Consistency creates trust
A simple and often neglected community design principle
The community rollercoaster
I know sooo many groups that organize amazing experiences that they pour their heart and soul into. Everyone leaves excited and hungry to have more soon. And then you don’t hear anything from them for 8 months. One day they email you and say “hey, sorry for the silence, we’re back and we’re hosting an amazing experience”. And after that experience you don’t hear from them for 5 months. And on the rollercoaster ride goes.
This illustrates a simple community design principle that’s too often overlooked: humans need consistency and a stable rhythm to build long-term trust into a group and an organization.
To say it differently: for a community it matters more to have small things that happen regularly and consistently than to have big things happen sometimes.
Consistency matters, because it affects how members assess the future of the group.
A consistent rhythm creates trust in people that this group will still be around in three, five, maybe ten years from now. And if I believe that this group will still be around in five years from now, it’s worth investing myself fully into it now. We all are investing our most valuable resources — time and trust — when we engage deeply with a community and we want to make sure the investment will pay off. Most communities have little collective value in the short-term, but as the value of relationships and trust compounds, the community becomes really valuable. So it makes sense for members to assess the chances of the group surviving more than just an initial excitement.
On the flip side, we have all experienced groups that didn’t go very far. If the community is on and off in their offerings and activity levels, it’s natural to assume that it won’t last that long. And in that situation it makes sense for people to show up with a consumer mindset: let’s see what value I can get out of this in the short-term, and let’s see how it develops. That’s a dangerous dynamic for the wellbeing of the group.
Consistency can show up in a variety of places — for example:
- How regular do events happen?
- How regular do you email people?
- How often are new people being added to the group?
- Is there a calendar that looks months ahead or does everything happen last-minute?
Curious to hear what you think about this! This is related to the cheap & simple design principle.
— — —
Looking for more community building resources?
Community Canvas
Check out the Community Canvas, the open-source tool we have created to support community builders across the globe and join our Community Builder Facebook group where we come together to share community relevant topics and learn from each other.
Community Building Newsletter
Every few weeks I send out a short email with 3–5 of my favorite insights, blog posts and articles about building meaningful communities. If you care about bringing people together, this might be for you. Sign up here.
Other community building content you might enjoy
- From Me to We — the shift in behavior I see in powerful communities
- Cheap and simple — a counterintuitive & powerful community design principle
- Organizational values are great — turning values into practices is even better.
- The world needs less gatherings, summits, conferences, events, meet-ups… (and more communities)
- Why communities based on reciprocity are selling themselves short
- What value do brand communities create a) for corporations b) for its members?
- I keep coming across community leaders who are burning out. Why is that?
- The state of “community” in 2018–4 observations for the upcoming year
- There are two ways to show up in a community: as a consumer or as a co-creator.
- 8 ways to empower people to show up as active co-creators in your community
- 9 ways to turn recurring events into a community
- Why running a community is both the best job in the world, and the worst.
- 7 ways to actively manage expectations in a community
- What does “community” even mean? A definition attempt & conversation starter
- My Ideal Community Manifesto
- Introducing the Minimum Viable Community Canvas — summarizing the core elements of a community on 1 page
- The Community Test: how to measure the strength of a community
- Why do communities exist? For internal or external purpose? Or both?
