Recently, we’ve been talking a lot about the many purposes of a microsite (or a family of microsites!) for my marketing strategy. We’ve been digging deep on the benefits that implementing this solution can have for our whole digital game, and which are the types of brands and companies that this strategy is best suited for. So basically, we’ve been going on and on about your relationship with your microsites, and how they will affect YOU, but what about your users? 

Being a user myself, I know when a website makes a difference in my experience, and I definitely consider that whenever I have to decide where to buy or get what I’m looking for. Creating a website that lets your users know that you care about them and that you are interested in adding value to their experience is definitely a key point of your whole marketing strategy. We’ve talked about having a microsite to help your users find their best fit among your products, but today we are going to dig a little deeper: How about having a microsite for all your users to share their experiences, and actually become an active part of your community? Well, let’s see! 

A very adaptable technique 

Creating a microsite to be used by your users is a technique that can have many faces and can be implemented in many different businesses. You can create microsites with different forums for your users to discuss your products, you can create a literal community of people through a group chat (some platforms like Slack and Discord are great for this type of strategy) where users can exchange a lot more than just opinions, or even develop some sort of social media dedicated exclusively to your users. These are just options from a wide variety of strategies that you can choose in order to, basically, have a place where your users can interact with and get to know each other based on having, at least, one common interest: your product, industry, or brand. 

Adding value to your user’s experience 

As I said, it is not the same to browse through a randomly created website, with a bunch of information just thrown in there, as going through a website that actually makes you feel like the owner put time and effort into it.  Whether you build a forum, or a group chat for your users to be a part of, it will definitely make a difference from any other website that does not enable the possibility of having your users interact with each other. This opportunity will not only mean that your brand is cool and dedicated, but also it’ll allow your users to learn first-hand what people have to say about your company and products. 

A source of knowledge 

Who’s better to tell you where you need to up your game than the people who actually use your products? Right, no one. And even if you have a customer service department that takes care of these situations, it is not the same as having a whole site ready for you to find out what it is that your customers like and don’t like about your brand. So basically, a whole website dedicated to having your users chit-chat about their needs and thoughts is an awesome source of knowledge when it comes to defining your brand’s strengths and weaknesses, and your next moves. Looks like a collateral effect, but I kind of think this is an awesome reason to go for it because, let’s face it, how long have we been struggling to understand what our audiences would want? And how easy would it be to just learn it from their own voices? 

As a fun tangent, I’d like to say that there already are brands that have implemented this kind of strategy to learn more about their users, and the best example is Spotify Ideas Board right in their Spotify Community. Basically, Spotify created a community website for users to, not only exchange thoughts or ask for help, but also to submit ideas that they think would be good for Spotify to implement, and that other users can vote for or against. 

Target your audience 

Anyone who joins or participates in your community website is definitely interested in your product, and that’s an awesomely easy way to target your audience. Basically, your managed placements problems can be solved by targeting websites visited by anyone who went through, and even more if they participated in your community’s website. So much for ad waste, huh? Well, by implementing this technique, you can be sure to have your ads shown to people who have already shown interest in your product, so they probably will be a lot more likely to click on them, and eventually convert in your website. 

It is good for your SEO 

Any website that links to your website and is filled up with keywords and related content will have Google giving you more SEO points. However, having a website that links to your website, is filled up with keywords and related content, AND has an active community of users exchanging thoughts, creating content (becoming prosumers), and actively sharing opinions about your brand, is not only great publicity but will also make your website look a lot better and much more trust-worthy to Google’s eyes. 

So, to conclude, I believe microsite strategies, in general, are an awesome move to make in order to improve your marketing game. But the special thing about community microsite is that not only it has a lot of benefits for your business, but can actually make a really positive impact towards your users’ experiences and can actually make a big difference when it comes to differentiating your company from others. So, if you have the time and budget, then why not go ahead and give it a try?