Online community platform

An online community platform is a site where your audience communicates with each other like on a social network: each member has a profile, there is a shared feed of posts, interest groups, private messages, reactions and following each other. Unlike a forum (see the “Forum and community” service), where communication goes through topic threads in a “question — answers” format, here communication is built around people: personal profiles, an activity feed, following each other and private messages — interaction between members, not a breakdown by topics. And unlike a membership site (see the “Membership site (closed access)” service), which is about paid closed access and perks, here the focus is the communication of members itself; paid access can be added, but that is not the point. Picture a professional community as a small closed social network: everyone has a profile, a feed of posts, topic groups and private messages — only for your audience and under your brand. The base price starts from 350,000 ₽ for a limited set of features and load: a full social platform with a feed, private messages and following is technically more complex than a forum, so we calculate the total individually based on the number of members, features and load.

• Your audience communicates in someone else’s social networks — you own neither the platform, nor the data, nor the reach, and you live by their rules and algorithms.
• A forum with threads does not give live communication around people — no profiles, no feed, no follows and no private messages, no network effect.
• Members’ content and connections are scattered across Telegram and WhatsApp — no single platform, no history and no search by people.
• A growing social platform is technically complex and needs moderation — spam, conflicts, load; it cannot be handled manually.

• Member profiles: avatar, description, activity, follows
• A shared feed of posts with reactions and comments
• Groups and sections by interest or topic
• Private messages and notifications
• Members following each other, recommendations, network effect
• Moderation tools: reports, bans, pre-moderation, roles
• Personal data processing under the law; responsive; spam and load protection
• Optionally — paid access or levels (combined with membership)

• Your audience communicates on your platform under your brand — you own the data and the reach
• Network effect: people follow each other and come back for the communication, not just the content
• The whole community in one place with history, search by people and topics
• Moderation, roles and protection keep the community in order as the load grows

• You leave a request and describe the community: who the members are, what features, expected load, whether monetization is needed
• We design the profiles, feed, groups, direct messages, moderation and the architecture for the load
• We develop, set up spam protection, test and launch

• How is a community platform different from a forum?

  A forum (see the “Forum and community” service) is topic threads in a “question — answers” format: communication revolves around topics and sections. A community platform is a mini social network: communication revolves around people — personal profiles, an activity feed, following each other, private messages. A forum is simpler and cheaper; a social platform is technically more complex, which is why it costs more.

• How is it different from a membership site?

  Membership (see the “Membership site (closed access)” service) is about paid closed access and perks: the main thing is membership and monetization. Here the main thing is the communication of members itself; the platform can be open or closed. They can be combined (a community with paid entry), but the essence of a community platform is social interaction, not selling access.

• Who is responsible for member content and what are the risks?

  Content is created by members (this is UGC, user-generated content). Legally, full responsibility for user content, personal data processing under the law and possible claims (from members and regulators, up to blocking of the platform) lies with the owner — we provide the technical moderation tools (reports, pre-moderation, bans, roles) to manage this, but we do not take on legal responsibility for the publications.