With the introduction of communities on Blink, we know that a lot of our customers will want to convert their existing social channels into fully enabled community groups.
Below are some simple instructions and supportive resources for doing so:
Example: I have a social channel for Menopause Support at Work and want to convert it to a community group.
Step 1: set up your Menopause Support at Work community group in the Admin panel.
Give your group a short description: you may want to mention this group replaces the old channel
Setup the appropriate feed post rules: we recommend Admins and members can post since you want to encourage community sharing
We recommend adding a few members to the group who you know will help champion your transition from the old channel to the new community group:
It’s all about people-power to help drive effective change!
Create your community!
Note: when you create a community group, a default channel will be created! So you don’t need to manually set this up (as you usually would for a team).
Step 2: promote your new community
Head to your community’s homepage to find and copy the community url
See viewing groups, if you’re not sure how to do this
Select the 3 dots (top right of the community homepage) and click copy link (see screenshot below)
Share the community link on your existing channel. Here’s some copy to help:
Exciting news! This conversation now has a proper community home with a dedicated feed, channel(s), resources, and members list!
Join now to continue the conversation (insert community link)
Small print: this channel will be closed on (insert date). Please copy any relevant resources to our new community space. We look forward to seeing you there!
If you added some community champions to your community, you can engage them via your default community channel and ask them to promote the community link.
You can also promote your community on your main feed to rally interest.
FAQs
Why should I convert my channel to a community group? | A community group benefits from a lot more features such as its own homepage, feed, channels, resources and members list. Read more here. |
Should I delete my old channel? | We recommend this. You can give a good period of notice before deleting the channel. Don’t worry if some members haven’t joined your new community yet. They can easily discover it via their Connect menu or web widgets. Sometimes people’s circumstances change and they may not want to be part of the community anymore. |