Re: [Coworking] Re: Marketing a new co working space in New Delhi, India (in a city with only one other co working space)

[Alex Hillman]

I've been on this list for a long time and if I've said one phrase more times than anything else, it's been "focus on the community". So Joanne's advice is sound. Community growing takes time, and is even harder with the pressure to keep the lights on.

I've also realized that for a lot of people, "focus on the community" can feel like empty advice, especially if they don't know how to do that (or what they've done to prevent it from working so far). It's easy to mistake a group of people for a community, and we've seen countless people on this list make these mistakes. 

After 5 years of learning on our own as well as coaching so many spaces around the world, I realized that solving coworking logistics aren't nearly as common of a problem as "how do I build a successful community". So I took a good hard look at the commonalities between our success in Philadelphia, many others successes, and common stumbling blocks that people run into with community building. They generally fall into one or more of a few categories:

• How to get the word out about a community via word of mouth
• How to attract/retain members
• How to structure a community & memberships (in the case of a coworking space, the business model) so that it rewards community growth instead of inhibits it)
• How to plan events that help develop community
• How to involve & include members in the evolution of the community

So I'm answering all of these questions in the first edition of a new course that I've designed to help people learn how to build any community, not just one for a coworking space. It's 100% virtual and conducted over email (the current class has attendees from across the US, 4+ from Australia, Italy, and more) and takes 4 weeks to complete.

I've made the warm-up lesson available for free here: http://gum.co/community-builders-masterclass for anyone who's interested, and will be sending out more details about the October course very soon!

Community building is a process, and it's one that never stops - the sooner you start, the better off you'll be in the same amount of time. 

-Alex

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/ah

indyhall.org

coworking in philadelphia

On Tuesday, September 4, 2012 at 9:57 AM, Joanne Popham wrote:

Hi Shitij

 

My name is Joanne I started a Coworking Space in Swansea, South Wales, UK in October 2011. We will be open a year next month.

 

I thought that as soon as we opened the doors we would have queues of people waiting to take up a desk but that has not been the case. We have grown over the last 11 months but very slowly and it has taken determination and dedication to get through the start-up period.

 

I was lucky to meet up with a space owner in a near town to us who informed me that he had also been in the same position as us, lack of people, lack of understanding of the concept. It took them 3 years to build their community and they have just opened 2 more spaces int heir town. It just takes time and patience.

 

So my advice to me and you is to stick with it, believe in it and grow your community.

 

Hope that helps?

 

Joanne

On Tuesday, 4 September 2012 07:17:06 UTC+1, Shitij Malhotra wrote:

Hello Everyone,

We recently setup a co working space in New Delhi, India.

While we set it up with passion and made sure the interiors, exteriors, location are nice. We are finding it difficult to market the same and attract people.

It could be because of the lack of awareness about such a concept.

I would like to ask other who have pulled this off, on what are the best ways to build a community and market the space.

I'm sure this would be of interest to alot of others too.

Thanks in advance

Cheers

Shitij

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[Craig Baute - Creative Density Coworking]

Alex brings up a good point and his class sounds very interesting on creating the process on building a community. It is a skill to build a community and there are several key things space owners have learned through trial and error over the years. I was just asked yesterday what three key things were important in a building a community once you have people in the space.

Here were the things that I learned and came off the top of my head at the moment (meaning they likely will be slightly changed over time)

1. Events - Social + Support. Have events that start the conversation between new and old members and another type of events that create a support system like show and tells, accountability meetings, etc.. These s also helps integrate new members and allow current members share new projects or hobbies and keeps the relationships growing strong.
2. Be a great host. Introduce people, make them comfortable in their new setting, and use that initial interaction to start indicating the culture and type of community that's in the space.
3. Design a space that encourages interaction, but also allows for people to work in a variety of different ways. Space and interior design are under estimated ways to encourage the interaction and culture you want within a space.
   

Now how do you get people in there?

I'm not that familiar with the India market but start your branding with a specific voice that tells the culture and community that you have or want to create. You are competing against the home office (maybe not so much in India because the homes are much smaller), traditional executive suites, coffee shops, and probably other elements different than the US market. BUT your greatest competitor is the lack of awareness of coworking in India. If you have a strong brand and voice coming from you and your community then it will create a story that intrigues others to at least explore coworking. Offer a few free days and you can emphasis what I stated above.

There are plenty of threads that exists on here about how to build a community throught Meetups, Jellies, starting the chatter online, and creating collaborative groups. I would recommend you just search for previous threads that give ideas for getting people in the space and developing a community even before a space is opened.

Good luck!

Craig

Creative Density

Denver, CO

[Aishwarya Chaturvedi]

Use Meetup, post content (photos) on your facebook page, make videos of the place and float it on youtube, you could also contact E-cells at the colleges, they usually have a good network with startups. You can collaborate with the E-cells in fact that you can offer space to the startups that the E-cell incubates or as prizes of their B-plan competition etc.