You want new customers to find your community as quickly as possible.
This is one of the biggest missed opportunities for communities around products and services.
New members are going to have a lot of questions, face a lot of uncertainty, and are your most likely segment of customers to drop out. Small increases in retention rates have a big increase in profit.
Two approaches work well. First, in the onboarding material, product information, and new customer emails add places where members can ask questions about any challenges they face. Show links to relevant questions in the past, include a top 3 questions about this area in each email and provide a specific category for newcomers to ask questions about their uncertainty.
Even better, invite your new customers from the past month into a new cohort group. Each group is mentored by one of 12 expert members. In these groups, members can ask questions, get advice from mentors, and get to know other people going through the same challenges as them.
After three months, you can have a graduation where they join the rest of the community. Welcome and mention them by name (within reason). You might be surprised how powerful this approach can be.
