A community is a great way to build engagement for your virtual summit. The goal of a summit community is to get your attendees engaged, excited, and taking action together.
But if this is your first time, you might run into some questions. Things like:
When should I open the summit community?
So you've decided to have a community as a part of your summit. But when in the world should you open it?
Some experienced summit hosts, say you shouldn’t open it until a few days before the summit starts or even on Day 1, but I disagree with that.
A big part of your summit’s engagement is getting attendees comfortable and engaged before the summit begins. Because of that, I think it's important that attendees can join your community and start interacting right after registering for the event.
A few benefits of opening your community early include:
- You'll have more time to build relationships with people who are new to you. This will help build trust, get them excited, and increase the likelihood that they'll purchase your all-access pass and anything else you offer after the summit is over.
- Having your community open early is also a great way for attendees to have fun, engage with you, and learn from you. It keeps them engaged until the summit starts.
- It increases the likelihood that attendees will actually join the community, since right after signing up is when they're most likely to join.
Because of these things, I encourage you to open your group as soon as registration opens. Use my tips to keep attendees engaged in a Facebook group to help. Your goal is to show them that the group is a fun and safe place for them to experience the transformation that your summit promises.
When should I close the community?
Alright, you know when to open your community. What about closing it?
The choice here is up to you - you can either close the community once the summit is over or keep it open long-term.
If You Decide to Close It
If you decide to close your community, wait until after your all-access pass cart closes and any launch you do is over.
After the summit is over, have a few days of connection prompts to give people a way to connect with each other, the host, and the speakers.
Then, after the summit and any launches are over, close or archive the group. Be sure to post letting attendees know what's going on.
If you're using a Facebook group, let attendees know that you'll be archiving the group, but they'll still be able to search posts. From there, you can unarchive the group to use it for your next event.
If You Keep It Open
Some hosts decide to keep their summit community open and use it as a jumping-off point for a community to use for their business long-term.
Only do this if you can dedicate the time you’d to make it a beneficial marketing method for you and make it beneficial for people to stay in that group.
What join questions should I ask?
The next frequently asked question is what join questions to ask attendees when they join the group. There is no right answer for what questions you ask.
Here are the 3 questions I ask and why I ask them:
- What is one thing you’d most like to improve about _____? - This is a good gauge for which presentations hit the mark and can give you ideas for bonus training and content ideas for your business moving forward
- How did you hear about the summit? - By asking this, you can find out which speakers are promoting the summit, and which method (Google, Facebook Ads, etc) is bringing in the most traffic.
- Do you agree to the rules? - This sets the expectations of kindness and inclusivity in your community.
For an attendee to be approved, I recommend requiring that they agree to the group rules and answer at least one open-ended question. This avoids spammy posts and attendees who aren’t aligned with the event.
Should the community be just for attendees?
Another question I hear a lot is whether the summit's community should be private, just for attendees, or if can it be in another Facebook group.
I recommend using a summit-specific, private group. For a Facebook group, set privacy settings to “Private” so only other members can see the posts in the group.
As for whether you can do it in another community you run, I’d advise against it. If you host an engaging event, there will be hundreds of posts, which can get annoying and confusing to people in your existing community.
After the summit is over, post in the summit group and encourage attendees to join your other community.
Should Speakers Join the Community?
I've also had a few hosts ask whether speakers should join the community.
I wouldn't make it a requirement, but it's definitely a perk to have them in there!
Having speakers in the community is a great way for them to connect with attendees. It's also helpful when attendees have questions after a presentation because they can tag the speaker and directly ask them.
I let my speakers do encore videos in the group after their presentation is over to connect more with the attendees and answer any questions that came up. Not all speakers do, but it’s always a big hit!
Can I host my entire summit in a Facebook group?
The last question we'll cover is whether the entire summit can be hosted in a Facebook group.
In short, it is 100% possible, but not necessarily something I recommend.
I don’t recommend it because:
- It’s not a great user experience.
- It tends to be difficult to find videos and links.
- More and more people are avoiding Facebook altogether and are unwilling to use it. Instead of just not choosing to join your community because it’s on Facebook, now they can't join the summit at all.
With that being said, it can be done successfully. If hosting a summit in your Facebook group is what will let you get that first event out there, do it!
If you do host your summit in a Facebook group, keep two things in mind:
- Pay special attention to making it easy for everyone to keep track of where to find the videos.
- Expect emails from people who don’t want to use Facebook. Let it go and don’t let it bother you too much.
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