So you have a forum
or a blog
or a community
and you feel like you’re talking to yourself.
You’re normal.
“The 90-9-1 rule,
popularized by Jacob Nielsen,
based on research by Will Hall,
says that
90% of users in an online community
are lurkers who don’t contribute,
while 9% contribute sometimes
and
1% contribute frequently.”
There are some arguments
over whether or not
90% of users lurk
but there are no arguments
that the majority of users lurk.
The majority of readers lurk.
The majority of product users ‘lurk’.
The noisy few are exactly that
– the noisy few.
They may or may not be representative
of the majority.
And if you don’t hear from them,
that doesn’t mean no one is listening.
Don’t measure success
by feedback.