Have Fun and A Community Will Follow

When you are trying to create a community around your brand (personal or corporate) there is an important consideration that you need to have in mind.

And that is your “fun factor”.

I’m not sure if it is something we are programmed to detect (like those tales of pheromones and the cavemen and stuff) but I think people like to hang around happy individuals or fun brands.

If you are writing content, uninspired or because you’re doing a chore, or meeting numbers, or increasing followers, people will smell your fakeness from a mile.

There’s a brilliant campaign sponsored by Volkswagen called the “Fun Theory“:

This site is dedicated to the thought that something as simple as fun is the easiest way to change people’s behaviour for the better. Be it for yourself, for the environment, or for something entirely different, the only thing that matters is that it’s change for the better.

One of my favorite videos is about a train station in Odenplan, Stockholm that decided to try a novel approach to make people use the stairs instead of the escalator, by turning it into a piano.

At the end of their experiment 66% more people than normal chose the stairs over the escalator. It was more fun and without knowing it and they where also doing good for themselves.

What ever you’re doing that has to do with communities, do it because you really want to. Be the “fun piano” and people will choose you instead of the mechanical alternative.

Photo by W2 a-w-f-i-l