Have you heard of the 90-9-1 theory?
Community Guy, Jake McKee has devoted an entire site to this principle. If you haven’t, it essentially states that in any given community or social group, 90% of the users are lurkers, 9% are contributors and only 1% participate “very often.” You can also find more information about it here.
Based on my experience as the managing editor of the online community GOLO, I think this theory is pretty accurate, give or take a few percentage points.
But I don’t think that we should buy into it so much that we don’t focus on turning those lurkers into contributors and those contributors into people who post often. In other words, perhaps as community managers, we can shift the paradigm.
I am certainly going to try.
What’s your take on 90-9-1?
15 comments
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December 5, 2008 at 2:37 pm
Martin Reed
I am not a fan of the 90-9-1 ‘principle’, as I mentioned in my last blog post. I think it is often used by those involved in communities as a way of justifying their low levels of member activity.
In my opinion, if only 1% of your members are actively creating fresh content, something is wrong. It is up to the community administrator/manager to work on getting more members active, not hide behind a supposed ‘principle’. Surely if 99% of people don’t regularly contribute there is something inherently wrong with your community?
- Martin
December 5, 2008 at 9:58 pm
Angela Connor
I am so happy to read your thoughts on that Martin. I, too thought the numbers seemed low and that is why I took a moment to write about it. Perhaps you are correct on that last statement/question. I’d like to discuss this further.
December 6, 2008 at 10:12 pm
Ari Herzog
The metric, regardless of actual percentages, is correct. One only has to look at the number of blogs about, oh, gardening and see how many are updated every week to ascertain less than 5% are and more than 80% are not.
December 7, 2008 at 12:40 am
Patrick
Hey guys,
Jake is a friend of mine, just like you both are. He’s a good guy and a vet. He’s not hiding behind any principles, just trying to explain them. The principle is a reality. That doesn’t mean it’s always true or that it’s everyone’s a reality, but that it’s a reality for some.
Just to clarify, as well, the theory is visitors period – not members/those with accounts, but also guests. Taking forums as an example, it would apply as such: 90% of total website visitors read content and rarely contribute, 9% sometimes reply to other threads and rarely start new ones and 1% regularly start their own threads. That’s the principle. Breaking it into two groups, it would be more that 90% of the visitors (that is all visitors, including search engine traffic, etc.) read and don’t contribute while 10% contribute at least somewhat regularly. Not that only 1% contributes regularly.
I’m not saying I subscribe to the principle, necessarily, as I don’t really think about those things that hard – but, it certainly does make some sense. The bottom line of the principle is that most people read, some reply and fewer start new threads. Throwing out percentages, this basic understanding is true of all communities. It’s nothing to buy into, Jake’s not selling snake oil here.
You should always try to encourage participation as you are comfortable doing, if you have 99% lurkers or 1% lurkers. 
Thanks,
Patrick
December 7, 2008 at 3:29 pm
Jake Mckee
Thanks for raising the debate, Angela!
First off, let me clarify that I’m not necessarily a believer that this principle (not rule) is spot on. I created 90-9-1.com because I realized that we practitioners didn’t have a single spot to point audiences, clients, and colleagues to help us explain the concept itself.
As Patrick mentioned, the concept doesn’t apply simply to registered users but the entire participant base. We can debate endlessly the question of whether “participation” should include the unregistered lurkers, but for the 90-9-1 discussion, that assumption is determined.
I think there’s also a dynamic at play here that applies to the type of community. In my original blog thread, Joe Cothrel makes a great point that in forums, perhaps the 9% and 1% roles, as I defined them, should actually be swapped.
Whether 1% creators is a good or bad percentage (and whether it’s actually 1% or simply a representation of the unbalanced ratio of one group vs. the other) depends greatly on the type of community. YouTube has less than 1% creators, yet they’re HIGHLY successful. I’ve heard of niche forums that have their 1% group closer to a 50% ratio and consider that less than successful.
At the end of the day, I call this a “principle” because it’s really trying to communicate something bigger and more generic: most communities have a far few group of people contributing (certain types of) content than simply consuming that content. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
December 8, 2008 at 3:51 pm
Regina B
I don’t think the numbers are accurate for my community, but the underlying principle is quite sound.
In my community, I would probably further refine the 90% into sophisticated lurkers, those who visit the game’s third party fansite forums, and unsophisticated lurkers, those who do not participate in forums at all and whose only interaction is purely the game.
December 8, 2008 at 4:05 pm
Scott Dodds
I think of 90-9-1 not really as a principle in the sense that we have to believe it or not. Its more of an observation about how we have seen participation distributed across online members in the past. Could you do better in your community? Perhaps, but the key is not to plan for it or beat yourself up over it if you don’t.
The most useful aspects of 90-9-1 in my mind are threefold:
1) If you want to increase quantity of activity in your community, it’s more effective to increase the total population who visit your site than to get current members to participate more (not that you shouldn’t do both, but the former will typically be more effective than the latter).
2) If you want to increase the quality of activity in your community, focus your efforts on those 1% who contribute the most.
3) If you want to find out what the total reach is of your community, be sure to count the 90% or so who are spectators as well as the 10% who are posting.
In the end, whether 90% are posting or .01% are, as Jake says above this is simply a distribution, not a measure of quality. What is important is how you can use this knowledge to help you further the goals of your community.
December 8, 2008 at 4:25 pm
Mike Rowland
As I’ve posted on our blog and on Jake’s, I’m not so sure we should even be using this as a principle in talking to potential clients. The ratios we’ve seen and measured since 2000 are much different than this. There are far too many variables that come into play to make such a simplistic comment to someone considering a social media project.
Even Joe Cothrel who used our data from work with Cisco, Sony, AARP, SAP, and others in his research at Participate.com would admit that it’s a stretch to over-simplify community participation rates like this.
Instead, we should be focused upon how the offering (blog, community, social network, wiki, etc.) helps the client meet a tangible objective that is measurable. Then put that objective against the benchmarks of your other clients’ work from a similar industry and effort to judge its effectiveness.
Where I do agree completely with Jake is that there is distribution of who participates and who consumes. But there is not a quick ratio that works for this stuff. Your mileage will always vary.
For more see our blog at http://impactinteractions.blogspot.com/ including the multiple factors that will influence your offerings ratios.
Mike
December 10, 2008 at 2:31 am
Alison Michalk
I’ve always found this principle to be quite accurate with the community of 140,000 that I manage. And is almost certainly true if you include unregistered users.
I look at in terms of 10% of members participating with 1% being VERY active.
I agree with Scott’s point #1, this approach has seen our membership (ergo activity) increasing rapidly over the last 12 months.
Activating existing members is a hard metric to report on but still something worth trying also. As a Community Manager I often pay attention to popular or contentious threads that lure lurkers into posters (they’d be the people with low post counts but not a new membership). Incidentally I find blog comments are good for this as the interaction is slightly more two-directional, and therefore some ease into it better/find it less daunting as a participant.
December 13, 2008 at 3:56 pm
Angela Connor
Alison: I like that strategy and I think I’m going to implement it myself. We do have those posts that pull in everyone and I suppose that closer examination of the comments would reveal some lurkers who have come around to join the conversation “on the record.” I’d love to talk to you more about your community of 140,000. That’s amazing!
December 13, 2008 at 3:59 pm
Angela Connor
Mike: Thanks for your additional insight on that and sharing your thoughts and experiences. In regards to using the principal to talk to clients, I completely see your point. You mention tangible objectives that are “measurable” and that’s good to hear. How are you educating those who say that social media metrics aren’t tangible?
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November 28, 2009 at 9:24 pm
Miles Maker
The 90-9-1 concept is a sobering reality–especially for those of us currently crowdfunding our projects to raise money for Artistic ventures, nonprofits organizations, causes, etc. However I believe passive players (lurkers) still talk about what they see, hear and encounter to other people, and although we can’t always quantify their contribution, I believe the long-term effect benefits sustainable growth by word of mouth for any brand, product or cause.
90-9-1 is an open challenge to do more and do better! Thanks for sharing @communitygirl
Miles Maker
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November 28, 2009 at 11:13 pm
Angela Connor
Hi there Miles: I completely agree with you on the value of lurkers. You’re right. They do still talk about their actions even if they are not fully immersed in the community. I like that perspective. You know, so many do end up taking the plunge after a good while. It’s just at their own pace. I try to take specific actions to lure lurkers into doing more and certain tactics work. But some will forever remail lurkers but that doesn’t mean we discount them. Now, I am going to check out some of your websites.
Best,
Angela