Online Community | The Heavy Chef Project

3 Things Lady Gaga is doing right in Community Management Posted in Community Management, Concocted by Yolandi Janse van Rensburg September 1, 2010 5 comments

She’s the “Queen of Twitter” according to Famecount and she happens to be the first living person to achieve 10 million fans on Facebook. Famecount lists Lady Gaga as the most popular online entity worldwide, with more than 16 million Facebook fans and 330,000 YouTube subscribers. She is breaking records on all social media platforms. How does she do it? Read Further
The Community Management grid Posted in Community Management, Social Media, Concocted by Mike Perk August 30, 2010 10 comments

I see many digital agencies falling into the trap of thinking they are online community management ‘experts’ just because they have created a great campaign in Facebook with 50,000+ fans or have generated 10,000 Twitter followers for their client. Read Further
Three Key Stages of Growing a Community Online Posted in Community Management, Concocted by Fred Roed August 26, 2010 6 comments

Community Building is something we’re very busy with at World Wide Creative (the digital marketing agency responsible for The Heavy Chef Project). We’re trying to build online communities around brands such as Honda, Virgin, Exclusive Books and even former South African minister Jay Naidoo, who, with his work on improving global nutrition, has become somewhat of a brand himself. Read Further
What is Online Community Management? Posted in Community Management, Digital Marketing Basics, Concocted by Yolandi Janse van Rensburg August 24, 2010 3 comments

Online Community Management is a Mad Hatter’s Tea Party. It’s fun and everyone loves a party. To keep the festivities going everyone has a part to play. Let’s do some role playing!

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Top Social Media Sites: Age Breakdown Posted in Social Media, Concocted by LouisJvR January 7, 2010

The Nielsen Company recently released research results on the age breakdown of members on 3 of the largest social networks around: Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

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My formula for creating online community Posted in Branding Online, Digital Strategy, Social Media, Concocted by LouisJvR November 16, 2009 2 comments

(*reposted from my personal blog http://www.louisjvr.com)

The term online community is something that’s thrown around a lot these days… and legitimately so.

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Thinking about Silver Surfers Online Posted in Digital Strategy, Concocted by LouisJvR September 11, 2009 1 comment

In a recent chat with a client of ours at World Wide Creative, we got into an interesting discussion around ’seniors’ (that is those people +-60 years and older) and their level of activity on the web and their value to marketers.

So, I did a bit of digging around and found some interesting learnings…. in fact over the last 3 years or so this market, dubbed the “Silver Surfers“*, has become quite a hot topic of discussion… Read Further
Creating New Worlds: Comcast Town Posted in Digital Strategy, Social Media, Concocted by LouisJvR August 25, 2009

At one of our previous Heavy Chef events in Cape Town, Justin Gomes (FoxP2 Ad Agency) in his talk on “Creativity And Its Power To Transform Business”, told the story of George Lucas and Star Wars, and the importance of creating new worlds…

So, when I stumbled across Comcast Town, I was reminded of Justin’s words of wisdom.

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Community ROI – Don’t forget the ‘I’! Posted in Digital Strategy, Concocted by LouisJvR February 18, 2009 2 comments

Currently, a lot of noise is being made about measuring the ROI of online communities and social media initiatives - something that quite frankly, that we as communication professionals are far from getting to grips with.

Now, all of these question pertaining to measuring ROI are relevant and are worth the time and energy to investigate and improve on further – however, I do want to emphasize that we still need to remind ourselves that the ‘Return’ is 100% dependant on the ‘Investment’… it can’t be the other way around. Read Further
Your website is an online community when… Posted in Digital Strategy, Social Media, Concocted by LouisJvR January 29, 2009 4 comments

When I started writing this post, I thought…Ok, let’s Google all the definitions for ‘Online Community’, ask Wikipedia and provide my beloved, loyal and always good-looking readers with a list of definitions of this term and throw in a bit of my own interpretations.

NOW, HOW BORING WOULD THAT’VE BEEN !? Read Further
Keep Your Community Members Active & Addicted Posted in Digital Strategy, Concocted by LouisJvR January 22, 2009 1 comment

Here are a couple of pointers on how to hook people to join your community and then how to keep your members active and addicted: Read Further
Top 10 Reasons for Building an Online Community in 2009 Posted in Branding Online, Digital Strategy, Concocted by LouisJvR January 20, 2009 2 comments

Yep, another ‘2009′ post, but this was such a good find I couldn’t resist…

The Top Ten Reasons for Building an Online Community in 2009

(courtesy of Vocici blog) Read Further
3 Rules for Building Better Community Posted in Social Media, Concocted by LouisJvR October 14, 2008

Thanks to Barry from The World of We for this post on tips to build a better online community: Read Further
Ideate.co.za Is Not An Online Community, IF… Posted in Branding Online, Digital Strategy, Online Advertising, Concocted by LouisJvR September 26, 2008 2 comments

ideate

…IF the authors posting on www.ideate.co.za (about Small Business in SA) DIDN’T participate in the conversations taking place on each of their posts…

Fortunately, the “mild-mannered alter-egos” behind Ideate, Fred (The Heaviest Chef of them all!!), Andrew and Shane, as well as some of their other guest contributors, ARE participating – and this, to me, is the primary reason behind Ideate’s success.

Don’t believe me? Case in point, I randomly went throught 10 posts and this was the level of participation from them… Read Further
Things to remember… Posted in Branding Online, Digital Strategy, Concocted by LouisJvR September 19, 2008

If Seth Godin says we need to remember, REMEMBER… Read Further
Brand-owned Online Community for Movie Buffs Posted in Branding Online, Social Media, Concocted by LouisJvR September 5, 2008 2 comments

brand owned

I’d like to bring your attention to a not-so-unique, not-so-flashy, but well thought out online community. An online community that is championed by a specific brand and that I think has some very interesting lessons for all involved in this space… first, the background:

One of the largest cinema/entertainment companies in Canada, Cineplex, has recently launched its very own – and I quote: “online social networking movie and entertainment community” (jeez, that was a mouth full!) called mycineplex Read Further
Beware Bozo – The Community Troublemaker Posted in Social Media, Concocted by LouisJvR September 2, 2008 1 comment

bozo

Yep, “Bozo” is the troublemaker in online communities. The guy (or girl) that stirs things up. Craves for attention. Has little to no social skills. In short, a community manager/webmasters worst nightmare.

Online communities are essentially about social interaction. And, as in the offline-world, where there is social interaction unpredictability is a sure thing. Read Further