Research

Online Community: Identity, Reputation and Ranking

10 Dec 2007, Bill Johnston

The Identity, Reputation and Ranking research study was initiated in November of 2007. Bill Johnston (Forum One Communications) sent approximately 250 survey invitations to online community professionals in our network of executives and practitioners. We received 54 completed surveys. Participants included community managers, strategists and executives from large software companies, large community destination sites, niche community sites, consulting organizations and platform providers.

The research results uncovered several interesting findings, including:

• Members typically don’t fill out non-required profile fields;
• Slightly less than 1/3 of the respondents (32%) have, or plan on making member’s profiles portable in the next 6 months;
• Slightly less than 1/3 of the respondents (32%) have, or plan on implementing a universal ID solution in the next 6 months;
• The majority of respondents have, or are developing a reputation system for their communities.

A note about the report: the “good stuff” in qualitative research is generally found in the detailed comments. I encourage you to comb through the report with that in mind.

Highlights from the report include:

• Member Registration Fields (page 6): member profile fields being collected and displayed;
• Member Profile (page 11): a list of member profile fields, broken out by those shown by default, shown at the member’s discretion, and never shown;
• Rating Systems (page 18): an overview of the types of ratings systems in use by the respondents;
• Reputation Systems (page 21): an overview of the types of reputation systems in use by the respondents;
• Moderation Involvement (page 30): an overview of how moderators are involved in shaping community content, conversations and reputation;
• Advice on Implementation (page 33): advice on how to introduce identity, reputation and ranking systems.

Download (PDF, 270 KB)

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