In a new Seedcamp Firsts podcast episode, our Partner Sia Houchangnia chats with Dan O’Kelly, an early Community Lead at Seedcamp-backed fantasy sports unicorn Sorare. They cover all things community building, including:

  • the importance of community in building a fast-growing startup;
  • founders’ key role in setting up the vision and building the foundations of an authentic community;
  • the early tactics Sorare used to build their community;
  • how to kickstart and nurture your community;
  • how to nurture organic initiatives by community members;
  • why it is important to put resources into community building;
  • mistakes and lessons learned in scaling community in the hyper-growth phase.

 

“The most aspirational high-level line is if you built a community, your community and users feel like they belong to the product. And so that combination of ingredients really built an ecosystem where our users were just empowered to build and innovate around Sorare.” – Dan O’Kelly, Sorare

 

Key takeaways:

  • Identify and integrate yourself in micro-communities you believe your value proposition will resonate with;
  • Empower early adopters to start their own initiatives and leverage word-of-mouth;
  • Build relationships with key people in the community;
  • While in the early days community members have patience and more understanding, as you scale and develop your product, their expectations rise;
  • Adapt your messaging to the different audiences you want to reach;
  • While there is no real standard science for measuring community sentiment, find ways to measure the ROI of your community;
  • As the company grows, make sure that the community function is well understood, especially by new hires, and that resources are allocated to community building and nurturing.

 

Listen to or watch the full conversation on your favourite platform, or read here

Check out our growing Seedcamp Firsts Content Library.

Unrivalled network
Unfiltered advice
Unwavering support