Freedom Blog

Top 5 Reasons to Build Online Communities for Small Businesses

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In the saturated digital marketplace, small businesses often feel lost in the crowd. Building a recognizable brand and forging lasting connections with your target audience can seem like an impossible task. But what if you could build online communities for small businesses in a powerful and sustainable way?

In this article, you will swiftly learn:

 

Why Traditional Online Communities Fall Short

Online communities are crucial for businesses today, fostering deeper connections, loyalty, and brand advocacy. However, popular platforms like Facebook and WeChat come with limitations. Businesses have minimal control over the user experience, making it difficult to tailor the environment to their brand and audience. Additionally, intrusive advertising and limited data access hinder personalization efforts.
This crowded and noisy environment makes it hard for a single business to stand out.  Without targeted engagement strategies, businesses struggle to build long-term relationships and maximize the value of their communities.  Alternative solutions, like branded communities or innovative monetization models, are needed for businesses to truly thrive in the online community space.

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Why Building the Right Online Community Matters

The right online community is a game-changer. It fosters meaningful connections and feedback among customers, leading to loyalty, increased retention, and higher customer lifetime value. Additionally, it provides valuable insights for product improvement and boosts brand visibility and credibility through positive word-of-mouth.

5 Reasons Why Your Business Needs an Online Community:

  1. There’s more ways to fuel brand engagement
    Forget one-way messaging. Fire up brand engagement by sparking real conversations with your customers. Take things a step further with interactive online communities where you can share valuable content, host engaging events, and even co-create experiences with your audience. 
    To really turn things up, incorporate gamification elements like polls, quizzes, and contests to actively engage your followers and fuel their enthusiasm for your brand.

  2. A goldmine of customer insights
    Don't just listen, truly hear your customers. Online communities unlock a treasure trove of insights through customer conversations, feedback, and suggestions. By actively listening and gathering this data, you'll gain a deeper understanding of their needs, wants, and challenges. 
    This goldmine of information empowers data-driven decisions about product development, marketing strategies, and how to craft the ultimate customer experience.

  3. Turn your customers into brand advocates
    Cultivate a thriving community where customers feel valued and connected. This fosters a deep connection with your brand, transforming them into loyal advocates who naturally spread the word.  This organic, word-of-mouth marketing, fueled by genuine passion, is far more powerful than traditional marketing.

  4. Ignite a collaborative spark
    Imagine a community buzzing with passionate customers, sharing ideas and co-creating the future of your brand. This is the power of online communities. 
    By fostering open communication and idea exchange, you tap into the collective genius of your audience, sparking innovation and collaboration that can lead to groundbreaking products, services, or marketing campaigns.

  5. Embrace the e-commerce evolution
    The online community landscape is constantly innovating, with exciting features like NFT vouchers emerging. These unique digital assets can be used within your community to offer exclusive rewards, memberships, or even access to special content. 

    Imagine using NFTs to incentivize purchases and create a more engaging, exclusive shopping experience for your customers.

Building a thriving online community takes dedication and planning, but the rewards are substantial. By creating a positive, interactive, and engaging environment, you can transform your small business into a brand magnet, attracting and retaining loyal customers to become your biggest advocates.

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Want to unlock the power of community for your business?

Introducing Freedom World, designed specifically for small businesses to easily monetize, acquire, engage and retain customers in thriving online communities.

We understand the challenges community leaders face in nurturing a thriving online space, all while striving for sustainable financial growth. Freedom World empowers you to overcome these hurdles.

Our platform goes beyond the limitations of traditional solutions, offering a comprehensive suite of tools designed to help you achieve both goals simultaneously. Here's how:

Freedom World equips you with powerful tools to:

  • Create A Unique Loyalty Program:
    • Launch your own community on the Freedom Console website.
    • Set up and manage your own in-app community with personalized loyalty programs and rewards. 
    • Utilize a powerful combination of NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens) and tokens to incentivize desired behaviors and foster a sense of community ownership.

  • Ignite Engagement with Gamification: 
    • Encourage community interaction and participation through the Mission system.
    • Engage directly with in-app marketing tools like feed, banner and push notifications.

  • Unlock Data-Driven Insights: 
    • Review transaction history and export reports on Freedom Console.
    • Gain date-driven insights to understand customer behavior and preferences. 
    • Tailor your offerings and promotions effectively, ensuring your community's needs are met.

  • Seamlessly Bridge the Offline-Online Gap: 
    • Integrate your online community with existing marketing efforts, creating a cohesive and consistent brand experience across all touchpoints.

 

Best Small Business Story from Freedom World: 

Case-Study

 

Mee Khwan Sook 

Mee Khwan Sook leveraged Freedom World's online community and engagement features to achieve impressive results. Even with a humble small business, the virtual community within Freedom World helped it grow alongside its existing social media marketing efforts.

Boosted Customer Engagement

They ran a promotional campaign within the Freedom World app, where users who topped up 500 MKS points (Mee Khwan Sook's loyalty points) earned an additional 50 MKS points. This clever incentive encouraged active participation within the community and increased engagement with the brand.

Enhanced Brand Awareness

During their grand opening cafe ceremony, Mee Khwan Sook utilized Freedom World's Airdrop functionality to distribute 25 MKS points to anyone who attended and joined their community. This innovative strategy helped attract new customers, raise brand awareness, and build a loyal community from the very beginning.

Take the first step towards building a community that propels your business to success!

Head over to our main portal page and sign up to start your own thriving community. Unleash the potential of a custom blockchain loyalty program powered by Freedom World, featuring engaging NFT rewards and a plethora of features to boost engagement, build loyalty, and unlock new opportunities for your business

 

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