Not the Only One Starting a Ning Site
Douglas Welch started off the New Year by launching a Ning network tied to his Career Opportunities podcast, which is somewhat interesting. Of course, the one big reason I went with Ning, as opposed to an existing social networking platform like Facebook, was to allow folks to participate in a network for child abuse survivors, without having to tie it to a professional, or other existing profile. I’m not sure why we need to Ning sites to network in common areas of interest instead of existing platforms, thereby making us keep up with yet another profile.
I’ll be interested to see how and if Douglas can differentiate this network from something like a Facebook group, so I did join. (Of course, the fact that I already have a Ning ID makes it easy for me to do that, even though I’d have to recreate profile customizations on this network as well if I wanted it to match the other Ning networks. But I don’t really want to do that, so I left my profile pretty generic for now.)
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Mike,
Great thoughts! I am writing down my thoughts off the top of my head, as this is often the way I come up with my best ideas.
Why did I create the Career Opportunities Community site?
First, I tend to try a lot of ideas and see what sticks. It can rise or fall on its own, but at least I tried it.
Next, I see the Career-Op readers as a small affinity group that has one major thing in common — they all read or listen to Career Opportunities. In this case, I don’t need the community to be huge, as long as it can achieve my main goal for the group, which is to facilitate communication between fellow readers/listeners, not necessarily the world as a whole.
I think that sometimes conversations are better held in small groups over large. I see this as similar to national groups that have individual chapters. People might want to talk about big ideas, but are simply more comfortable doing it in a somewhat smaller space, even if that space is still virtual.
I would love for large parts of the world to know about Career Opportunities, so I am on Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and other social sites, but I also want to look to those most loyal supporters and try to do something that serves them in a very close and special way.
I have just come to this idea as I am writing this, but in one way, the Career Opportunities Community site is my Rewards Card, my VIP program, my customer loyalty program. My readers and listeners have shown that they are interested in what I have to say, so I am making an effort to facilitate communication among themselves as well as with me.
Will it fly? No way to know at this point, but I am a firm believer in “Fail Often, Fail Quickly.” (SMILE)
Thanks again for writing this post and linking to the new site!
Douglas