Top 10 Community Softwares for Media Companies

Media companies are businesses that produce and distribute content through text, audio, video, and images to inform or entertain its audience. As a result, media companies continually try to optimize their content and discover new ways to expand and retain a wide audience. In recent years, many media companies have realized the value of building communities around their web platforms, as this allows them to form a following directly around their content and keeps readers and viewers coming back to consume more content. There are many software tools available today that directly or indirectly allow for the development of a web community. Read on to see our review of some of the best community softwares available on the market today.

Viafoura

Viafoura offers a suite of community engagement and management software tools that allow you to create social media-like experiences through your own platform. From live blogging tools and community chat to identity management and immersive social experience elements, they have everything you need to start taking audience engagement to the next level and building a community around your content and platform. We especially recommend Viafoura as a fantastic option for media companies that focus on blogs, articles, and other published content; check them out here to learn more.

Sprinklr

Sprinklr is a community software that was named a leader in Social suites in 2021 by Forrester. This software helps media organizations to engage their audience beyond articles and other content through enhanced research, customer care, marketing, and engagement. Sprinklr also has integrations to use analytics tools to track engagement and sentiment around your content and use that information to optimize content, providing audiences with content that interests them.

inSided

inSided lets your business create and manage online forums for customer interaction. This customizable tool also offers a wide range of community support functions like discussions, product Q&A, research & co-creation, ratings/reviews, etc. All these features can be integrated into other systems in the company, such as Facebook contact centres or CRM.

Webtrends

While technically an analytics software, Webtrends allows you to capture and analyze data generated on your own platform and without external influence, meaning you can use the information to make meaningful decisions about the content being offered on your platform and better redirect it to engage with your audience, which means that your audience is much more likely to remain part of your growing web community.

Forumbee

Forumbee is a free and easy-to-use tool that helps create online communities for businesses. Useful features include public, private forums for Q&As or discussions of any topic; an activity trend chart to track what’s happening in the community at once with text analysis – all without having to set up complicated software.

Muut

Muut offers a revolutionary system of social media style communication designed to help you grow and connect with your audience in ways never before possible. With the Muut Designer, you can customize any part of your site for maximum effect and gain more traffic from users who are eager to share their feedback. You’ll even be able to find moderators if needed to control content and atmosphere around community discussions.

Higher Logic

Higher Logic is a web-based software that helps businesses connect with customers and volunteers. They offer various products such as online communities, customer advocacy management, small organization web managements, volunteer management services, among many more. One of their most popular features includes automation rules that allow the user to target communications based on different events or triggers to better engage your networks.

BoonEx

BoonEx offers a solution that gives you the power to create your own social site, which means that you can seamlessly integrate social media style functions directly into your media platform. You can design it with whatever content and format you want, and there are some features available through other systems like Facebook Connect or polls in forums that are optional. The platform also has plenty of modules for all different needs, such as articles, avatars, feedback forms, and more.

IdeaScale

The IdeaScale community is a great way to get customer feedback. Customers are able to leave their thoughts in the form of ideas and suggestions, have discussions with others on topics that matter most, vote for what they think should be done next, as well as post-profanity-free comments. The company can also integrate this community engagement tool into Facebook so it’s easy for audience members who may not know about your platform yet to find out more about you or join the conversation happening within your organization.

How To Choose The Right Community Software?

• Match functions with the Community Objective: If you want your community to be successful it usually needs to be built on a sound premise. Similarly, the software you choose to use needs to help you achieve your objectives. Consider what you can do with the suite of tools being offered; oftentimes, the software provider is happy to give suggestions on ways in which you can use their software to your advantage.
• The Kind Of Functionalities You Need: The features that you include in your community will depend on the intended use cases. The platform or solution may also change depending on your end goal with this customer group. For example, if you want to encourage engagement and feedback from customers about products they have ordered but don’t like, then discussion forums would be a good idea for users to voice their opinions anonymously and ask questions without fear of being shamed by others who might not agree with them–thus creating an open environment where all viewpoints are accepted rather than just one side being heard at any given time.
• Ascertain Roles And Responsibilities: With the introduction of these new communities, it is more important than ever to make sure that roles and responsibilities are clear. Who will take care of your day-to-day management needs, and who will handle long-term considerations for this project? Key community leadership positions such as moderators and channel managers can benefit greatly from using community softwares to make their jobs easier, and can allow you to diversify your team through their use.

Community software is important for media agencies because it allows them to engage with their audience on a more personal level, provides them with a space to interact and discuss your brand, and lets them collect data on their customers’ opinions about the company. Proper management of these aspects are a critical facet of successful community growth and engagement with a brand platform. When considering ways to manage and expand your digital presence to increase your viewers and readers, using community management software can make a huge difference in the results.