Since the topic of Communities is somewhat complicated, I would like to go into a little bit more detail here.
NOTE: Communities should be used with caution.
Communities are generally a homogeneous group that have grown together over months or even years. They are made up of moderators, fans, makers, and all kinds of different people who know each other and have put in a lot of time and effort to keep the community running.
Building a community and keeping it alive is one of the most difficult things to do in life.
Now put yourself in the position of these people when someone comes along as a newbie and simply posts their product / idea.
How would you feel if you put years of work into a community and someone just wants to use you to advertise their work without adding value to the community?
Some communities are centered around sharing your idea / product with them. A great example of this type of community is Product Hunt.
With sites like Product Hunt, if you are not active, it could be more difficult for people to find your product. To help with this issue, some people advise that you find someone who is active in the community, called an “influencer”, and have them post your product for you.
These influencers have spent years being active in the community in order to build up their 15k, 20k, 100k, or even a million followers. If you just come along and say
“hey yo, can you post my cool product?”, you’re not giving them the respect they deserve for the time they’ve put in to get where they are.
- Be active for a while before you post your product.
When my first product was posted on Product Hunt, I was active for a while. Not for two or three weeks, it was several months.
- Add value to the community
If the community is a DIY community for the garden, then it doesn't help if your product is for an ecommerce product. In Germany there is a saying, “Schuster bleib bei deinen Leisten” which means “stick to the subject you're good at”.
- Make contacts
Make your presence felt in the community. Make contacts and try to help others. Not only that, you will be helped later if you are helpful, you never know what contacts are helpful for in the future.
You never know what the future holds. When I was active on Product Hunt for some time, I found more and more cool products and services. I am still active on Product Hunt today and I've grown very fond of it now.
In the meantime, I found some really good products there. Think about posting your product in a community where you are not active.
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In the best case, your product won't attract attention
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Worst-case scenario? Your product is talked extremely badly by an Influencer from the community, your reputation suffers extremely from it, and people still remember it years later.
Do you want to be remembered that way? I don't think so. Be helpful and try to add value for others, the rest comes all by itself in most cases. And yes, damn it, it's a shitload of work!