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Why can’t we create a tsunami of likes & shares??

By asha chaudhry on 30 Comments / 1709 views

So I’ve been meaning to write this for a while. It’s not a rant. It’s a question. For all of us.

Before I start off… pls have a look at the number of views Abhinav’s famous Flat, marriage and family – 3 reasons why young Indians don’t turn entrepreneurs has got as of y’day…!

That’s right… One lakh thirteen thousand something views!

 

Now we consume shitloads of digital content ALL DAY LONG. We like, we share, we tweet, we re-tweet. We spend time & energy commenting on threads we share on fb. Bashing people up. Ranting or raving.

So what stops us from doing the same on TheRodinhoods??!!

We have great content going. No one can argue that. So why can’t we do a ‘mini-Abhinav’ to every post??

 

A couple of months ago, a startup dude asked me, “All other startup communities seem to be pretty dead, what makes trhs such a vibrant one?” My confident answer was, “Because WE’RE NOT A NOTICE BOARD! People actually take pains to interact with each other, respond to queries in ASK, with absolutely no personal agenda at all…”

But after that conversation, I did some introspection, and realized if engagement goes down, we could very well become a notice board :(. Many newbies share their new ventures with us in Showcase! They get some great feedback – and then vamoose! They are never seen again… What if every new member started doing that?? And what if every old member got so busy with that next new product…?

 

Very often some member pings me over chat and says, “I didn’t get any response to my question…” and I’m tempted to ask back, “How many posts in ASK have you answered lately? How many posts have you commented on?? How many startups in Showcase! have you given feedback to…???” But I don’t. Instead, I’m posting this in ASK myself…

Guys… I get it. All of you are busy building your own startups. That’s exactly what I’m doing here as well – building a community! So I know exactly how much sweat & tears go into building something BIG. But for a FREE and OPEN-TO-ALL community to thrive, and EVERYONE TO BENEFIT, all of us need to give & take!

Abhik wrote something similar (but way more refined!) on Alok’s b’day. Guess how many comments his post got? ZERO 🙁

If you care, share!

Each one of us can contribute (not just by writing goosebumpy stories with heaps of learnings) but by making wow posts go viral! Let the whole world read an awesome trhs story that resonated with you. Let Rodinhooders benefit from your social media network! Let other people reach out to our members to help them! Good content needs to start a bushfire. And all it takes is a mere click!!! 🙂

This is what each one of us can do:

i)   CLICK the FB LIKE or SHARE or the TWITTER button at the end of a post

ii) Share YOUR OWN posts on fb/twitter

iii) Mention @therodinhoods over twitter so it can be re-tweeted (more work for me but I’m always HAPPY TO RT!)

iv) Share your twitter handle at the end of your post so I can mention it over twitter

v) Follow therodinhoods over facebook and twitter

vi) LIKE & SHARE posts you like on trhs fb page.

vii) Re-tweet stuff you like!

viii) Comment on trhs itself! If we like something the least we can do is encourage the writer. If we don’t like something we ought to say so – it encourages healthy discussions! Share your views/story in a similar situation.

ix) Entrepreneurs thrive on FEEDBACK! ASK & Showcase! are perfect places to earn #karmapoints by taking out time (whenever you can) to check out someone’s website/idea/app and give them some candid feedback. You might end up saving the guy from wasting his precious time on something he might be doing wrong!!

Answering an ASK or giving feedback is probably the greatest way to contribute…

x) Has a Rodinhooder helped you in any way? Write a testimonial so we can all feel proud and other members can benefit.

xi)  Have you met someone at one of trhs Open Houses or Meetups who has stayed in touch and added value to your biz? Tell us about it! It inspires people to attend our events and network there!

xii) If you’ve posted in ASK and people have responded to you query, pls ACKNOWLEDGE that someone has bothered to take time out to help you – it’s basic community etiquette plus it helps ensure your post remains buzzing with more insights!

xiii) PLS ADD MORE EASY-TO-EXECUTE IDEAS TO CREATE A SNOWBALL EFFECT!!!

 

I’ve started sharing a story a day on my own personal fb page for many months now. And I try my level best to connect rodinhooders who have synergies; even ping people to comment on certain threads! (but this is not a scalable idea!)

Alok tries and shares one story a day as well. Over the weekends he takes time out from his reading & writing and goes through the ASK & Showcase! sections. He tries to answer as many queries as he can, gives inputs, even tells someone his/her idea is crap! 🙂

Darshan Bhambiru tries to connect as many rodinhooders as possible and shares all relevant links to almost every post. We call him the Wiki. He’s been MIA for a while and it shows 🙁

There are many other regular Rodinhooders who come by and give much more than they will ever take (classic example Abey John). We have numerous regular contributors and we salute them for writing so regularly and sharing the awesomeness with us!

 

7535 members and counting…

That’s a big number and it’s growing! Surely we need a better plan to ensure EVERYONE who posts gets enough traction and a good response!

So why can’t all of us be that NETWORKING officer? Or that LIKE officer? Or that SHARE officer? Or that HELP officer? Help me, help you by increasing engagement on the site so your posts get discovered and read and shared and liked a million times! why can’t we think.do.be.click…??

A LIKE a day. That’s all I’m asking. Let’s start this tsunami, what say?!

🙂

ps: I realize all of us had other stuff on our minds in March and nowadays the Election is consuming a lot of mindspace… but I needed to just put it out there!

image sources: atelierdesprit.ca

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30 Comments

  1. Asha – agree on some people doing a disappearing act. Could be many reasons – mostly people busy, some people are “transactional” in nature, some may be disappointed by lack of engagement on their posts etc. I know I haven’t been very active posting new stuff but I will continue adding my views on any questions people might have, only if I can add value. I am off social media for some time but will keep track of new posts on trhs.

    For readers: I have noticed that in general, people who write something compelling, usually write from heart and engagement usually follows. Write as if they you are talking to self. I some times see some people respond with comments to please Alok or some get into arguments with Alok just for no reason. I think it is okay to disagree if you are objective about it. I really believe if one writes things devoid of any bias — people will connect with those thoughts. On engagement to your posts …The more active you are the better response is; even off trhs. As an example: I don’t have my product ready yet so I haven’t been talking/writing about my startup any where (except for meetings with potential customers and investors) Some times people just find my prelaunch website through my comments and posts on trhs and subscribe to my beta signup list; and I know for sure most of those folks come from trhs.

    Asha – I also think some posts get lost in the blogs section below. May be we can combine Discussions and Blogs, or make it more visible?

  2. rishi,

    WOW! i had no clue about this!!  Some times people just find my prelaunch website through my comments and posts on trhs and subscribe to my beta signup list; and I know for sure most of those folks come from trhs.

    btw… you are one of the few newbies who joined – created a few forest-fires (read rodinstars!) and HAVE STAYED ON DAY AFTER DAY!

    you contribute at least 3 times a week (if not more) by answering q’s in ASK and by giving precious candid feedback. you are a huge value-add to trhs (even when you’re not writing!!)

    all i’m urging rodinhooders to do is click LIKE or SHARE if they like something and don’t feel like commenting!

    i think over a year back alok and i talked about the BLOG section – it can’t be combined. we could get rid of it altogether but i think we should have it for softer stories and self-expression. i normally share lots of blog posts over the weekend as they make perfect weekend reads 🙂

  3. Committing more interaction now onwards….

  4. 🙂

    you’re such a rockstar!!!

  5. Just a few thoughts:

    1. Maybe Quora can be taken as a use case for study. How the traffic is increasing, especially from India – http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/quora.com. Some algorithmic stuff they are doing for curation or things on content or on sectioning. I’ve started asking and answering there soon enough, though let me tell you that I’m reading articles on TRHS much earlier than that! I mostly get pulled from FB where I’ve liked TRHS page. 

    2. Maybe the chat functionality can be made more prominent. People might be liking instantaneity of response as a pulling factor. I remember, when I asked something in chatroom, a few responses started coming up, but I was directed to make a post in Ask, where I got just 1 response. 

    3. You see, entrepreneurship is a vast topic and there is a subset of all the topics in which I’m interested. I want to get updates from specific topics / tags only. I’ll be in a better position to contribute too, in that scenario. So in Quora again, I’ve followed relevant topics and get notifications regarding them. I haven’t taken the pain to come directly to the site (not via FB) and search posts to do something. So I would like that I should be logged into different chatrooms of my interest as soon as I arrive and get notifications if anything is posted in those (Just hypothesizing).

  6. yep, the least everyone can do is to like the Rodinhood page on Fb so that they get a steady stream of content on their wall….

    If you haven’t done it yet, here is the link: https://www.facebook.com/TheRodinhoods

    and Twitter if you aren’t such a Fb fan: https://twitter.com/TheRodinhoods

  7. For a lazy person like me, I need to be told about such things. You’ll probably see a significant increase in my activity at TRH for a month or so (saying this from my experience) and after that I’d need to read something like this again 🙂 . Thanks and keep doing the good work!

  8. And I just realized one thing. If I open TRH on my smartphone (I guess most of us would do that), I don’t get to see the share button of FB and Twitter..

  9. :)))

    the whole idea was to remind and nudge people. coz we all do read stuff here. so if we like it we need to click it!!

  10. hi prateek,

    trhs is on NING and that doesn’t have the kind of algorithm that quora does!

    the very fact that you can get people to answer stuff by a click of a button is awesome. i do that here manually
    :()

    also yes, i agree – getting notifications on topics you like is a big bonus.

    we do have the “follow” feature though. so what i do – if a particular ASK interests me and i know we are gonna get great insights on it – i simply follow the story!

    the problem with the chat is if you are chatting in the main room – the pings disturb everyone 🙁 otherwise a lot of people chat with each other individually ALL THE TIME! i myself use the chat to help me moderate!!

  11. hey thanks abhik – i’ll add the links in the post – i just take it for granted that everyone is familiar!!

  12. Hello Asha

    good reminder…i think if we can add some more features on the websites like Notifications, some improvement in UI then it will improve the communication….specially “Notifications” is what i think we are missing…coz it is difficult to follow our own posts…happens many times with me. 

  13. yunus..!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    how can you miss comments to your own post?? they will AUTOMATICALLY come into your inbox!

    we have a FOLLOW button at the end of every post. so even if you haven’t commented but want to FOLLOW that particular story you can! whenever someone comments on that particular post – it comes to your inbox.

    we are limited by the features NING offers. but email notifications have been very effective. 

    but keep the ideas & feedback coming…!

  14. Well.. content sharing is certainly one of the most interesting problems of social media.. The steps you mentioned over here will definitely help to spread the message far and wide, but the enthusiasm dies out after some time. Maybe if we can create a ‘gamification’ route for Rodinhooders.. assigning karma points and trophies for all top commentators and shares.. An option to add voice/video review of any post (for those who think writing is tough).. maybe create moderators for different content types: example a moderator for all marketing related posts, and another one for legal issues pertaining to entrepreneurship. People will only get involved when they find their solutions and once they find that, they help others as well. Social Media is a giant puzzle and no one has the answer! But the spirit of Rodinhoods is the most important factor here, which we should flare up and ignite more.. Rest assured, one daily activity is guaranteed from my side. Let the game begins!

  15. YOU’VE GIVEN ME AN IDEA MOHUL…….!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    like the RodinStar award for wow posts – we can have something else for WOW comments!!!

    RodinWow or something – will figure the branding soon! (it can’t be a long name)

    and since i can’t keep track of every comment the author of the post or any vigilant rodinhooder can ping me and recommend the RodinWow…!!! 

    let’s do this mohul…!!! 

    THANK YOU!!!

  16. mohul – we can call them KARMA COINS (or RodinKarma) – darshan had created this image inspired by the coin alok got from amazon. that’s when we decided we should give away karma coins in the future!! but we could always start with virtual karma coins 🙂 

    i’m excited!!! 

  17. Thanks for drawing my attention here Asha, have been lapping up a lot since the Haitus being Offline for some time, was reading through the posts on TRHS and other social media as well to catch up, have already read the above mentioned post and the Etiquette requirements inspiration it was aroused from 😀

    I do it, because I Love to Share and Spread the word around since that HELPS many others who read it again when shared too or may have missed it altogether!!!

    Maybe others have their own reasons to not do it too, not sure of that yet though, it hardly COSTS anything (apart from the already expended cost of Internet access though, if you ask me here now).

    • The #1 reason as per me why people would not share or like or post comments when reading is the content on TRHS is OPEN that is even if they are not logged in, the content is very much visible and consumable!! 

    • Also not every one goes through all the posts which may be relevant or connected too RARELY people use the Search function which is so Prominently placed !!!!

    • The level of interaction in personal Lives would also make it be liked shared or commented on depending on the Acquaintance levels of the same people online as well, if it is something of interest to Both parties involved (read Give or take, exchange) only then it takes the next Step at Times as per my personal experience, Overwhelming is also something which takes place while reading any content and the SHOCK treatment it leaves behind makes an Instantaneous Reaction to do it as required, now leaving aside psychology, it plain Human nature to pass on what they have in their own Nature to start with!!

    • In short if they read some posts they like it could at best be BOOKMARKED for ref on their devices but yes sharing and liking would mean acknowledging that THEY did read or like it which would bring them out of the Background  Many I know have been on TRHS for a long time without making a single post comment like or share, and then they declare it one day on a POST which makes it a Breaking News and gives it the Hype (so required) again its how everyone looks at it and again looks at it on a broader angle, “Sharing is Adding to the existing Knowledge and never Decreases it” More it is shared more it stays alive.

    • They get what they were looking for, to comment of course one has to be logged in, though the links for the Share Like are still functional but the motivation of the SHARE mode to be turned on lies WITHIN more than anything, if the person is not willing they would never do t since sharing also is a responsibility just like it comes on your OWN behalf as a recommend, it may or may not be the same within the Network or circle which the person shares other things likewise even.

    • Being a community which some see only as an entrepreneurial Digest or Bible for Information and connections to move their Requirements forward in some or other way than contribute at most times as rightly pointed on the post too, some do make a Post then vanish entirely without even bothering to check the comments or updates later.

    • Being a successful Entrepreneur demands Commitment and Dedication — more than most Jobs do. If you’re ambivalent or mildly enthused about your product or service, that’s not going to sustain you through the highs and lows that will inevitably occur. If you find something you love enough to want to share it with others, that unwavering passion will fuel and give you purpose. 

    • If it is your Job that you are working on, it is definitely someone else’s Business that You Mind!! 🙂

    • POV – Point of View 

    • I have learned a lesson from two of my Friends, who made me realize on what Happiness depends. 

    • They both have exactly equal things in life, a job, a car, a home and a wife. 

    • Yet one is Happy the other is Sad; one thinks life is Good, the other thinks it Bad. 

    • The difference is in their Point Of View, and the way they look at what they Do. 

    For all those who have interacted with me over the period of time, I never Knew almost 90% of them before the first connection but then after that it all becomes how things take a turn, the same also is true for all Offline Events and meets I have attended and have met regular and New people as well for the various activities they are involved in.

    Glad to be a part of this Awesome Energetic Bundle of Energy which always has its rays of Light flowing in all Directions with the Brilliance of Knowledge and Brotherhood. Just Being Myself and Doing my BIT!!!

    Winning the #TRHS Tee is also something which Was Declared much before I actually Got it too, so most of the times its what you Think Do and Be which comes out, be it Online or Offline too.

    Winning the #RodinHoodCoin – Alok Rodinhood Kejriwal

    SWswSwsW – Some will. Some won’t. So what. Someone’s waiting…

    Thanks to Alok Asha for the “Networking Officer” and the @rodinhood.com email id !!! 

    #WikiRH  Cheers!!! 🙂

    Your Friendly Neighborhood Alien!!!

  18. actually my account is directly connected with my facebook , so i rarely open that related email..hehe…my problem..

    surely will post other ideas…if they come.. 🙂

  19. Perfect reminder post. Much needed! And it’s kind of our responsibility to share and comment to make the wonderful content reach out more and more entrepreneurs ! 

    Asha ji, this has been been drafted so nicely…. I realize that no matter how wonderful a community is, you need to remind people from time to time.. We feel more responsible – which is a good sign!:)

  20. actually anamika, i realised i didn’t notice the share buttons at the bottom till recently. i normally share links everyday on my own personal fb page as well, but never did so from the actual post itself. that’s when it occurred to me that THIS IS THE EASIEST THING ALL OF US CAN DO! and that, perhaps like me, other people need to be reminded…. 🙂

  21. we can also have a session “Coffe with Rodinhood” so if some performance is well deserving he can win a coffee date with Alok when he is in town

  22. dear dear arpit!!

    alok spends 30 mins a day with one entrepreneur! either in person at his office or over a skype/phone call… all one needs to do is seek an appointment with him!

    let’s think of easy to execute gamification ideas – right now we will start with virtual karma coins 🙂

  23. Yes Asha I am pronouncing myself guilty and this ‘Guilt’, of not been able to contribute much to the movement is so high that finally it made me to decipline my day and be rest assured henceforth I shall be regularly contributing to the forum. You know what people know that they need to save for better and fulfilled future but they won’t. People know for sure that they need to eat right and exercise to stay fit however they won’t exercise and eat all the junk in this world similarly those who are entrepreneurs by genes, by luck or bad luck 🙂 knows that they need to be on THRS to consume, contribute and share content however they don’t. It all links up to lack of awareness or what I call it as ‘Sleeping through the life’, Don’t know about others, won’t dare to advise them either however I have decided to commit myself to the forum for at least few min everyday reading, writing and sharing content. 

    Thanks for shaking and waking us all out of our dreadful sleep 🙂 

  24. *LIKED*

  25. Asha

    Can i request for a feature? I would suggest you to improve the functionality we have on the mobile version of TRHS. I usually browse TRHS using my smartphone and when i like some post or I want to reply to it, I feel helpless and what I have to do at that point of time is to bookmark the link, open that link on my PC when I am back home and add my comment. This is a very tedious process and most of the time I forget to comment back or like the post when I reach home. 

    So, my suggestion – Improve the mobile version of TRHS and I am sure it would really help engagement on TRHS.

    Thanks!

    Anoop Nair

    Co-Founder eWeHelp Technologies

  26. hi anoop,

    ning 3.0 has many more features – we are hoping they will improve the mobile features as well.

    we are in the process of updating rodinhoodmonastery.com from ning 2.0 to 3.0. once that happens successfully we can do the same with therodinhoods.wpengine.com

    thanks for the suggestion. keep the ideas coming!

  27. Hi Asaha. I am a newbie to Trh and felt quite motivated after reading your post. Completely agreed that learning by participation and sharing makes it 2 sided and a beautiful experience.
    Will try to keep up the spirit :))

  28. awesome alankar! hope your enthusiasm spreads 🙂

  29. All Members (8,830) Wishing all a Merry X’Mas and a Happy New Year Ahead!!! 🙂 Think – Do – Be, Contribute!

    The Spirit of Rodinhoods

    It is not What we Get, But Who we Become, 
    What we Contribute, that Gives Meaning to our Lives!! Anthony Robbins~

  30. Great Content, no doubt.  Better UI can boost engagement. A responsive website will help :))

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