How to Boost Community Engagement: Respond. Don't Answer

The simplest trick I learned to boost community engagement was to stop answering questions. When a new member posts a question, be the first one to respond. Just don't answer them. Ask for more information, details and tag 2-3 members from your community who can.

I know how it sounds. As admins, mods or owners of the community, we feel it's our duty to be quick to answer new members. The problem is, most of the times, our answers are too perfect; and that denies other members the opportunity to participate.

It took me some time to accept I was the problem. From my perspective, the user had the best experience. They asked a question and got a perfect answer within 20 minutes. They'll now come back for more. Well, sometimes they did come back, but I left nothing for existing members to contribute.

No one wants to add to a solved problem.

So, I changed it. I simply continued to be the first responder, but I asked for details and then in the same reply, tagged other members of the community. I also added a little bit of appreciation while tagging so that my fellow members felt good.

The tagged members would receive a notification and were happy to offer detailed response. Then I added a few more points and tagged a few others to build the discussion.

Try it in your community and let me know if it helped you boost engagement. If you have questions, I'll be happy to answer.