Rewarding the LexBlog network : Onus is on us

Jeremiah Owyang, a San Francisco Bay Area Web Strategist, believes that the Web 2.0 or social media movement isn’t about technology. “Those are just tools that lead us to what’s really important = people connecting to people.”

Aaron urges community leaders like LexBlog to think about our community, and discover what drives it, and then reward community members.

…[I]t’s actually more psychological and sociological more than a web feature set. If we’ve already agreed that this movement is about people, then we can look at existing physical people networks and see what rewards them. The beauty is that when the rewards happen within the features, the network starts to become scalable, they’ll stay on your site and invite others, without your extra prodding.

And Aaron provides a some examples of successful social networks to ponder.

…maybe it’s that nothing pleases me more than to watch people comment and favorite my flickr photos, why? It’s this intrinsic deep rooted feeling (a reward) that I get from sharing my life with others –and in turn –they enjoy it with me.

…take networking sites like LinkedIn and Plaxo, for some the real badge of honor is showing to others who connected one is. Sales, Marketing, PR, and recruiters may thrive on this. For others, it’s the small intimate connections one builds with a few quality folks. MySpace, Twitter, Facebook, also have similar elements.

…maybe individuals want to be recognized, they want to be shown as experts in their field, or someone that helps others. Communities that self reward others can succeed.

…maybe it’s the collective knowledge that’s made easy to boil up: the how to’s, the current events, the meetups that one never would have found before, there’s an affinity and attraction for all. What is it that your website can do to highlight the usefulness?

For LexBlog, the keys are likely to be empowering good lawyers so they may establish themselves as experts in their field and to harness the collective knowledge of these lawyers. We do that and it ought to be a good ride for all.