Communities without faces

Communities without faces

By Tjipto Ramuni

JAKARTA (JP): Roy Sembel is a financial and investment expert.
He assigns himself to educate people so that they will have a
better understanding about money and investment. Hence, almost
all of his writings are influenced by this "personal" assignment.

Last year, he traveled across the country to speak at
seminars. The topic of the seminars were, of course, about money
and investment - how to build a business or make an investment so
that they would yield maximum profit.

He wrapped his talk with a catchy phrase, "Planting and taking
care of the money tree."

Most people who attended the seminars, which were held in
major cities, were interested in Sembel's idea of planting and
taking care of the money tree. Sembel then created a website
(www.roy-sembel.com) for people to discuss, exchange information,
share experiences or simply read about what others did with their
money tree.

Sembel does not just let visitors to his website discuss
without direction. As an expert, Sembel comments and answers
questions asked by members of the community.

The money tree community was established by Sembel
unintentionally. His task of educating the people about
investment has been made easier because people interested in the
subject are in one mailing list and can receive Sembel's
education by accessing his website.

The community which Roy Sembel has created is a virtual
community on the Internet. However, it was built in a different
way. Virtual communities are usually formed by launching the
website first, then inviting people to join them. In Sembel's
case, he traveled to several cities in the country, first to seek
out people interested in investment, then he created the website
and a mailing list.

The BCA community has actually been formed a long time ago.
Its members are the some 7 million people who have a BCA savings
account.

This is an extraordinarily large number. These people have
something in common: they trust their bank with their money.

Although it has not been officially launched, BCA's website
www.klikbca.com does not only function as a "brochure" for BCA,
but also allows clients to make any kind of transaction usually
done at the bank. Everything can be done here, except
withdrawals.

What BCA is yet to do with the website is maximally use its
clients' common interest. A special channel can be created in the
website for the community to discuss or share their experience.
It can even disseminate information about the bank or its new
products. It would also be easier for the bank's management to
introduce new policies to its members.

The money tree and BCA communities described above are very
different from communities created by other websites in the
country. Detikcom, which is visited by some one million people a
month, is among those who build their virtual communities by only
using the Internet.

It means the website invites people to join Detikcom. On the
website, people can choose which communities they want to join,
according to their interests. The communities are about, among
others, entertainment, finance and politics.

Another website which built virtual communities in a similar
way to Detikcom is Kompas Cyber Media (KCM)(www.kompas.com),
which is one of the oldest website in the country. Only in the
last two years has KCM been more serious in building its
community.

When ties among members of virtual communities are not strong
enough, their members commit "treason" by moving to other
communities they consider more beneficial. It is arguable if
visitors to this kind of website can be called a community.

However, the ties among members of the money tree community
and klikbca.com are strong because it is difficult for members to
find other communities which can replace their current
communities.

Another virtual community which is effective and has strong
ties among its members is at www.globalsource.com.. This virtual
community of suppliers and buyers from all over the world is the
most effective community on e-commerce in the country.

Another virtual community worth mentioning is the radio
community, radioklik.com.. The website cleverly makes listeners
of radio stations members of its community. The website pays the
stations to air commercials on the website everyday. So
subconsciously listeners click onto the website if they want to
buy a CD or electronic appliance.

However, two question can be raised: Is this a real community?
Can communities be used for commercial purposes?

These questions are worth asking for several reasons. First,
the number of people who have access to the Internet is still
relatively low. Internet users in the country amount to only
three percent or about six million people. Some of these people
do not have high purchasing power, and they access the Internet
from their offices, from other people's computers, or from
Internet kiosks, and not from their own homes.

These people do not have computers and do not intend to buy
one as they want to save on their telephone bills and Internet
Service Provider subscriptions.

However, people's curiosity of the Internet deserves two
thumbs up. But again, do they really have the purchasing power to
be included in a virtual community? Furthermore, these six
million people may not be interested in the community in which
they have become members since the Internet is still a new
phenomenon here. So these people will only add to the number
without "actually being" in the community.

Nevertheless, there is no better or effective way to grab the
Internet market in the country than to rely on this community
segmentation. However, this kind of community is not as solid as
the ones in the real world.

Take a community of perkutut bird lovers for an example. Its
members clearly have something in common i.e they are perkutut
bird lovers. Their needs are predictable and their monthly
spending on perkutut are measurable. Virtual communities, on the
other hand, are like communities without faces. We do not know
who they really are, what their needs are and how much they spend
every month.

However, someday when the Internet becomes a daily necessity,
as in developed countries, virtual communities can be used
maximally to target a segmented market.