More details are being revealed on ESPN.com regarding the $20 Million marketing package supposedly dangled before Brett Favre by the Green Bay Packers. Recall that I originally wrote on this a couple weeks ago, commenting on how strong your brand must be to be offered $20M for not competing against your former employer.

Part of this “marketing” package was that Favre would have his own blog on the Packers website. I don’t know if that means on Packers.com, the NFL-provided Packers site, or if the Packers have another site. I checked the Packers.com site and there is a sub-menu for “Blogs” under the “News” tab, but it’s a pretty limited blog. Entries are up to date but definitely no sizzle and from what I see you can not comment on it. Almost seems more like a “Latest News” bit.

I am curious to know what the Packers have in mind for a Brett Favre blog. How involved would he be? What would it set out to accomplish? Is there much risk in such a blog tarnishing the legendary reputation of Favre? I find such scenarios fascinating because they push the envelope a bit. Plus the idea of a mega-corporation like this including a blog in such a package says a lot for the general value of blogging.

Another consideration here which I think speaks highly of Favre is that he has now taken a job with the Jets. I respect Favre in that playing football truly is his motivation. He does not seem particularly concerned with his legendary status, the Packers organization, or a $20M Blog Marketing package. That says a lot about Favre and is probably a (good) omen to his destiny. Favre is driven my the spirit of playing football and that should take him farther along than any of these other dangling lights and distractions.

Funny how writing about topics perpetuates the subject in conversations. This week I had conversations with multiple people about the Online Communities they either run or in which they participate. In all instances the conversation pinnacled on a specific thought - Is the community in response to a need, or trying to establish one?

Online Communities created for the sake of being an Online Community pose a tough question…WHY?

Why create an Online Community simply for the sake of having one? Does it not make more sense to create one out of a growing need, or better yet, let your community evolve naturally from demand of an existing audience?

With social networking and online community software as abundant and cost-effective as it is today, many are lured in to the idea of creating an online community simply because we can, well in theory anyways. What is the motivation here?

Money of course is one reason. Not in all cases but in many instances it is. The Internet has developed this evasive stigma that you can make money by having an audience. Well, yes, you can, but can you make enough money for the amount of time you put in to it?

Recognition is another reason. I seriously think the desire to have your own online community tantalizes this fundamental human need. We all want to be recognized for who we are and what we do.

Opportunity is one, particularly for business folk and people prone to networking. An Online Business Community holds out some shiny bright lights of opportunity for many of us.

Reality is there is a lot more to establishing an Online Community that most consider, which is why so many come and go. Like websites and software, most people completely underestimate the requirements for success and effectiveness in these areas. And while there certainly are proven methods and best practices for establishing community, the process is certainly organic and requires vision, commitment, and dedication.

This is why I think that Venture Capital can be dangerous. If a person or group start pouring money into developing an Online Community from scratch without having an actual product or service then what is your community accomplishing and where can it go before the funding runs out? It’s a tough reality because it is all too simple for us to think we have a revenue model that will work if have an audience. The school of hard knocks will most likely reveal that your audience itself is what will perpetuate the need for, or at least sustain any effort to establish an Online Community.

Like the Dot Com days that reach unfathomable heights, so too is the practice of creating Online Communities becoming a Wild Wild West in online communications.

Online Business Communities have rapidly become a competitive marketplace. Companies are investing millions into their own communities, and with mixed results.

According to a recent article on SocialMediaToday.com, author Jerry Bowles writes “…several giant corporations have launched online business communities aimed at engaging small business owners and managers through a conversational social media approach” and lists more than half a dozen companies having invested $1M to $5M each into their Online Business Communities. Membership counts in these online communities range from single digits to tens of thousands. Time obviously a major factor for low member counts, but not the only reason.

Sites such as LinkedIn and Plaxo which are universally geared towards Online Professionals and fall in to the Social Networking category generate a lot of buzz traffic and offer a useful way to keep connected with close and distant contacts have an advantage in that they are not tied to a tight niche market or industry. Online Business Communities for big corporate well-known and established companies such as those listed in Bowles’ article, e.g. American Express, Visa, Dell, Intuit/QuickBooks, have the luxury of pre-exisitng large member groups with common and also recurring needs and interests specific to those organizations and their products also have an edge with their Online Business Communities because of those factors.

But one category of Online Business Communities to question are those in the niche market segments or industries that are starting up. We touched on the subject a couple weeks ago with DrivingSales.com, but there are others. The challenge with such Online Business Communities is their unique value proposition. Without an actual product or service, what are these online communities accomplishing? What can they do to develop and keep an audience aside from developing an audience for the sake of it?

Bowles makes some excellent observations that are good take-aways from his article which such all communities must consider.

3. The quality of the content of a web community trumps the most well-financed demand generation program. No amount of promotion can keep people coming to a community that is not engaging and useful.

6. Participants in smaller business communties are more engaged and likely to participate than those in bigger communities so make your community only as big as it needs to be. Two thousand engaged and qualified potential customers is better than a million page views.

8. That leads to what I modestly call Jerry’s corollary: the online communities that are most likely to succeed are those that are focused narrowly on engaging buyers of specialized, high-end products.

A concern with Online Business Communities that sprout from venture capital and which are designed for niche market segments and industries rather than evolving naturally from its customer audience is that through mere idealism they are putting the cart before the horse so to say in that they expect a software communications system to perpetuate the need for a business model.

MySpace evolved out of the need for bands to promote themselves which led to widespread popularity in promotion of individual persons. Facebook evolved that commodity into a more marketer-friendly environment. Both of these catered to a specific generation (or two). LinkedIn honed that down to a universal class of people, i.e. Online Business Professionals. But these sites are ultimately appeal to millions which is what gives them a chance to be successful.

Banking your model on something that will only appeal to a few thousand people makes for tremendous challenge. It limits advertising capabilities and puts you at the disadvantage with conversions and numbers.