An interview with Martin Reed

[Richard Millington]

Martin Reed is unique amongst us community builders. He doesn't have any client overlords to answer to. Margin finds popular niches needing a community, develops the community and monetizes his work. He currently runs JustChat, SoapForum and last year launched FemaleForum – an online community for women.

His blog, CommunitySpark, is one of the most popular online community blogs on the internet.

Here Martin talks about how he started three thriving communities, his process for building a community and his biggest mistake.

Why do you start online communities for women? Wouldn't men be easier?

Only Female Forum is specifically targeted at women. Just Chat is open to everyone over the age of 18 and Soap Forum is open to everyone over the age of 13. Granted, at Soap Forum the majority of our members are female however the site is not squarely aimed at women.

I launched Female Forum as it was time to set myself a new community building challenge. Just Chat is my oldest online community – I launched it in 2000 but conceived the idea in 1999. It's a mature community. Soap Forum was a challenge in that I spotted a derelict community up for sale and wanted to see if I could turn it around. It took some work, but I was successful. It's a niche that is tough to monetise, though.

Female Forum was my third challenge. It was time to build another new community from scratch. One day I happened to be visiting my parents and I asked my mother why she isn't a member of any online communities. She told me she had looked at iVillage but found it overwhelming. It was too complicated for her to use, which is a shame as it has a lot of great content.

I decided to do some research – are there other online communities aimed at women that do a better job than iVillage? Over the next few weeks I tried to find every online community for women that was out there. I didn't find any that were as intuitive as I would have liked. I felt I could do better than what was already out there, hence the mission statement of Female Forum, 'To be the most comprehensive and intuitive online community for women'.

Would a community for men have been easier? Perhaps. There is definitely opportunity out there for a more 'grown up' online community for men. Most communities for men that I come across are just beer and boobs (to put it politely).

At what stage did you realise you could earn a living from this?

Pretty early on I started running some banner ads from TradeDoubler on Just Chat. I made myself around £10-£30 a month. I was fine with that – I didn't start the site to make money. I guess I really realised a living was possible when it helped supplement my income when living and working in Australia in 2002, and again in Canada in 2005.

It wasn't until I returned to the UK in 2005 to start university that I really started figuring out my options for monetising a community. I started to earn enough to put me though my degree, although I wasn't confident enough to cut out all external funding, so I still have student loans to pay off like almost everyone else!

Living in New York, can we assume that you earn a very good living from developing online communities?

I wouldn't say I earn a 'very good' living. I earn enough to be able to choose whether or not I want to work for someone else. I am married, so my wife and I have two incomes coming in. My earnings wouldn't support both of us if she stopped working – that's for sure.

As Female Forum develops, that should generate an additional revenue stream. I am still weighing up the pros and cons of either doing some consulting work or looking for a community manager position as an employee.

If I worked full time and could also keep income from my communities coming in, then I would be earning a good living!

What is an average day like for you?

I'll wake up with in the morning, around 7.45. Have some coffee or tea and then check emails. Then, I visit each of my communities. I see if there are any messages there for me to respond to, I'll read a selection of posts and respond to some.

Next, I'll typically check on my blog for any new comments. Then I'll catch up on Twitter and my favourite blogs. I'll check Google Analytics to see how traffic is doing. Any new traffic sources? Any apparent bottlenecks on the site?

By now, I'll be approaching noon so I hit the community building period. From now, I tackle the 'to do' list so what I go through varies from day to day. I might send a few personal messages to members I haven't seen around for a while. I might make a few design tweaks here and there. Without fail, I'll be adding content and getting involved.

Towards the end of the day, I'll check up on revenue generated over the previous day. Community building first, revenue last.

What has been your biggest mistake so far?

Easy. A few years ago I purchased a 'free web hosting' site. After the transfer, the reality hit me that I don't know anything about the technical side of being a web host. The figures given to me before the sale weren't entirely accurate. I didn't know what I was doing, and I had no passion for the web hosting business. I lost a good chunk of money with the purchase and the running costs.

My lack of passion and interest also meant the attached forum failed. Ironic really, as it was the forum that encouraged me to purchase the site in the first place.

Can you talk us through your process for building an online community

Find members and create content. All communities are different, but the building strategy is very similar. A community without content won't attract members and nobody wants to join an online community that has no members.

You need to seek out your early adopters. Bring them in early. Get them involved in the community building process. Get their feedback and listen to it. Act on it.

Once you have the foundation, you can then build. Get involved in the community yourself, and constantly be thinking, 'How can I get my members more involved in the community'? You should always be coming up with new ideas. Some will work, others won't. But you need to keep at it.

What will your next online community project be?

I have absolutely no idea. I don't want to launch another online community of my own just yet – I am concentrating most of my efforts on Female Forum right now. That community isn't even 6 months old yet. It still needs nurturing.

What do you feel makes you successful, when others fail?

Perseverance. Launching an online community site is so easy. Maybe it's too easy. Thanks to services like Ning, people can set up a community site in a few seconds. What they can't do (or don't realise) is that building a successful community takes time and effort.

Pride. I don't want to fail - especially when I document what I am doing on my blog!

I learnt my skills from experience. I started out knowing very little and learnt as I went along. I made mistakes, but that's good because I learnt from them.

Finally. Who would you like us to interview next and what's the one major question you would like us to ask him/her?

Interview Patrick O'Keefe – his field of expertise is community management and dealing with chaos. I want to know if he plans on launching any new online communities in the near future.



You can read more from Martin Reed at CommunitySpark.com.

[Martin Reed]

Mathieu - I haven't really experienced 'cultural' conflicts, although there have been ones based on the nationality of members. For example, I have had a few instances where European members have directed less than flattering comments towards our American members. I guess this is more political conflict than cultural. Either way, it's not acceptable and these posts get removed and the members 'spoken to'.

In addition, I find that I am less trusting of new members that aren't 'Western'. I guess I am just a cynic after dealing with spammers and scammers for years and years. We recently had a new member join Female Forum who is from China. She has made a number of legitimate posts, but I find myself just waiting for the spam to come. Is this wrong of me? Perhaps - but I just can't help it due to my experience.

I think that as long as your community is based on a foundation of respect and understanding (you are responsible for building this foundation), cultural differences will be celebrated and discussed with interest.

An interesting topic. Thanks for the question.

[Mathieu Ayel]

Hi Martin, have you ever been challenged by cultural differences in your communities? People around the globe get involved and participate in sometimes very different ways. Do you have any story/experience/learning you could share with us?

[John]

Great interview, indeed. CommunitySpark is very well done and a great source for community building advice / insights. Also good luck with Female Forum!

[Martin Reed]

Firstly, I want to thank Rich for allowing me the opportunity to answer his questions here on Commania. Secondly, I want to thank everyone for their positive response to my interview.

I'd love to answer any questions people have. I'll start by addressing what people have asked in the comments, here.

Becky - You don't need to deal with advertisers yourself if you don't want to. You can sign up with a number of affiliate networks and promote companies that way. You'll receive a cut of the sales price, or a fixed amount for every lead you send their way. Check out TradeDoubler or AffiliateWindow for an idea to get you started. Feel free to drop me an email if you want some more in-depth advice: [e-mail]

Matt - I wish I had designed the site myself! No, I don't have any design talent whatsoever. That was outsourced. I ran a contest on Sitepoint Marketplace (now 99designs.com) for the design of the logo and the site itself. If you like the designer, I can put you guys in touch. Just let me know. The site runs on ExpressionEngine - a fantastic CMS. The forum isn't as advanced as stand alone forum software such as phpBB or vBulletin, but it does all I need it to. I chose EE due to the templating system, its flexibility and the way I can really integrate the community into the rest of the content on the site.

Andy - I actually blog about the development of Female Forum in a specific category on my blog. You may find it of interest:

http://www.communityspark.com/category/develop-a-new-online-community/

Let me know if you have any other questions. What market are you in?

[Angela Connor]

Martin is my hero. And who knew he was so totally adorable? Really though, Martin's blog has been a great resource for me and he is an inspiration. Keep it up Martin. You are on the stars. Female Forum is amazing. I was a big fan of Cafe Mom but I thoroughly enjoy FF.

[Amitha]

Thanks for sharing the great insights Martin! And a big thank you to Rich as well, for conducting the interview.

I was most fascinated by Martin's insights on the process of taking a community towards success. I believe those advices are extremely helpful for those of us who plan to build new online communities.

[Andy Lacey]

Really interesting interview, good stuff Rich.

Just checked out FemaleForum as it's the most closely associated with my market and got hooked into a couple of posts straight away. Maybe that says more about me than the great content but hey!

Anyway, love the site - I'd be interested to know how it was created. By the way, that sounds like my kind of day! Congratulations on spending your time doing something you clearly enjoy.

[Matt Cheney]

Excellent interview. I found the the average day question very interesting, as I'm a stay at home dad trying to figure out what a day in the life actually looks like.

@ Martin - Did you design Female Forum on your own? I've never seen a setup like that. It's beautiful and clean. What platform does it run on?

@Richard - I really like the interview feature and I hope to see more. Thanks!

[Becky]

Ah, Martin, I love it! Thank you for the interview and for sharing your experience and expertise. I don't think I'd have a hard time with content or getting people involved - I do have a hard time with monetizing it - doing the business end of things. HOW do you sell online ads - ie. how do you price them, where do you go to contact advertisers etc.? I'm still learning the differences between types of ads and don't understand how anything, apart from affiliate ads, really works. I've started several communities - two of which I know there's a demand/niche for - that I'm loading with content now - but HOW to make money with ads, what kind of ads etc? Any tips/links/advice on the ad versus sponsorship game? Who/What/When/Where/Why and How to determine which/what kind of ad etc. I'm TOTAL newbie at this. Thanks!

[Deanna]

What I find most inspiring about Martin’s work is the level of authenticity his communities encompass. Martin has started with one of the most important elements in mind…shared passion