Community Building on the Web : Secret Strategies for Successful Online Communities [Paperback]

Amy Jo Kim (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 6, 2000 | Series: On the Web

What makes a Web site a Web community? How have sites like Yahoo, iVillage, eBay, and AncientSites managed to attract and maintain a loyal following? How can Web developers create growing, thriving sites that serve an important function in people's lives? Community Building on the Web introduces and examines nine essential design strategies for putting together vibrant, welcoming online communities. Amy Jo Kim, a leading expert in Web community design, has helped AOL, Yahoo, Oracle, MTV, and others start online worlds that have become flourishing gathering places that people come back to again and again. The book is full of informative examples, case studies, and tactics for every facet of Web communities, from welcoming visitors to training community leaders. (Previously announced on the Winter 98 list.)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

There's been a marked shift in the philosophy of developing successful Web sites. The technologies (HTML, JavaScript, JavaServer Pages) no longer occupy center stage. Rather, functional objectives and the communities that grow up around them seem to be the main ingredient in Web site success. In her carefully reasoned and well-written Community Building on the Web, Amy Jo Kim explains why communities form and grow. More importantly, she shows (with references to many examples) how you can make your site a catalyst for community growth--and profit in the process. From marketing schemes like Amazon.com's Associates program to The Motley Fool's system of rating members' bulletin-board postings, this book covers all the popular strategies for bringing people in and retaining them.

Nine core strategies form the foundation of Kim's recommendations for site builders, serving as the organizational backbone of this book. The strategies generally make sense, and they seem to apply to all kinds of communities, cyber and otherwise. (One advocates the establishment of regular events around which community life can organize itself.) Some parts of Kim's message may seem like common sense, but such a coherent discussion of what defines a community and how it can be made to thrive is still helpful.

Read this book to help crystallize your thinking about community building, and to review strategies that work for real sites already. --David Wall

Topics covered: Strategies for designing Web sites around the needs of particular groups of people, attracting those people to your site, and motivating them to return frequently. Community identification, member profiling, community leadership, and organization (of information, time, and relationships) all receive ample coverage.

From Library Journal

The Internet has never been about finding information as much as it has been about finding people who created the information. Kim, designer of web communities for America Online and Adobe, has written a book that will suit everyone from the beginner to the CEO wishing to bring people together, understand a community, create roles for community members, and provide leadership; for all libraries.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 380 pages
• Publisher: Peachpit Press; 1 edition (April 6, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0201874849
• ISBN-13: 978-0201874846
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 7 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (26 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #439,029 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

47 of 49 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Building Community? Save thousands of $ and read this book! May 25, 2000

By "[e-mail]"

Format:Paperback

"Community Building on the Web: Secret Strategies for Successful Online Communities" raises the bar in the online communities field.

I've been in the Virtual Communities business for almost 25 years. During those years, everyone pretty much had to build their online communities by the seat of their pants. We were usually cursed to commit the same mistakes that so many others had encountered along the way. Many times communities would seem to run well for months, and then they would become popular, and then fail! Other times, otherwise interesting communities would languish for lack of a clear "Mission Statement" or poorly managed Terms of Service. In short, there was very little benefiting from other people's successes and failures.

This book changes all of that, forever! (Thank goodness!)

Amy Jo Kim brings together all of the fundamental building blocks needed to create a solid foundation for a successful web-based community. She provides the intellectual planning tools you need to help you understand what your community is about, how it will function, and how to help it grow.

If you don't understand online communities, this is THE book that will help you "get it."

Save yourself the first $3,000 of Community Web Site consulting, buy this book instead and use it!

This book instantly became required reading at my company, Communities.com. It immediately started saving us staff training time!

F. Randall Farmer Cofounder, Communities.com

29 of 29 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars From Mindjack May 3, 2000

By Dot

Format:Paperback

Amy Jo Kim's long-awaited book, Community Building on the Webarrived on my desk recently. I build online communities, so I'malways drinking in any information that comes down the pipe. The onebig plus that is apparent in the initial few pages of the book, is that this is a good starting point for those with no prior community-building experience. It's not that the book doesn't deliver much richer information -it does. What Amy Jo's book doesn't take for granted, is that there is a large audience out there of people who want and really need to start from square one.

Even before the book actually starts, the roman-numeraled introduction delivers Nine Design Strategies. #1 is Define and Articulate Your Purpose. Bang, that's enough to slow some people in their tracks and make them actually think about what they want to do. Three Underlying Principles are then introduced. For anyone actually involved in community building, just the information given in the introduction is more than worth the price of the book.

Chapter 1 draws on and expands the information presented in the introduction. Amy Jo even uses Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, presenting concepts to make sure the community member's basic needs are met before offering "higher-level" features. Something which is surprisingly often overlooked.

What I like about this book, is that it's void of academic and sociological, highbrow rhetoric. I thought it was quite subtle and interesting that Amy Jo's Ph.D. title is not displayed on the book. Instead, it delivers page after page of nuts n' bolts information on how to actually design, build and manage web communities. And before the building even starts, a lot of thinking has to take place. This book will get the motors running. If the reader's desire is still there after working through the "pull-no-punches" first chapter, then there's good reason to explore community building further. On the other hand, if the reader finds the wind knocked out of their sails, they'd have Amy Jo to thank for that too. No sense in investing a lot of time and energy if it turns out that a community venture idea never even makes it out of the gate.

One thing the author really has going for her, with her ten years of community-building experience, is that she's worked in a lot of virtual environments -and that is clearly reflected in the contents. From MUD's, to The Palace to eBay, each environment has it's own set of positives and negatives, and those are all well-covered.

The meat of the book delivers a well-rounded arsenal on community leadership, membership roles and rites of passage, etiquette, community growth stages, and even Event Planning 101.

The one aspect that might be missed by some is more actual case-history examples. In some ways, I actually found this refreshing, because there are more than enough web-community books on the market that cover those bases. If anyone is actually thinking of getting involved in building communities, they'll soon find themselves reading Cliff Figallo's Hosting Web Communities, and of course, the classic The Virtual Community by Howard Rheingold. (A second addition of Rheingold's book will be released soon by MIT Press.)

There are certainly more web community books [see our recommended links included with this article], but if there is one book to pick up first, Community Building on the Web, by Amy Jo Kim, is the one. END

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Best book by far for online community building June 7, 2001

By S. Lichtman

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

I'm an independent consultant on interactive technologies and web community building. I've read a number of books and articles giving advice about online communities, and none comes close to matching Amy Jo Kim's. Her book is the most exceptional in integrating human and technical considerations; describing how sites can launch, expand and evolve; giving lots of first-hand examples; and being an easy, fun read. I get the sense from her Naima company site that she's on the leading edge for design and technical approaches.

I'm personally working now with communities for performing artists and software developers. This book is the only one I'm willing to carry with me on all my customer consulting visits.