Social media is expanding everyday and everyone who uses it doesn’t realise they are apart of an online community. In the reading “ Finding your Community”, Brian Solis says, “‘we are judged by the company we keep. When combined, actions and relationships create a foundation for social capital.” This quote suggests that any individual, who gets involved or contributes to an online community or platform, creates a new relationship and builds an online social society as stated in my ‘Week 8- Finding Your Community‘ blog post.
In my Week 6 blog post I explained that I researched some travel online communities and then to find one that I liked the most to join and be apart of. I chose Travellerspoint.
Travellerspoint is not a social media platform, however is an “online community of people who love to travel” (Travellerspoint). It allows its members to communicate with each other via creating or participating in forums, producing a travel blog, uploading and sharing photos of travel experiences to other members and connecting with other travellers by starting or joining groups. In my blog entry ‘Week 7 Activity’ I explained what features I would use the most when I first joined Travellerspoint and how they would benefit me, later on I began to explore these features to get myself known and become apart of the community. The blog entry I posted ‘Week 8 Activity’, shows an image of a forum that I created within the community to become a contributor.
The forum allowed me to understand how to write for a particular audience, in this case, an audience I could choose. Before I could start writing my forum, I was prompted to choose what location/ country my topic was going to be about and to ensure that people who replied/contributed, knew about that specific location/title. I chose USA as my location and “Moving to America” as my title. I then asked members if they had ever lived in America and for any more advice on what the cheapest places were to live. When writing the forum, I expected other members to reply in a few days with some advice, or maybe some shared experiences about moving to the USA, however days later I realised I was not a successful contributor in my community as no one had replied. I think no one contributed to my forum because they either had nothing to share, or the members of this community had never lived in America.
I plan to stay apart of this online community as travelling is one of my main interest. I will try and contribute a lot more than I already have. I aim to join groups, comment and get involved in current forums and create a travel blog to start sharing my current experiences.
Source: Travellerspoint. Image Travellerspoint)
References:
Oatway, Jay, Apr 26, 2012, Mastering Story, Community and Influence : How to Use Social Media to Become a Socialeader Wiley, Hoboken. 97-109. ISBN: 9781119943457.
Travellers point Foundations, 2012. Travellerspoint, Available at: http://www.travellerspoint.com (Accessed 20 April 2016)
SARAH MIZZI ♥ 