In 2011, you built your online communities to a fair amount of fans and followers. Now what?

A community is nothing without engagement. In order for your communities to grow and flourish, you need active participants. A group of 300 engaged brand advocates is a much more powerful resource than a group of 30,000 passive followers.

Here are 6 proven techniques that every brand can use to encourage engagement and discussion via online communities.

1. Fresh Content

Your community is unlikely to engage if nothing ever changes on your website. Not only that, but Google’s ranking algorithm won’t think twice about kicking you while you’re down. It’s important to keep your communities informed about the latest updates and issues of interest.

Post relevant and interesting articles, news stories, and blogs regularly. Your community will come to see you as an expert resource, which means increased sharing and engagement.

2. Mixed Media

Creating and sharing different types of media is a great way to add variety to your content and produce positive engagement results. Working with multiple media types opens the door for repurposing content. A point from your last blog post might make an interesting 3-minute video tutorial. Don’t get stuck in a blogging rut – mix it up!

3. One-on-One Contact

Contacting your community members individually is a great way to build solid foundations and brand loyalty. Individual interaction shows your fans and followers that you really appreciate them. With online communities, even large brands can show their caring, mom-and-pop side.

Thank them for sharing their comments and answering calls to action. You might also want to suggest content that may interest them or direct them towards other actions in order to build long-term engagement. Remember, provide them with value and you’ll set yourself up for success.

4. Ask Away

Asking a simple question is often recognized as an effective way to spark conversation. People are more likely to respond when they are directly addressed with a question and their opinions are valued. So, try asking your community members what they thought about your latest blog post.

Dig for feedback from the entire community and truly listen to what they have to say. Remember, companies pay big dollars to get this kind of product feedback! At the same time, don’t neglect asking one-on-one questions. If you’re trying to reach out to someone new, a direct question will help hook him or her.

All of this only works if the questions you ask matter to your community and are relevant to your audience. So take the time to understand what your audience reacts to. Moms, for example, are more likely to answer questions about Kim Kardashian than Fight Club.

5. User-Generated Content

Pay extra attention to what community members themselves initiate. It’s one thing for users to respond to your content and questions, but it says even more when users come forward themselves. Identify trends in the topics they’re interested in. Do many of them want to talk about family, sports or a specific television show?

Brands lose a bit of control with online communities. This might result in some complaints and criticism, which shouldn’t be ignored. Alienating critical users may show you have something to hide. Apologize for the user’s experience and offer real solutions. Who says you can’t turn an unhappy camper into your new biggest fan?

6. Be Genuine & Promote Openness

People like to interact with people, not brands. Your fans and followers are more likely to engage when your brand seems approachable. It’s time to drop the cold, professional front and be real! Remember, you can’t fake being genuine and open – just be your loveable self.

The role of a community manager is to build and develop the brand’s own online communities, as well as communities of interest and communities that impact the organization. A community manager is an essential role for brands that want to take charge of their social channels (online or offline) and benefit from everything they have to offer.

With that said, there is no universal job description for a community manager. Actual roles and responsibilities will vary by brand and industry. Focus may be placed on customer service, marketing or sales, product development, awareness, or a mixture of all these. Regardless of focus, however, some aspects of the process will always stay the same.

Monitor & Observe

Being a community manager means scanning all news feeds and social streams several times a day. It means looking for relevant news articles, blog posts and other media that is of interest to the community. These media are intended to fuel conversation and develop community.

Community managers also perform routine scans and searches for particular topics, keywords and brand terms in order to reveal relevant conversations and commenting opportunities.

Share & Engage

Despite popular belief, building community is not about collecting as many fans and followers as possible. What’s the point of 5k followers if none are willing to contribute or talk about your brand? The experienced community manager knows that quality, not quantity, is supreme.

As in real life, better conversations occur in trusted relationships. Part of the community manager’s role is to build and maintain the trust of the community. This is done by always letting your community know you have their backs.

Effective community managers take care of the community’s interests and opinions. Post applicable updates and tweets. Ask questions to show that you value your community’s opinions. Schedule messages to spread out your visibility and share throughout the day.

Community managers constantly check comments, messages and shares on all social channels. They make comments and write replies as they are necessary.

Revisit & Repeat

Community managers also review analytics for the brand’s blog and other relevant metrics such as RSS subscribers, e-mail subscribers, information product downloads and sales leads. Software, training and practice make such things possible.

It is obvious that online community management is much more of an art than an exact science. The role of the community manager will change with the needs of the community. The conversation will increase as the community does (if you’re doing it right). As a result, communities will become more and more demanding as timeliness is key.

Community management is not your everyday 9-5 job. It’s very time-consuming and the results are not always visible immediately. Community management is an endless process that requires constant attention and revision – building a community is nothing like running an advertising campaign. For this reason, community managers are curious by nature. They’re always looking to learn more.

Above all else, it is important to understand that communities do not want to be managed. Instead, they want to be cared for and supported. Online communities need more of a master of ceremonies than a directive manager.

Once your brand’s blog has a steady flow of traffic, it’s probably a good time to start thinking about monetizing. After all, your brand is going to be blogging anyway and monetizing is a great way to earn some extra cash in the process.

Making money with your corporate blog is far easier than with a general interest blog. Your brand’s blog attracts a more specialized, niche audience. The more concentrated and focused your audience is, the simpler it is to monetize. This is because visitors to your blog are already looking for specific products and information.

As a result, you have many more options available when it comes to making money. To help you get started, we’ve listed a few basic opportunities below.

Advertising

You have the choice to advertise empty space on your blog. Pay-per-click (PPC) and cost-per-thousand (CPM) ads are the most popular and widely used monetizing options. Google AdSense specializes in PPC advertising. Based on your content, AdSense delivers relevant advertisements and pays you every time someone clicks on them.

How much money you make will vary, of course. Advertisers bid on certain keywords. So how much you earn will depend on your blog’s niche and the particular keywords you use. Obviously, keywords with high bids generate more income per click. So, when using this method, be sure to be keyword-focused while writing your blog posts.

Unlike CPC, CPM ads pay per impression. In order for you to earn money, viewers don’t need to click the ad – they just need to see it. All you need to provide is a space. The downside is that CPM ads pay very little, but they’re still a good option to use in combination with other monetization methods.

You’ll have to monitor both CPC and CPM ads quite frequently to make sure they’re properly targeted. Small tweaks help ensure they are generating the most possible clicks (and income). Make changes as you see fit.

Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is another common way to monetize your blog. In order for you to receive a commission, viewers actually have to do something: buy, register or fill out a survey. Needless to say, these are the highest paying advertisements.

Again, you’ll need to watch how relevant and applicable the ads are to your content. For example, if you’re promoting an eBook on your blog to earn affiliate commissions, you’ll want to ensure it’s on a topic your readers are interested in.

Products & Services

It is very simple for a brand to sell its products and services on a corporate blog. Whether it’s consulting, copywriting or home repair, businesses can market their particular services using their corporate blogs.

Businesses can offer webinars for a fee, write and promote an eBook, or even launch a new app. Brands can also post product reviews on their blog with links to purchasing information. This method is more manageable as it doesn’t involve worrying about external advertisements.

Merchandising

Lots of brands partner with companies that will print custom t-shirts, mugs and other promotional items. You could have your swag developed and offer it via your blog.

Sounds simple, right? It’s an option that many brands overlook. Believe it or not, your brand advocates will be interested in your merchandise.

As with most money-making strategies, diversification is the key. Try a combination of these monetizing methods so that you can maximize your corporate blog’s earning potential.

When monetizing, keep in mind that you don’t want to overcome your blog’s content or become too ad heavy. You never want to irritate or alienate your audience.

It’s important not to let monetizing become the priority or take up too much of your time. This ensures you can focus on the important stuff: developing amazing content, growing traffic and building a powerful brand.

Everyone has seen Fight Club, right? It’s an amazing movie in almost every sense of the word. It’s clever, it’s funny and it’s thought provoking. If you haven’t seen it yet, go watch it on Netflix and then come right back (we’ll wait).

Surprisingly, there is a lot you can learn about marketing from a movie about an underground fighting club. We’re going to run through some of the biggest takeaways from this movie. So, settle in because we are Jack’s social marketing genius.

1. Develop Advocates

“Fight Club was the beginning. Now it’s moved out of the basement. It’s called Project Mayhem.”

Fans will wait in line for hours just to say they were the first to see a movie. Fans will quote the lines daily for the next two months. Advocates will still be talking about the movie almost 13 years later. Advocates will still be quoting the lines over a decade later. It starts with fans, but you need to turn them into advocates.

2. Act Fast, Fail Faster

“This is your life and it’s ending one minute at a time.”

Life is short, so it’s alright to be in a bit of a hurry. Test your theories to find out what works and what doesn’t. Iterate to make your strategies better. Change the order of the words to make the messaging perfect. Act and fail quickly if you want to truly succeed.

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The question has been plaguing Internet marketers for years. What is more important to a successful social marketing strategy: presence or promotion?

A recent study by the wonderful people at eMarketer offers an answer. The study found that 74% of social media marketers think a presence on Facebook is important. Only 57% of those marketers believe promotion on Facebook is important. Comparatively, 47% think a presence on Twitter is important and only 42% believe promotion on Twitter is important.

The study suggests that presence wins over promotion. If social media marketers from six different countries can agree, it must be right. But can the answer really be that cut and dry? No, it can’t.

Not Black and White

Like most other aspects of social marketing, the battle of presence vs. promotion is not black and white. There are hundreds of different shades of gray between and that’s where the real success happens.

Organic promotion works and there is no doubt about it! You can spend your time reaching out and connecting with your audience via social media (and you should). Slowly, your fan base will begin to build and you will ignite a community.

At the same time, it is important to note that social promotion, or social advertising, is a great way to kick fan base growth into gear. Studies have shown that most Facebook fans are acquired via social advertising. It’s not about being the brand with the highest fan count, but it is about casting your net as far as you can.

Clearly, a combination of organic effort and social advertising is the key. Who wins this battle? It’s a draw. Just as you should integrate traditional and social marketing, you should integrate social presence and promotion.

A New Perspective

A great way to think about this is in terms of PPC (pay-per-click) marketing. If you setup a killer landing page and simply wait for traffic to flood in, the process will be slow. Similarly, if you setup an awesome AdWords campaign, but have no landing page (direct linking), your growth will be stunted.

That is why PPC marketers perfect both the method of sending the traffic (AdWords, in this example) and the method of converting the traffic (a landing page). They’ve realized that while they both would work separately, they work best together!

What do you think? Does presence trump promotion? Should they be partnered together?