Unless you've been in a concrete bunker for the last couple of years, it's pretty clear that the real estate market has seen better days (oh and by the way, that bunker is probably worth a lot less now than when you moved in  ). With the one-two punch of decreased demand and shrinking credit available, it's never been a tougher time to buy or sell a home.

That's why it's pretty amazing that Redfin, the real estate industry's first online brokerage for buying and selling homes (and a Lithium customer), announced today that 51% of people who bought a home through Redfin reported that the company's online community influenced their decision to work with the brokerage, an increase from 30% the year prior. You can read the full press release here, but here's a few of the numbers listed for you:

• Visits to Redfin's online community have increased 415% year over year.
• Prior to making a purchase, over 22% of Redfin buyers had posted a question to the community.
• Redfin's revenues have increased by more than 40%, while the company has reduced marketing program expenses 82%.
• Redfin's Net Promoter Score, a measure of customer satisfaction, has increased by 5%.

Revenues up, costs down, customer satisfaction increased. Can you say business value? Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman can:

"Redfin gives consumers four times more information about a listing than most other websites, and thousands of customer reviews of our agents, but this data just sits there without a place for people to discuss it. An open community where anyone can agonize over what to offer on a listing or rant and rave about our service is the key to Redfin's credibility, and the only sustainable way to drive revenues."

The real estate market isn't back, times are tough and customers are harder to come by. In fact, name the industry and that statement is still true in today's tough economy. But smart companies that embrace their customers and find ways to identify and enable their advocates can flourish even in adversity.

So what part of your business are your customers helping you with today?

Photo by Tumanc

I've worked with many companies and their communities and each one has been different. But there is usually a moment during the launch where the team realizes something important that they hadn't before, some new way of looking at communities that puts everything else they've known in perspective. I think of these as the Aha! moments, and you can almost see (or in the case of a teleconference, hear) the light bulbs go on in the client's imaginations when it happens.

Here's a few Aha! moments that I've seen occur more than once:

We aren't writing the content, they are: At the start of an engagement, concerns are typically about what kinds of content to create, and resources needed to generate the content. But once the realization hits home that its not the company's content but the members' contributions which are important, the conversation shifts to talking about the best ways to elicit content from members rather than designing impressive-looking content showcases.

Content is consumable, People are interactive: Communities aren't made of content, they are made of people. While content may serve as a way to get members to the community, what convinces them to post is that someone else is there to talk to. This realization brings with it an awareness of aging and freshness to the consideration of content quality. Once this sinks in, like above, the discussions change from building up repositories of content to growing conversations over time.

Members value interactions with other members: While your participation on the community is expected to some degree (even if it is only to listen), what many members are really looking for when they come to the community is the chance to interact with others like themselves. If all that members wanted was to hear from you, they are typically many other ways they can achieve this today. What really sets a community apart is the ability to speak to their peers.

Community management is as much about looking inside as it is about looking out: Some groups are more familiar with outward-facing tasks with customers, while others are more adept at internally-facing activities within the organization. But whatever your initial focus or skill, there comes a time when the community manager realizes they have to address both areas in order to succeed. This balance and alignment of member needs and business needs is the philosophical core of the community manager role, and this realization is a definite milestone on the road to success.

It is difficult to narrow down why these moments happen and when. They occur at different times and different phases for each customer; some customers arrive having already assimilated many concepts, and others don't truly grasp them until after their launch. But we all have them as we leave the old ways of doing business to embrace this new means of interaction. And I like to think of our role at Lithium as being a facilitator of these Aha! moments, helping our customers to achieve their full potential and transform their business relationships with their clients.

What was your Aha! moment in your community? Does it still color your thinking today?

photo by Maxpipi