BRX Pro Tip: Build Community With Your Community
Stone Payton: [00:00:00] And we are back with BRX Pro Tips. Stone Payton and Lee Kantor here with you this afternoon. Lee, when it comes to building community, your council is, build community with your community, not for your community.
Lee Kantor: [00:00:16] Absolutely. I think that for most small to midsized businesses, one of the areas that they’re neglecting is really building and nurturing and growing a community around whatever it is that they do. And if you do that well, you’re never going to have to kind of search for clients. So, that, to me, it’s a critical element. It’s a great way for solopreneurs, small and midsized businesses, to differentiate themselves. If they can be the hub of a community that’s filled with people that they serve and people that serve them, they’re never going to go hungry.
Lee Kantor: [00:00:52] But when you’re building this community, it’s important to understand that this is not a top-down process. This is a bottom-up process. So, you have to build the community with the community. You cannot mandate a community to exist. You can create an ecosystem that has the possibility to build and kind of grow with from within. But you can’t kind of force people to be part of the community.
Lee Kantor: [00:01:21] So, I would look at your community more like a cohort where we’re all in this together, learning together from each other, and helping each other. Rather than this is me saying, “There should be a community and let’s all do this. Let’s all take this hill together.” It’s not that way anymore. It’s not a top-down hierarchy where you’re in the front of the room. I would encourage learning. I would encourage connecting. I would encourage working with each other. And instead of managing your community, encourage the community members to kind of all work together and lead themselves.
