How can you pick a community that will help you reach your goals?

Everyone is a part of some sort of community. Some are unfortunate to be only part of society.

Photo by John Cameron, courtesy of Unsplash

Others find their tribe on the Internet, and depending on how well this tribe coexists, they achieve more or less.

Some time ago, I tried to find such a community on one of the discussion forums focused on the Godot engine. Despite its twists and turns, I couldn't find my place there. The Q&A format dominated for technical issues or those deeply related to the game engine, but not much beyond that. I visited for a few weeks and then stopped. One day, I might return when I face technical problems.

A bit later, Jamie Northrup, aka THE Minimalist Hustler, created his community for... well, minimalist hustlers. For a limited time, the entry was free. And because free is a fair price, I decided to join. Worst case scenario, I would stop showing up.

Spoiler alert! I'm still active there.

As if that wasn't enough, I started actively participating on Medium because I saw a few people starting and earning a few cents the next day. And then the second person, the third, the fourth, and they all announced it almost on the same day. Soon after, I joined them!

At that moment, I realized why some communities work better than others.

A community built around an object will help you less than a community built around a role. The first one is about sharing information (mainly, I'm generalizing a bit). The community you want to belong to helps people become someone.

You're looking for a community where there are no problems with people bragging about the smallest successes. Watching mutual successes works well for motivation; you simply won't want to fall behind.

When looking at the number of participants, remember that 90% of people probably don't participate at all. This is not the most crucial piece of information, but a crowd doesn't help in keeping up, let alone participating.

You're looking for a community where there are many people at a similar stage to yours.

You don't want to be surrounded by experts if you're just starting. Too much gap between a beginner and an expert carries the risk that you won't benefit much. They have vast knowledge, but in communities, it's more about activities and achievements. You want to feel a bit like a kid in a sandbox, where the better ones were a year or two older than you but still close enough for you to benefit from their fresh experiences.

Believe me, a good community is better than all social media combined.