENTS

•  Customized email invitation to ‘Insiders’ (invited ﬁrst)
•  Customized email invitation to partners by area of interest
(e.g. arts & culture, education etc.)
•  Insiders invited to contribute content and receive
administrative permissions
•  Oﬃcial launch at Power of Giving forum event (partners
invited to sign-up onsite)
•  Weekly email communication to users from Con Edison
highlighting new posted content
•  Con Edison Program Managers trained to invite partner
contacts
LAUNCH STRATEGY

550
Members
1 Year Post-Launch
New Members Every
Week
145
Blog Posts
Posted by Users
300+ photos and
videos
8-10 Average
Minutes On
Site
POWER OF GIVING
ONLINE COMMUNITY

BLOG

EVENT BOARD
The events board is used
weekly by members to
promote events that are
happening within their
organizations.

•  Social Impact Measurement Group: 34 active members
•  PR & Media Relations Best Practices Group: 32 active members
•  Arts & Culture Group: 28 active members
•  Social Media Bootcamp: 22 active members
GROUPS

ENGAGEMENT SNAPSHOT
Members ask Con
Edison for input and
feedback on hot topics.

REPUTATION MANAGEMENT
Hurricane Sandy
updates received over
250 views by members

WOMM-U
Kick Starting Online Communities:
Best Practices to Engage Audiences Through the
Power of Community
May 22, 2013
Sandra Fathi
President, Aﬀect
sfathi@aﬀect.com
@sandrafathi

Kickstarting Online Communities: Con Edison Case Study

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