Good morning! I've been kicking around an idea for a SAAS community management product based on what I see as limitations in platforms like Discourse.
Good morning!
I've been kicking around an idea for a SAAS community management product based on what I see as limitations in platforms like Discourse.
Basically, it would be a "total community management" system and incorporate the following features:
- Forums & Messaging (Similar to Discourse)
- Articles & community member blogs (Similar to Medium)
- Newsfeed to tie 1 & 2 together (Functionally similar to Facebook, etc.)
I've built out the component parts (newsfeed, discourse-like platform, Medium-like platform) for other projects - Just wondering if there's a desire to have all these things available when managing your community.
#idea-validation
I have launched https://hittly.com a week ago. It's exactly what you mentioned. Its a forum + blog + has some e-commerce functions to sell courses and site memberships
Yep, you definitely have a lot I was thinking about. I'm checking out the demo community and I'm curious, what are you using for the text editor?
I like that idea and have thought about that need in the past. I did run into this lately: https://www.mightynetworks.com/
Let me know if that's similar to what your're thinking.
It looks similar to what I'm thinking - At least in the same space. To be honest, though, I'm still not 100% sure what a 'mighty network' is. I didn't spend a ton of time checking it out, but it seems like social media, some blog functionality (not sure if that's just for the host or if network members can also use it), maybe with a Meetup-type functionality, and something about offering courses?
I could see that as being useful.
Basically, atm it's annoying setting up a community. Discourse works as a forum, but to be able to add in different types of content is not really possible, but so important as part of an overall community strategy.
Thanks for the feedback! Yeah, that's basically what I was thinking. Just curious, have you checked out https://www.mightynetworks.com? like @jlogic mentioned?
Seems like that's in the same space at least, but I'm not sure I can nail down exactly what they are/do without investing some time in creating a "Mighty Network".
I have, an am not convinced tbh. It provides very little customisation, if any, from what I can see. That annoys me.
The founder/CEO was behind Ning, and tbh, Might Networks just looks like a more modern Ning. It took me ages to move away from Ning, but it got bought and basically was left to die. I'm surprised Ning still exists (had to quickly check!).
I like Discourse because it is fairly customisable. It's open source which is always nice. We do have it hosted for us, as we don't really want to deal with that. We've ended up having it connect with other stuff from our website/platform which is a huge pro.
We've done a fair bit of investment into tech around our website, integrations 'n' what not. If I were to do it again, I'd rather not have to invest all that time/money into that side of things.
Generally, Discourse has too many options, it would be nice to have a simpler and easier to use version.
That is such awesome feedback, thank you!