Work: Bright One
Info: Bright One’s Ben Matthews contacted me to throw together a couple comps for an emerging company he is spearheading. I can’t divulge much information about the company yet but what I can say is that it’s a great idea and I’m hoping to be a part of it in some way, shape or form.

I’ve often thought about what evangelism really is when it pertains to web based companies. As someone who has helped build communities over that past 8 years or so I’ve been able to witness the struggles and successes of trying to keep an active community and at the same time garner new users. It’s not an easy thing at all but if you learn how to balance those two roles things become much easier.

How much do you, as a company/community owner count on your current users to spread the word about you? I would expect that word of mouth if perhaps the most lucritive way to get new users. One person, the evangelist, cannot be charged with the growth of their companies community/usership. I think any company who thinks otherwise is sadly mistaken. When I ran LoTR Online, later The Fantasy Forum I had a few people on staff charged with getting our name out there. I couldn’t count on just one person to grow our community and I realized this right away. This leads to my question. Why do some companies only have one person charged with evangelism? If you’re a company that is growing at a spectacular rate do you look to add another person to help spread the word or do you hope that there are people like me and others out there that will write about you and tell their friends?

Support? How much of the support load should an evangelist be charged with handling? We can pretty much say already that an evangelist has to have an exceptional grasp on the product but how in depth does is the grasp expected to be? I understand that sometimes having a developer answer support questions might be a little out of the question. Some developers have the “Doctor Complex”. You know, they come into your room and answer your questions in words that aren’t under 10 letters long and you have no clue what they’re talking about. It happens. It’s happened to all of us. I’d like to thank evangelists for filling the gap between the “lei-men and the doctors”.

So what is an evangelist? Community Builder? Tech Support? I’d like to think it’s 80% community builder 20% tech support. One thing I don’t think an evangelist should be is the swiss army knife for your company. It’s when you start going to your evangelist for design work, development, etc you’ll only end up holding back the real potential for growth of your community. I understand that in a Startup environment everyone might have roles but they overlap. However, once you get beyond that startup stage if you’re going to your only community person for other work maybe you need to examine what your other departments are doing or not doing?

These thoughts will, I am sure evolve into other posts on evangelism the more I go over it and whiddle down the true roles of what it is we are actually supposed to be doing/accomplishing.

Thoughts?

I’ve been absolutely astounded by the reports coming in from the media about the lack of sportsmanship from some athletes at the Olympics. Sure it could be the fact that the Olympics are being covered heavier than they ever have been before. But come on here folks. You’re an Athlete at the Olympics. Win or lose be a good sport about it.

Sure you can be sad if you’ve lost and yes, of course you should be happy if you’ve won. Beyond happy in fact. But for god’s sake don’t be arrogant about it. When I first started swimming it was one of the very first things taught to me. Win or lose let the other people in the race know they did a great job. Take Usain Bolt for example. I won’t take away the fact that he has talent but he immediately turns me off because of how arrogant he is. Please don’t tell me he is too young to realize what he is doing. Give me a break. You’re on the Olympic stage, everyone is watching you, people look up to you. Act appropriately. Another example? How about the Cuban Taekwando Fighter that got disqualified in his match and subsequently kicked the ref in the face. Enjoy the lifetime banhammer. Or how about the boxer who thought he was gipped from a Gold or Silver medal so when he received his Bronze Medal he took it off and dropped it? Congratulations you’ve been stripped of your medal now. Don’t these people realize that they are in the top 1% of their sport and shouldn’t be acting like this? My favourite was the British 4×400 Relay Team in the Semifinals. Half way down the straight away the final leg runner started taunting the other runners behind him. Congratulations you’ve won a semifinal heat and proceeded to make your entire country look like a bunch of pricks. Don’t these people realize that what they do not only reflect on them but their teammates, coaching staff and country, as well?

I’ll pay attention to the real sportsmans and forget about the ones who are arrogant, immature, disrespectful and whatever other phrase you want to throw in here. It’s not in the spirit of the Olympics or sport for that matter and they ought to be ashamed to call themselves athletes and for representing their countries.

Photo Credit: Yasudach @ Flickr