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Tip Tuesday: Creating Banners with Canva
One of the simplest ways to bring a brand’s look and feel into your community is with custom banners. If design isn’t your day job, don’t worry. Tools like Canva (or alternatives like Pixlr) make it easy to create clean, professional visuals in just a few minutes. Here are some quick tips for getting started: Start with…
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From Canva to code: how I built the new Gleaniverse community in Higher Logic Vanilla
When I joined Glean in January, the Glean community was entirely housed within Slack. We had just purchased a new community tool, Higher Logic Vanilla but had not begun the implementation process. Our goal? Launch our customer community, the Gleaniverse, at our first-ever user conference, Glean:GO, on May 20th. That meant…
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TipTuesday: Start Small, Grow Strong
Tip Tuesday: Start Small, Grow Strong One of the biggest mistakes people make with communities is trying to go too big, too fast. It can feel exciting to want a big splash, but the truth is… the strongest communities usually start small. A handful of people who are passionate and willing to engage consistently can set the…
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#TipTuesday: Creating extra email addresses
While managing your community, you are likely to encounter situations where extra email addresses are helpful. For example: Sign-up flows: Registering as a new member multiple times to make sure onboarding works smoothly. Event registration: Ensure emails, notifications, and automations trigger as intended for different…
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#TipTuesday: When’s the best time to host a webinar?
Webinar timing can feel like guesswork, and honestly, most of us just default to whatever’s worked “okay” before. But every so often, it’s worth checking the data to make sure you’re not missing out on sign-ups or attendees. Jon Schumacher pulled together a bunch of webinar benchmarks (from GoToWebinar, ON24, MegaMeeting,…
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[Tip Tuesday] Top 5 Qualities Needed for a Community Manager
Hey Everyone! Happy Tip Tuesday! I recently had a conversation with some friends inquiring on what does it take to be a Community Manager. Is it simply just about posting content & banning unfavorable behavior? Answer: No. It's much more than that. Being a Community Manager requires embodying a blend of technical,…
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Tip Tuesday: Don't skip the UTM tag in your URLs. Your future self will thank you.
As a marketer, I rely on UTM parameters all the time. They’re one of the easiest ways to see which emails, social posts, or announcements are sending people to your community and which ones aren’t pulling their weight. So if you’ve ever looked at your analytics and wondered “How did people end up here?” a missing UTM might…
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Why Office Hours and AMAs are gold 🍯 🌈
Answering questions and fostering genuine connections and trust between members are often key community goals. This is precisely where "Ask Me Anything" (AMA) sessions and "Office Hours" prove invaluable, transforming impersonal digital spaces into vibrant hubs of humans. Easy to produce A key advantage of AMAs and Office…
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🎯 TIP Tuesday: The Power of Real Connection
When it comes to building a thriving community, it’s easy to get caught up in the numbers—total members, likes, followers. But the true magic happens in the quality of connection, not the quantity. Ask yourself: Are you creating a space where people feel seen, heard, and valued? Are you starting conversations that…
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Tip Tuesday: How to use Groups effectively for user research
In general, community groups can be invaluable in user research, providing rich insights and facilitating a deeper understanding of user needs and behaviors. They offer access to diverse perspectives, help identify potential issues, and can be used for various research methods such as focus groups, surveys, and…
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Tip Tuesday: The Custom Fonts Talk.
You want to funkify your site. You've put your heart into the visual presentation of your Vanilla community. You're comparing it to other communities and you're pretty sure your's is a 10. But then you notice, there are some other 10s out there. You want to go up to 11. You're thinking web fonts! (OK, the real story is…
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#TipTuesday : Quick Rank Label Styling for Non-Developers
Hello Success community, Who's ready for another #TipTuesday? As you may know, Ranks are a tool that allow you to either grant or restrict specific community privileges to your users based on their activity on the site. (Need a refresher on Ranks? Check out this article for more info.) Each Ranks has a label that will…
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#TipTuesday: Defining Your Community's "One Thing"
As a community manager, you’re often asked to have your members do a lot of different things. Q&A, feedback, ideation, testing, use cases, customer stories - the list goes on and on. Before you know it, your community home page ends up looking like Times Square complete with billboards and flashing lights. This quickly…
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#TipTuesday: YouTube embeds for your homepage
Everyone loves video content. It's eye catching, easy to consume and can help drive engagement in your community. We know it's easy to copy and paste a URL into a discussion today but how can you showcase your video content on your community homepage? 🧐 It's actually incredibly easy. Most companies and organizations have…
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#TipTuesday: Surveying your community via pop-ups
Time for another #TipTuesday! Whether your community is the new kid on the block or has been a key part of your user journey for years, it is always great to check in with your users to ensure your community continues to provide value – not only meeting your business needs, but your users’ needs as well. How are other…
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#TipTuesday - Encouraging Internal Stakeholder Engagement
Well, it is a bit late, but it is still Tuesday! Today I wanted to talk a bit about how to encourage internal stakeholders to engage with your customer community. Create a staff-only leaderboard - showcase those staff members who are impacting the value of your community through a board that focuses on employee roles. Set…
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#TipTuesday - Boost Community Engagement with Automation Rules
🚀 Boost Community Engagement with Automation Rules Save time and scale your community with Automation Rules in Higher Logic Vanilla! These “virtual assistants” handle repetitive tasks, freeing you up to focus on driving engagement. 🎯 How It Works: •Triggers: Events like unanswered questions or post inactivity. •Actions:…
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Tip Tuesday: Struggling to get replies? Try framing your questions like this...
Hey Vanilla Community, It’s Tip Tuesday, and today’s tip comes from my perspective as a content marketer, pulling from some copywriting techniques. Let’s talk about how to drive better engagement from your community posts. Whether you’re prompting a conversation or genuinely looking for advice, try opening with a specific…
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#TipTuesday: Default Category Following & Notification Preferences
Last year Vanilla released Default Category Following and Default Notification Preferences. Let’s review why you should enable both features. Setting Default Category Following for new members in your community can help streamline user engagements and encourage participation. By doing so, users are automatically subscribed…
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#TipTuesday Give a nudge to users who are still using the custom profile avatar.
Here's an idea to add a personal touch to your community. I've created a custom HTML Widget to encourage users to complete their profiles with a snazzy avatar. Having custom photos/avatars help to bring out the personality of your community and encourage engagement. It's why give badges to users who upload their own…
