How do you "Marie Kondo" your community?

Kara
Kara Vanilla Ice Cream
in Talk Community #1

Spring is a little ways off (especially here in Montana!), but I'm planning ahead for some spring cleaning and the one-year anniversary of the community I'm currently managing.

What "clean-up" tips do you have? Are there processes around them? Examples:

  • Delete users that have been inactive for X amount of time every quarter/year
  • Compare databases to find people who are community members but have left the relevant job role
  • Remove outdated discussions
  • Member inventory to ensure everyone has the correct permissions
  • Offer new badges to shake things up
  • Update your design and images
  • ______________?

How do you keep things tidy?

Comments

  • Adrian
    Adrian HLV Staff Alumni
    #2

    Hey @Kara - I love this list. The things I like to do, is consider the leaks around the house, like I do before the winter. For the community that means to a make sure that the links to the community on the main website are still visible. I like to consider the new user joining experience. So once a quarter I like I go through it and make tweaks, for example, I may see the welcome email needs a spruce up. It’s amazing how things get broken when we think they won’t change.

    another thing that I notice some sites do, and I would consider, is to review announcements. Some of those announcements, can be moved from being “announced in recent discussion” and just kept for the category.

    I’d love to hear what others have on their list. Thanks for starting the conversation :)

  • gpapasergio
    gpapasergio Vanilla Bean
    #3

    I love the list, but I have some concerns about removing outdated conversations and the impact this can have on SEO.

    Thanks for the list.

  • Kara
    Kara Vanilla Ice Cream
    #4

    Hi @gpapasergio - That's an interesting point. What would your concerns be? If members are completely inactive, they wouldn't be tied to any discussions or replies that would be searchable. And since there is no member directory yet, they wouldn't be searchable there.

    I'm a big fan of thinking ahead to try to mitigate things that effect the bigger picture, so I appreciate your insights!

  • Adrian
    Adrian HLV Staff Alumni
    #5

    Good point @gpapasergio. I always get nervous about removing conversations especially if I see it has pageviews. I would rather, close or archive. I'd hate to lose the SEO benefits.

  • Lorna
    Lorna Vanilla Sprout
    #6

    Does archiving impact SEO?

  • Adrian
    Adrian HLV Staff Alumni
    #7
    https://success.vanillaforums.com/discussion/comment/3118#Comment_3118

    If you use the Vanilla archive feature (like I have done for the conversations categories once they are done), Google can still see it, but it does not appear in community search. If you don't add a No Index Meta Tag, it will still be crawled. You would be able to add this via a Pocket - if needed.

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