How to use discord to grow your brand and business

In this digital era, marketers need to build communities to foster relationships and engagement. Communities are formed not just from a shared goal or interest but also with a shared trust among members and the brand. This leads to stronger brand loyalty and upselling opportunities for brands. Not to mention, the other potential benefits from making crowdsourcing ideas and getting immediate feedback easier. That is why community is such a powerful strategy.

Discord is one of the most popular community-building platforms out there and a great tool for companies who want to launch a community. Today, many businesses outside of gaming also have Discord communities including the football team Liverpool FC, the consumer tech business StudyStream, and the developer tool Cloudflare.

What is Discord?

Discord was launched in 2015 as an online platform dedicated to the gaming community. Since then, it has grown to include interests from industries related to gaming, cryptocurrency, art & music, education, technology and more.

It is estimated that Discord has over 150 million monthly users. It is a thriving hub to communicate in real time via voice, video, or text without being bombarded with irrelevant ads.

According to the user statistics:

• 42% Discord users are between 25 & 34 years
• Roughly 22% of the users are between 16 & 24 years
• Discord is a thriving hub for gamers, artists and large micro-communities of students
• Over 64% of Discord users are men.

How does Discord work?

Users can access Discord from desktop or mobile apps. It offers text, voice or video chat for communication. They join servers, which are virtual rooms on specific topics. Servers can be private or public.

• Private Servers: These are for smaller groups of friends, and people united by interests. There could be a group of game developers on a private server, for example.
• Public Servers: These are for larger communities that discuss common topics such as games, movies, NFTs, education, the stock exchange, and more.

Within a server, there are dedicated channels that serve specific functions. For instance: A server can have channels defined for announcements, help desk, suggestions and much more.

Using Discord for Business

Unlike other platforms, Discord is not ad-supported. Businesses can set up a server for free, with text, voice and video chats. Discord also offers a premium paid tier called Discord Nitro. This provides better streaming quality, unlimited file size uploads, unlimited storage and perks such as unique badges & animated avatars.

Here are some ways you can leverage Discord as a business:

Build communities to engage your target audience around their interests

Start by discovering the interests of your target audience. Then, you can create communities that cater to these interests. Through real-time interactions and gamification, Discord can help them learn more about their interest.

Communicate with users and offer support

Discord is a great way to share more about your brand. You can use Discord to ensure customers get quick support or service, as well as to relay announcements and solicit feedback.

Engage users through games

On Discord, games can be an important part of community management.  Games over the server involve users, keep them active and, of course, award prizes. Games make the server a fun place to be on, and keep users coming back for more. These can be trivia games, games involving animated characters, or classics such as chess and tic-tac-toe. Members may then have a higher affinity with your brand.

Host Events

Businesses can host events on their servers to build engagement and stickiness. Quiz nights and gaming contests are two types of popular events on Discord. Other events could involve daily giveaways, art contests and collaborating with other servers for joint events.

To learn more about community engagement strategies for Discord, check out this article.

Slack vs Discord

Unlike Slack, Discord is a better fit for those who want to build a large audience, as up to 500k members may be a part of any one community. It does not charge per members and is much more affordable as a result. Discord is also preferable to Slack if you target a younger demographic.
Also read, Discord stats that every admin should track for their server

Setting Up a Discord Server for your Business

Follow the steps below to get started:

1. Set up a Discord server by using a template or creating one of its own.
2. Choose a name and icon that reflects its business and the nature of the server.
3. Add channels that deal with sub-topics. These depend on the goals and the nature of the audience.
4. Set up server rules to establish codes of conduct & behavior.
5. Finally, promote the server via social media, email and website content. Start actively nurturing the server with events, ongoing discussions and reminders.

Lastly, make sure to avail of Discord bots to automate server tasks. There are many types of bots for businesses. For example, bots for usage statistics, scheduling events, roles, polls, and games. Choosing the right bots goes a long way in building communities.

At Blaze, we’re dedicated to helping businesses make the most of emerging platforms such as Discord. Schedule a demo today and discover community-building insights and Discord user statistics.