The Blogchatter Half-Marathon has ten commandments, of which the fourth is:
Thou Shalt Build Thy Community
Clubhouse is a relatively new community-building platform. It was started in 2020 with the idea of speaking and talking live rather than reading or watching passively. Here you listen in to someone who has something to say. Everything is by audio. It’s a podcast, but its LIVE. Not only do you listen in, but you can participate in the ‘club’ It’s a radio program that’s interactive. Come into Clubhouse and find your people.
There has been a lot of hype about this new social network because scoring an invite was so hard initially. It has been a year of Beta testing on iPhone only. When I joined during the iPhone beta-testing period (courtesy my friend Richa), it was pretty sedate. Clubhouse has now opened up to Android owners and its still invitation only. Find someone with an extra invite and get it! With the new expansion, we have exciting, made-for-India clubs and conversations and we have already stirred up controversies with unguarded quotes and speeches inside Clubhouse! Within a year this platform is zooming in popularity. You can easily find your people in Clubhouse community. There are ‘rooms’ in regional languages too.
You can create a room if you have something to say. You can listen in if you want to learn something new. The conversations disappear once done and nothing is saved. Famous names have walked through Clubhouse, Mark Zuckerberg is rumored to have walked its ‘halls.’ Oprah and Ashton Kushner have joined in, though I seem to have missed them all every time!
Niches are anything and everything. If you think you have something to say, well go on then, find your niche and open up a room or better yet book a ‘room’ and invite or wait for people to come in to interact with you.
What’s a Room on Clubhouse?
You enter the Clubhouse app in a “Hallway” Here you will find a list of rooms with details of conversation topics, speakers, and number of attendees.
Don’t worry, there’s no funny business in the ‘rooms’ here. Its just a place for you to hang out and listen or speak. Anyone can speak, ask a question and join in. Sometimes if you are the coordinator you need to keep the conversation going, so have a lot of points to talk about. Invite other hosts to speak too. You can see how many people are in the room and what it is about before you join them in the room. If a connection of yours is there, the room displays that too.
The good thing about of Clubhouse is that you can be doing other things while you listen in. Drive, cook, feed a baby or load your laundry. When you are ready, you can join the conversation. Just raise your virtual hand and talk when you are invited to speak. It’s fun to build your community on Clubhouse.
Build Your Profile
Do remember to polish up and build your profile. This is very important if you plan to be a conversation starter or speaker. It helps you to connect with other people and get them to follow you. A follower is always informed about a room you create through notifications.
As a Listener, you will want to find speakers/rooms of interest to you. The Clubhouse algorithms will show you rooms that match your interests first. You can look through the niches and find clubs that interest you. You will definitely find your people in Clubhouse. Click on follow and you can get notifications for rooms that come under this niche.
How Can Clubhouse Help You?
Most of us have conversations and share knowledge at conferences and events. But here at Clubhouse, you can meet leaders in your niche or business and interact in the rooms. You can connect with other professionals in your field easily. Build your community inside Clubhouse and exchange information, form opinions and become stronger.
As the platform becomes more popular, brands can have their own rooms with conversations that attract your customers or create new customers. Soon we expect that speakers will be able to start paid classes. This is exciting, classes and a chance to question your instructor?!
What Else Can You Do on Clubhouse?
- Build a community
- Find news about your chosen topic, field feedback
- Understand your customer better
- Introduce New Products and Events
- Find Someone to Invest in You or Your Business.
- Find paid customers for your Clubhouse rooms.
As Clubhouse grows and more an more people start to use it, all of the above is possible.
Conclusion
With so many social media platforms, it can get very busy online. The best part of Clubhouse is that you don’t have to read or watch anything. You plug in your headphones and are good to go. In a podcast you do the same but it isn’t live, which means if you have a question or need clarification, there’s nothing you can do. This is ideal if you are trying to learn something. Come on, join the party, what are you waiting for?
This blog post is part of the Blogchatter Half Marathon
I’ve just begun to explore Clubhouse and all the interesting conversations seem to happen at night!
You are so right! All the action is at night – wish I had mentioned that!
I heard about this platform rather recently when it created some controversy of sorts in Kerala with some people bringing discussions to the “below-belt” levels especially on subjects related to nationalism, religion… Sad that people can’t discuss intelligently.
Yes it is very much in the news now – nothing like controversy to make something popular!