What is Digital Engagement?

So what is a nurturing pathway?  I define a Nurturing Pathway as the journey you are guiding someone through to help nurture them around your vision.  When you think of nurturing, you think of caring and stewarding someone as they become a better person.  You think of a mother with a newborn.  You think of a father caring for a child who was hurt.  You think of a teacher training and equipping their students.  

In a digital environment, a Nurturing Pathway is similar in its feel but different in how it’s executed.  You are looking for ways that you are guiding people to their next step and helping to see them grow.  A Nurturing Pathway is an internal strategy to meet people where they are and help guide them to what’s next.  

I have unpacked the concept of a Member Pathway in other areas… this is different.  A Member Pathway is how you are guiding someone through the stages of becoming a member and the various membership maturity stages.  A Nurturing Pathway sits right on top of the Member Pathway but this specifically looks at how you are caring for them at each stage… or nurturing them.  Another way to look at this is a Member Pathway is how you are moving someone to deeper engagement and through your various tiers.  A Nurturing Pathway is about the development of the person and who they are becoming.  

Let’s spend some time unpacking what this looks like.

• Think Coffee Shop - I believe one of the best ways to get your mind around what true nurturing looks like is to put yourself at a coffee shop across the table from a person at this stage and think about what you would talk about with them.  Map that out and then explore how to leverage technology to help bring that to life.  

• Drip Campaigns - You are going to have key triggers of activity that can launch specific communication series.  Drip campaigns are excellent ways to nurture someone who has just made a decision.  Remember that every decision has some level of doubt in it so you’re working to help remove someone’s doubt while helping them know exactly what comes next. 

• Picture of Success - Build a picture of success… not about your success but their success.  This is a time to paint a picture of exactly what you hope success looks like in their life and on their journey.  This helps you build a baseline and goal as you consider how you are nurturing this person.  

• Put Yourself in Their Shoes - Take time to put yourself in their shoes and think about how you would want to be nurtured, guided, spoken to, resourced, and encouraged.  Think about frequency, tone, collateral, personalization, and quality.  You’re not doing something to someone… you’re doing something for them.  

You don’t have to spend a ton of time building your Nurturing Pathway, but it’s still very important… especially to help frame our strategies around the betterment of our people.  Take time to map out with your team a simple Nurturing Pathway and continue to build on it.  

Cause Machine Solutions

Cause Machine is designed to help guide people to greater engagement within a private community.  The platform helps you implement your Nurturing Pathway and helps automate a number of ways for people to be cared for well in a community.  Schedule a demo today!

So here’s my challenge to you… to divide in your mind the difference between content distribution and community engagement.  More often than not, we call the things that are really digital distribution digital engagement.  But they aren’t!  This is why it’s good to differentiate and define several tiers of digital engagement.  I would lobby that the early tiers are more delivery and the later tiers are engagement.  

TIER ONE ENGAGEMENT: EXPLORING

Tier one engagement is really the first step of exploring what you have to offer and engaging with you. These actions are low-hanging fruit and simple.  They also require very little commitment or transparency on the part of the consumer.  These are also very one-directional (from you to them).  Some examples are:

• Views - people looking at your site, your videos, etc.

• Impressions - similar, essentially eyeballs on your digital assets

• Downloads - free downloads of resources (with or without contact capture)

• b - simple expressions of liking something they’ve seen

TIER TWO ENGAGEMENT: INTERACTING

This tier begins to see more interaction and transparency.  People start to share who they are and their contact information.  This stage becomes more back and forth with the constituent, but they are still exploring.  You do have the ability to start nurturing these individuals since you now know who they are (and they need nurturing!).  Some examples are:

• Comments - action to share something and be noticed in the community

• App Downloads - taking action to download an app asset onto their phone

• Subscribe - share their contact information and request to know more

• Sign Up - registering and signing up for something you offer (asset or event)

• Create Account - creating an account and/or becoming a member

TIER THREE ENGAGEMENT: ADVOCATING

This third tier is where you see someone more from interacting to advocating.  This is where the person becomes a champion for your vision/brand.  This is also where true engagement happens because the person is not only interacting with you but they are also interacting with others around them.  That’s the goal of almost all digital engagement… to see people engage each other.  Some examples are:

• Sharing - taking the action to share with friends or on social - advocating this to others

• Invite - taking the initiative to invite others to join in on something they are attending

• Groups - join or launch groups that bring together people in real life

• Post - posting content or stories to help enrich the community

I’m certain there are many more examples here so please add your own ideas.  My goal in this segment is to paint a picture that not all measures or engagements are the same.  In fact, I wouldn’t even call early-stage active “engagement”.  I believe engagement should be reserved for when someone starts connecting with others and advocating for your vision.  

My challenge to you is to explore and build your own tiers of engagement.  Please, take these tiers if they make sense to you, or start from scratch.  But you need your own grid of tiered engagement so you can (1) measure properly, (2) set goals properly, (3) track conversion from one stage to the next property, and (4) celebrate member maturity.  

Cause Machine Solutions

The entire Cause Machine platform is designed to help bring various tiers of engagement to life for people in your community.  We believe in the nurturing of individuals in these private communities and the goal of helping everyone reach toward a deeper engagement… true tier-three engagement with your community and each other.  Schedule a demo today!

One of the most effective ways to define something is to both define what it is and what it is not.  This is a common exercise to set expectations, understand the scope, and simply manage the direction you’re heading.  Digital Engagement is no different… it’s good to know what it is and what it isn’t.  So let’s take some time to map out our two lists. 

DIGITAL ENGAGEMENT IS

• Drive to Relationship - it should always be moving people from technology to personal relationships (much more on this in other posts).  

• Uniquely Personal - it should be unique to each person and tailored to who they are as a person.

• Grassroots - is should have the ability and grow from the bottom up (or democratized) so the community can own, shape, and grow organically.

• Guided Process - the overall experience should be guided and constructed by you to guide people well.

• Measurable Activity - it should give you the ability to measure how people are engaging, where things are falling off the map, and unique insights into your audience.

• Known & Intentional Next Steps - it should constantly be showing people their best next step and the easy ability to reach that.  

• Multi-Directional - it should include what you push out to your audience, means to respond back to you, and means to engage one another in the community. 

DIGITAL ENGAGEMENT IS NOT

• Simply Social Media - it’s not simply leveraging social media platform to be present and reach people.  

• Simply Pushing Content - it’s not just pushing out content (social media plus other means) to your audience.

• One Directional - it’s not just communication on directionally to your audience without abilities to receive feedback and connect with others.  

• Two Way Communications - it’s not just speaking to you audience and them speaking back with you… it must include them speaking with each other.  

• Purely Online - it’s not all online and in a digital format.

You’re probably seeing a trend here in what Digital Engagement is and is not.  In some ways, Digital Engagement is a tough strategy because ultimately we believe that the goal shouldn’t be digital at all.  We believe that life is all about relationships and the digital resources in life should be bettered our relationships.  

I heard a story once of a man who had over 700 friends on Facebook.  One day he decided to invite all of them to a party and to connect in person.  He set up an event and invited everyone… all 700.  A few registered to meet up at the park that day, but not as many as he had hoped.  When the day came, he sat on a bench waiting for people… not a soul showed up.  How do we begin to live in a world where we have “700 friends” yet not a single one of them shows up in person.  That’s why a clear definition of Digital Engagement is so important and how you as a leader should be helping people build a nurture true relationships.  

Cause Machine Solutions

The entire Cause Machine platform is designed around the principles expressed in this article.  The Cause Machine’s goal is to equip community leaders with great tools to connect with their audience and connect their audience with each other.  The greater goal for us at Cause Machine is to see your members making amazing personal connections because of the tools of the platform and your great engagement.  Schedule a demo today!

Here is a simple truth that’s both powerful and most always forgotten… your members need a path to follow.  They are desperate for a path to follow.  And your leadership and stewardship demand you create a path to follow.  Yes, it’s that important.   

Big picture… you’re guiding people from having no idea who you are/what you offer to be deeply invested and an advocate of your vision.  

A Member Pathway is simple the journey they will follow as they engage in your community and what you offer them.  These are maps with intricate detail and nuanced side paths to make sure you capture and guide people well.  Let’s start with a few components of a Member Pathway and then talk about how you build and use this.

• Visual - these are visual, not just a list of engagement points, but a visual map that charts the full engagement map from first exposure to your picture of thriving.

• Spider Web - this map is going to be messy at first and look like a spider web of paths.  That’s good and normal… you’ll refine in time.  Embrace that it looks like a spider web of opportunities.  

• Going Off Path - don’t just map the perfect journey… also capture where people are going to go off the path and leave your desired destination.  This is important to help prevent that and have tools there to bring them back on the path.  

• Not Linear - while we often want to make these paths linear… they are not!  It’s good to have a general linear pathway, but be open to how messy and non-linear this might evolve.  

• Access Anywhere - it’s also easy to want to see people walk a path from start to finish, but you have to take into consideration that people come in at various stages and maturities.  Build a path where people can come in at various stages.  

Always remember that it’s more important to think in steps for your members over programs and destinations… every engagement should be a next step.

I believe the best way to build a Member Pathway is to get a large sheet of poster board or a large whiteboard and start mapping out all the pathways, nuances, tributaries, off-ramps, etc.  Ask others to help you build this for where you are guiding your people.  

Once you’ve sketched your Member Pathway, then you’re ready to start putting this to action.  Here are a few ways to bring that to life in your organization.

• Transfer to Software - now it’s time to move this from a sketch drawing to something a bit more professional.  There are various software systems to help with this.  I personally love Whimsical as a simple tool to build these types of flow charts.  

• Refine with Others - take your newly designed pathway and hash it out with others on your team and your constituents to refine the concept and what might be missing.

• Evaluate Your Process - take time to look at all of your member engagement processes and pathways to explore how you might refine and align to this newly crafter pathway.  

• Evaluate Your Technology - review your technology solutions to see how they are helping and automating your Member Pathway.  They should be complimenting this and not working against your desired path.

Have fun building your Member Pathway and implementing it.  I’ve seen this done so many times and the excitement and clarity it brings has always been amazing.  Yes, there are going to be some pieces that are overwhelming about this… that’s normal.  Take a bite at a time and enjoy how you are better guiding people to success.

Cause Machine Solutions

The entire Cause Machine platform is designed around the concepts and goals of Member Pathways… working to guide members one step at a time to what’s next.  The platform helps you build pathways per membership tier and guide those members to better ways to connect and engage.  Guiding people through a path is part of the very framework of the platform and the vision we have for guiding people well.  Schedule a demo today!

One of the core tenets I share over and over about digital engagement is the desperate need and drive that all things digital should drive people to something physical.   

I believe society has bought the lie… hook, line, and sinker… that social media will help draw us closer together as individuals and create better communities.  That very well may have been one of the original intents and it may even be a derivative of what we experience in social media.  But we’ve seen far more of an increase in jealousy, comparison, materialism, isolation, false security, and many other attributes that we don’t like about ourselves.  

This is why it’s important for anyone who leads a social community or digital engagement to always keep in front of them the deep need for all digital to drive to physical.  

I believe that we are all hard-wired for community and relationships with one another.  And while technology can make some great connections and provide great experiences, nothing can replace physical interaction and presence with other people.  This is most obvious when we are hurting and in need of a friend to process life.  No amount of social posts will replace being with someone who loves you and cares for you.  

Let’s make this more practical… how do you lead people from the digital space to something more relational and physical?

• Virtual Events - guide people to personal connections with other people of similar interests with a nudge to connect in person.  

• Virtual Events - guide people to joining groups in their area to keep process but also to see they are not alone.  

• eCourses - encourage people to take courses as a cohort and go through in person with others.  

• Online Groups - guide people from virtual groups and discussions to in-person events and gatherings.  

• Blog & Content - encourage practical engagement with your content in a manner that connects people in person.

• Membership Platforms - guide people to connect with others who are like-minded to meet in person and build sub-tribes.  

Be creative and have fun exploring how you can help guide people from digital to virtual.  You have a responsibility to make this part of your ethos.  

Okay, so yes, why am I talking so much about this concept in a discussion that’s primarily about digital engagement?  I write this because, for any digital engagement strategy to be successful, it must lead to relational connections.  And I would argue those relational connections should be physical (face to face).  The strongest digital communities and digital strategies keep this tension in place and guide people well in both.  May I encourage you to do the same as you build your digital engagement strategy.  

Cause Machine Solutions

The Cause Machine platform provides various modules and tools to provide digital engagement touchpoints (memberships, groups, events, and more).  The platform stands apart in how it uniquely connects two people in a community based on like-minded interests.  These connections help make a large community small and help create great relationship connections. Schedule a demo today!