Shownotes
How to run a thriving Facebook group with Sam Hill, Community Manager
I’m here today with Sam Hill. Many of you will know Sam as she is the community manager for us in the free Do More Than Therapy community, Psychology Business School and the DMTT members group. Sam has built her own business around helping peoples’ communities to thrive. It is a real skill and she is here to share with us the secrets of a group that gets people talking.
The highlights
- Sam tells us how she came to be a community manager, and what that is 01:06
- Sam talks about how we can measure if a group is doing well, if it’s thriving 02:58
- We discuss engagement and how to get your posts seen and commented on 04:02
- I ask Sam what some of the common mistakes are when setting up a group for the first time 09:49
- We talk about rules, and Sam tells us why we need them 10:38
- Sam tells us to use questions for joining a group, and to be strict about it 12:46
- We talk about using the questions to get people on our email list 14:01
- Sam tells us which rules are the most important to stick to 17:31
- Sam explains how to use units/guides to organise our group 22:03
- Sam talk about the importance of cornerstone content 23:46
- We discuss pop-up groups and how they can be successful 29:05
- We talk about the time needed to run a group and whether you need a community online 36:21
- I ask Sam how people make the decision to bring in a community manager, and what they can get help with 39:56
- We discuss risk management, having a disclosure in your rules, and a fairplay agreement 44:29
- We talk about outsourcing your social media in general, and who should post what 48:03
Links to find Sam
https://www.facebook.com/groups/975281076155451
https://www.instagram.com/samantha_j_hill/
Links to other podcasts referenced:
Don’t set goals without a clear vision, values and mission! Why psychologists and therapists usually fail at goal setting and how to plan better: https://psychologists.drrosie.co.uk/the-business-of-psychology/vision-values-and-mission-psychologists-and-therapists-goal-setting/
3 Ways to Use Facebook for Psychologists and Therapists:
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Do you sometimes wake up at 2 am worried that you’ve made a terrible error that will bring professional ruin upon you and disgrace your family?
I’m laughing now but when I first set up in private practice I was completely terrified that I had “missed” something big when setting up insurance or data protection.
Even now, three years in, I sometimes catch myself wondering if I have really covered all the bases.
It is hard, no impossible, to think creatively and have the impact you should be having in your practice if you aren’t confident that you have a secure business. BUT it can be overwhelming to figure out exactly what you need to prioritise before those clients start coming in.
I’ve created a free checklist (plus resources list) to take the thinking out of it. Tick off every box and you can see your clients confident in the knowledge that you have everything in place for your security and theirs.
Download it now from
https://psychologists.drrosie.co.uk/client-checklist
TRANSCRIPT
SPEAKERS
Rosie Gilderthorp, Sam Hill
Rosie Gilderthorp 00:01
Welcome to the business of psychology podcast, the show that helps you to reach more people, help more people, and build the life you want to live by doing more than therapy. I'm here today with Sam Hill, many of you will know Sam, as she's the Community Manager for us in the free Do More Than Therapy community, Psychology Business School, and the Do More Than Therapy members group. So we keep her really, really busy. Sam has built her business around helping people's communities to thrive. It's a real skill, and she's here to share with us the secret of the group that gets people talking. So welcome to the podcast, Sam. I've been trying to get Sam on here for ages. Because when we first met, I had absolutely no idea what a community manager was, or why anybody would want one. But now I absolutely could not be without you, Sam. So why don't we get started with you telling us a little bit about how you came to be a community manager and what that is.
Sam Hill 01:06
Okay, so, um, I used to run wool shops, I had a knitting business for 11 years. And I built up a really strong, thriving community from that business. When I sold the business, I realised that was kind of what I was good at. And what I missed most about the business was the community. So I had the opportunity to look after my business coach at the times community Janet Murray, she's become like, one of one of my main clients. And yeah, so I that's what I do full time now is help business owners like Rosie to build communities. Essentially, what I think Community Manager is, is customer service online. That's how I describe it, if people don't understand.
Rosie Gilderthorp 01:54
That's a really great way of describing it, because it, it makes people in my experience anyway, since having you on board, it's really helped people to feel looked after. And like we're kind of more on the ball than I could be on my own.
Sam Hill 02:07
Yeah, I look af... yeah I look after people, care for them, make sure they're happy.
Rosie Gilderthorp 02:13
And I know that there's a lot of people listening to this podcast, who want to create a Facebook group, or some other kind of online community, because they're thinking about, you know, selling a product or a service that needs quite big audience. And in some of the previous episodes, I've recorded about Facebook, I'm pretty sold, that if you're on Facebook, a group is the way to do that. But there are groups and there are groups, right? And you can spend a lot of time getting nowhere with a group if you don't really know what you're doing with it. So we love data in the psychology community, you know this. How can we how can we tell how can we measure if a group is doing well if it's thriving?
Sam Hill 02:58
So what I look at first is the insights. So if you're, if you've got your community on Facebook, which is where yours is, there's an insights in there, which is really helpful, and that will show you the first thing you want to look at is the engagement figure. So if people are engaging, you're doing something, right. It's not about numbers, don't get hung up on vanity numbers, you can have 50 people all talking to each other. That's brilliant, you could have 50,000, and your engagement be super low. So that's like the main thing you want to look at. The other one is active member rate, which you'll know I put in your report every month. So that tells you who's looked or seen or commented on any comments at all. That's really important, because as your group gets bigger, you'll find that it, that gets a little bit lower, because lots of people don't see everything that's in the group. So that's kind of where you need to start with, with the insights and data stats.
Rosie Gilderthorp 04:02
Yeah, I mean, that's a really good point. Because one thing I didn't realise until we started working together was how much of an algorithm Facebook really is in groups. I kind of thought that I would see most things from a group that I was a member of, but that's really not the case, is it?
Sam Hill 04:19
No, not at all. And actually, it's funny because I've just done a video recently showing how you can make sure that people are seeing more comments in your group because I was part of a group that I didn't even realise because it wasn't shown on my feed. So the best way to do that in a Facebook group is you can change your notifications so that you see every single post that comes through. So it's best to like ask openly, ask your members to do that. But also the communication; every time you put a post out that somebody comments on the next post will be seen more. So it's really important to get people talking.
Rosie Gilderthorp 05:01
So this is why engagement and active members kind of work together as the most important stats, because presumably, if you're getting lots of engagement on a post, more people are going to see the posts and become active members.
Sam Hill 05:16
Yeah, that's right. Yeah, more. So if you've got a really, really popular post, and then you've got a post that you think might not be as popular, put it after the most popular one, because the algorithm will show it to more people, because the last post was active, if that makes sense.
Rosie Gilderthorp 05:33
That's a really good tip, because people often ask me in the Do More Than Therapy community, you know, I've got this blog post or a podcast episode or a video even, that is on a topic which I don't think is going to get very good engagement, but is really important. And that can be a way of getting that seen can't it. I remember when I was writing about trauma, that was something which we had to do quite a lot. Because, you know, I'd have like a light conversation post, get as many comments as I could on that one. And then do the blog post post afterwards, because nobody's going to admit to needing the blog post I was about to put up.
Sam Hill 06:12
Yeah. And I think in in the communities that your listeners will be in, a lot of topics that you talk about, won't necessarily lend itself to open conversation. So that's why you need the lighter sort of conversation starters in the group first, to allow that to kind of get shown to everybody. And then that might lead to a private message or an email or an going on like that.
Rosie Gilderthorp 06:42
Yeah, that was definitely how it used to work when I ran groups for parents with different kind of clinical struggles. It was very much like nobody was going to kind of openly talk about their problems in the group, which I must admit, I was a little bit disappointed by. One of the reasons I set up, a couple of the groups that I set up was to try and provide support, and did a lot of thinking about how to manage risk and all of that stuff. It was a lot of work. But actually, that wasn't what people were on Facebook for. That wasn't how they wanted to access me, but I would get work in my inbox, I would get people kind of messaging me from that, and the group stayed kind of lighter. And and we can talk more about that later if it's helpful, kind of, you know, one of the groups I did work well, because it's very task focused, and I think that can be helpful. But we might come on to that a little bit later, I think. So you know, if engagement is really important, I think the first thing people are going to want to know then is well, how the hell do I get people to talk in a group?
Sam Hill 07:44
So the best way is not to be super, like businessy. And I know that sounds completely back to front. But you need to remember that everyone in your group are people, whether it's members to do with your business like Rosie's going for psychologists, or you've got clients in there. So have conversation starters, which is what I call them. So like, really silly things like what's your favourite colour? It's easy conversation that anybody can answer and they don't feel pressured. And that will start the conversation and make people feel more confident, I think, to get going with the conversations.
Rosie Gilderthorp 08:26
It's about asking them something that's easy to answer and kind of non threatening.
Sam Hill 08:30
Yes, definitely. Yeah. It just makes it more comfortable.
Rosie Gilderthorp 08:35
Yeah, and different things seem to be more comfortable for different audiences as well so that you've probably got to test, like do you remember in the Do More Than Therapy community, we tried to do a like gifs conversation starter, and because it worked really well in another group that we're both in, and I love a good gif, but it turns out that people in the Do More Than Terapy community did not like a good gif.
Sam Hill 08:56
I think that's where you need to have a little bit of patience, it's test and trial. People come to me wanting me to give them like the straightforward you must do this, this and this on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and it will work, but unfortunately, it's not the case. Like a lot of businessy groups you do need accountability and wins. But you know, I manage a baby group that you don't want accountability in a baby group, that's not gonna work, so you do need to consider your, your audience I think.
Rosie Gilderthorp 09:28
Yeah, I mean, with everything in marketing, I feel like I'm always kind of banging on about the fact that good marketing is actually good listening. And it's the same when you start your group, you've got to get to know those people and what they want from you and what they want from each other, and then you're just kind of facilitating that.
Sam Hill 09:46
Yeah, definitely.
Rosie Gilderthorp 09:49
So, what are some of the common mistakes you see when people set up a group for the first time?
Sam Hill 09:57
One of the big mistakes is that the host, so for example Rosie in hers, feel like they need to answer every single question immediately. And I think all this does is scare your clients, because no one's gonna want to talk to each other. You need to remember it's a community and they're talking to each other. And if you're going to jump in and answer every question immediately, that's never going to work. So try and let them answer first, and then you jump in and answer the question. I think that's probably the one of the biggest mistakes. Another one is not setting up rules. I don't know...
Rosie Gilderthorp 10:38
Ah, I was gonna talk to you about rules. Rules is something that Sam, like, enforces for me. Because I think for any community owner, you want to help everybody, you want to let everybody in. Erm I, I really struggled with this, but Sam has proven to me how worthwhile rules are. So tell us a bit about why we need rules Sam.
Sam Hill 11:02
I'm, I'm very strict when it comes to rules. I think you will, you need rules, because it's your group, you need to remember that, that's it is your group and your rules goes. Because especially in business, like people will come and take advantage, unfortunately. So having a good set of rules set up at the very beginning, makes it a lot easier if then later on someone breaks a rule or you get arguments in the group, or I don't know, someone wants to come into the group that the group's not there for, you can just point them to the rules and say, look, this is the rules of my group, no. It's easy as that, really, but yeah, lots of people shy away from them. And I don't know why.
Rosie Gilderthorp 11:45
Well, I know why, I think it's because you, you feel like you're denying something helpful to somebody. And that never feels comfortable, especially a lot of the people that we've had to say no to we've had to say no, because they aren't a mental health professional.
Sam Hill 12:03
Yeah.
Rosie Gilderthorp 12:04
And, and it's very important to the Do More Than Therapy community, that it's a safe space, because everybody can be confident that everyone else in the group has a shared understanding of the work that we do. And you know, it doesn't matter whether you're a psychologist, or whether you're a therapist from a completely different school of thought. To me, you know, essentially, everybody in that group is somebody who has, you know, committed their career to helping people with their mental health. And, and that brings with it a certain mindset. And that's the community that we wanted to create. But I find it really difficult to say no to people, just because that's not...
Sam Hill 12:46
I think that comes in with the questions as well. Like, when you have a group, you get a choice of three questions that you put in. And I always say to my clients, like, go with the question, don't just let them in if they haven't answered them, you need to be strict about this, because that's about engagement as well. Like if somebody can't, like almost can't be bothered to answer three questions before they come in your group, are they going to talk in your group? Are they going to engage? Probably not. So that's kind of why I'm super strict with that, and taught Rosie to be.
Rosie Gilderthorp 13:22
Yes, because I think, yeah, you're right. Somebody who's not going to answer a question probably isn't going to talk very much in the group. And is that bad then, is it bad to have people there who don't do anything?
Sam Hill 13:35
I wouldn't say it's bad. Like, you'll always get kind of a percentage of people that just sit there. And that's fine, because you never know, like, I lurk in some groups, and then I'll buy something like six months later. So you'll always get those people. But you're the majority of people you get in there, you want to be engaging, because otherwise it's not a community.
Rosie Gilderthorp 14:01
So I've realised I've kind of sidetracked you a little bit into into talking about the questions. So I'll asked one more thing on that, and then
