How to make new users feel welcome
Here are a few tips on how to welcome new users effectively and orient them on how to use an online workspace and actively participate in the community. Sending a welcome message to new users within the first 24 hours of joining often makes a huge difference encouraging new community members to actively participate. A friendly, informal, and light-hearted tone helps people get comfortable and points out specific actions users can take.
Below is an example of a welcome message. Often, it's nice to send such a message from a personal e-mail address to accompany automated e-mails that get sent out when you invite users. This is a fairly generic example, feel free to edit and repurpose for your own group.
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Welcome to the YOUR GROUP NAME online workspace! Now that you're here, you may ask 'what now?' Here's some quick tips:
1 - Access documents - workplans, reports, presentations, spreadsheets, they are all here!
2 - Post to the group blog, or comment on posts from others
3 - Participate in a discussion - here's a list of currently active topics (cite a few)
4 - Check out other users' profiles
5 - See upcoming events on the shared calendar (and subscribe to an iCal feed)
Let us know if you need any help logging in or using the tool and we look forward to your participation!
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In addition to a welcome message, for some groups it helps a lot to do a training, either via a webinar or a live face-to-face training. Training participants should have their own computers open and be completing tasks themselves rather than listen to a trainer talk the whole time. Contests and scavenger hunts are also fun ways to introduce new users to the tool. Lastly, recognizing and thanking new users who contribute a comment or a document is a great way to reward that behavior and encourage it in the future.
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From Edward Baker on 14 September 2009, 10:34
I think it would make more sense if you hid all of documents when a person goes to the initial document page and just show the "file structure". That way, they are accessing the files directly through the folder the file is kept in. I would at least like the option to do this. Otherwise our company loves this!
From Kyle Keller on 11 November 2009, 09:09
Thanks for suggestion Edward! We'll definitely keep it in mind! We're trying to make the most current documents freshest, but only want to do so in a way that meets your needs. We'll be sure to look into this when thinking about our next release!