Independent content creators and entrepreneurs must build an online community to connect with their audience, keep them engaged and lead them to related content.
While building a community on social media platforms is great for engagement, a separate online community where everyone shares the same passion for a specific topic poses a unique value.
It leads to in-depth conversations, insights, and support that’s hard to come by on a generic social media channel.
If you’re keen to start your own community, read on to find out what Circle is, which features it entails, and how you can use it to build a loyal user base.
Building Your Community on Circle
Final Thoughts: Building an online community on Circle
Circle 101
Circle is a platform that helps you create a community that matches your brand. Members can create profiles, participate in discussions, share content and message each other.
You can share your content via rich posts, text or videos. You can host public or private discussions, inbox community members and see your growth through real-time statistics.
Your community can be free, paid, or a mix of both.
Suppose you’re a creator with an online course you’d like to start a community around; you can use Circle to organize discussions, share videos and create private spaces where premium members can get one-on-one coaching. For example, Smart Passive Income has a paid community on Circle, where you have to apply to become a member.
With Circle, you can build:
- Membership communities: Offer exclusive memberships for paid content, conferences, expert talks and integrate with other membership tools like Memberstack and Memberspace.
- Course communities: Help your students interact on course platforms such as Teachable and Kajabai via integrations.
- Coaching communities: Create a welcoming and collaborative space for your clients.
- Podcast communities: Help your listeners connect and share ideas/ feedback after every episode.
- Brand communities: Keep consumers engaged and up-to-date with an exclusive community where you share offers, collect feedback and clarify doubts.
With Circle, you can create a customized community that your audience can call its own. It’s a safe space for discussion, idea sharing, feedback and general chatter.
Circle Features
Circle offers diverse features for online creators across the board.
Different Types of Communities
On Circle, your community is whatever you want it to be.
Besides the communities listed above, you can customize your community as you see fit to get everything right. You can weed out the toxicity of general social media platforms and drive insightful conversations.
For example, Makerpad helps entrepreneurs and business owners create websites and run them without using any code. A large part of their platform is dependent on its community members helping each other out, which they do through Circle.
Customize Your Community Branding
With Circle, you can create a community that matches your brand. You can customize colors, settings and themes. You can add different channels and even have custom guidelines.
You can use a custom domain and own 100% of your members’ data. Your audience won’t even know you’re using Circle unless you tell them.
Website Integration
Circle integrates with popular platforms and apps, including WordPress, Slack, Mailchimp and Shopify.
Integrations allow you to embed your community within your existing website, so users don’t have to visit a separate domain to connect with you or other members.
Online Course Platform Integration
If you’re an online creative entrepreneur and use Teachable, Kajabi, or any other major course platform, Circle makes it easy to share your content with your community.
It allows you to naturally lead your audience into your community, where they can discuss and elaborate on the topics discussed in your course.
Building Your Community on Circle
The first step to creating an online community on any platform is to ask yourself:
- What is the common interest of this community?
- What do you have to offer to the community?
- How do you want to communicate with your community?
- Why do you want to create this community?
- What type of community do you want to create?
Answering these questions will help you form an in-depth strategy for community creation and audience engagement.
Based on your answers, decide on the features you want and choose a pricing plan with all these features. Larger communities with more than 1,000 members can opt for the Professional or Enterprise plans.
After setting up your community, you need to engage with your users. Circle has guides in their Knowledge Base to help you do just that.
Final Thoughts: Building an Online Community on Circle
Circle is an excellent choice for businesses eager to build a loyal community around their entrepreneurial endeavors.
It connects you with your audience at a deeper level, and you can easily add it to your website or coaching platform.
