Building Communities vs. Audiences on Social Media

In today's social media marketing age, your brand's success isn’t about the number of followers you have anymore; it's the value of the impact you leave.

If you are a brand owner struggling to turn your audience into leads or generate sales, you should be questioning the fundamental assumption ‘Is growing a large audience still the ultimate goal, or does building a community deliver better business value?’ The answer? Audiences help with reach, sure, however, despite popular beliefs, communities drive connection, loyalty and measurable growth.

To define what an audience is at a basic level, it's a group of followers or fans who consume your content. They may like your posts or click straight through, but the relationship is mostly one-way and transactional. By contrast, a community is a two-way, interactive network where members engage not only with the brand but with each other around shared values, interests or goals.

To simplify it even further:

Audience = Reach

Communities = Engagement and Belonging

Communities are often smaller than audiences, but their engagement is much deeper and more sustained. Consider brands rooted in a genuine community strategy versus those with a solely online presence posting meaningless content. Which one tends to stand the test of time and scale into multimillions?

Whilst it’s no secret that growing a large follower count looks good on paper, engagement tells a different story. Online communities show around 28% engagement and 39% active participation monthly, far exceeding typical social media engagement. Social media posts often see double-digit drops in organic reach and low interaction compared to community activity. Expert analysis shows communities can deliver real dialogue beyond the passivity of likes or views. In fact, research shows that one highly engaged community member generates more meaningful interactions than hundreds of passive followers, who may never engage with your content beyond scrolling past it.

Communities are powerful engines for loyalty, and it’s that emotional bond that keeps people coming back:

• 68% of community members say they feel more loyal to a brand after joining its community.
• 40% retention boost: Brands with active communities experience significantly higher customer retention than those without.
• Brand trust grows: 62% of consumers say belonging to a community strengthens their connection to a brand.

This deep loyalty doesn’t just feel good; it matters financially. A strong community can drive repeat purchases, reduce churn, and turn customers into vocal advocates.

In 2025, some of the most successful social strategies didn’t focus on follower growth alone; they focused on participation. Brands that treated their audiences as active communities, rather than passive viewers, saw stronger engagement, cultural relevance and long-term loyalty.

Standout Examples

One standout example is Duolingo, which continued its reputation for community-first storytelling. In early 2025, the brand leaned into a viral narrative arc around its mascot, inviting users to react, speculate and co-create the story across TikTok and other platforms. Rather than a one-off viral post, the campaign worked because it activated an existing community that already felt emotionally invested in the brand’s personality. Industry analysis highlighted how this approach transformed views into conversation and participation, reinforcing Duolingo’s position as a brand with a shared cultural language rather than just a large following (Talkwalker, 2025).

A similar shift can be seen in Doritos Dinamita’s 2025 creator-led campaigns, which prioritised community humour and inside-joke culture over polished brand messaging. By working closely with creators who already resonated with niche online communities, the brand generated over 91 million views and more than 537,000 engagements, far exceeding typical engagement benchmarks. The success wasn’t driven by reach alone, but by content that felt made for the community, not at it (Popular Pays, 2025).

Meanwhile, Starbucks leaned into user-generated storytelling through its 2025 “Global Together” initiative. By encouraging customers to share what coffee culture meant to them in their own words and visuals, Starbucks shifted the narrative from brand-led messaging to community-led expression. The campaign reinforced emotional connection and highlighted how shared rituals (not promotional content) are what sustain long-term engagement (The Social Media Blog, 2025).

Finally, e.l.f. Beauty demonstrated how values-driven communities can outperform traditional audience marketing. Its 2025 “Give an e.l.f.” campaign integrated social impact, inclusivity and activism directly into its community engagement strategy. Rather than broadcasting brand values, e.l.f. invited its community to participate in causes aligned with those values, reinforcing trust and emotional loyalty in a way that goes far beyond product promotion (People.com, 2025).

The Financial Payoff

When you build a community rather than just chasing followers, the payoff can be significant:

• Community members spend more: Customers coming from community channels spend around 24% more per purchase and contribute to higher lifetime value.
• Lower acquisition costs: communities reduce customer acquisition expenses by more than 30%, as word-of-mouth and peer referral become powerful organic drivers.
• Higher conversions: community users often convert at higher rates than general website visitors exposed to the same offers.

These figures underscore why 78% of brands now consider community marketing essential to growth in 2025 and beyond.

One of the biggest problems with audience-centric strategies is dependency on platform algorithms. These controls determine what users see and when, and organic reach is constantly declining. Communities, especially owned ones (e.g., private groups, forums, Slack/Discord servers), give brands direct, reliable access to their most engaged supporters without algorithmic filtering. This ownership creates durable digital assets that continue generating value over time, similar to how SEO yields compounding organic traffic.

How to Build a Community (Not Just an Audience)

Here’s our advice:

1. Focus on Shared Purpose

• a. Communities thrive when members align around values, identity, or a mission, not just product updates or promotional content. Create spaces where people can connect around shared interests.

2. Facilitate Two-Way Dialogue

• a. Respond to comments, ask questions, spotlight member contributions, and nurture conversation. Don’t just broadcast posts.

3. Offer Exclusive Value

• a. Members should feel rewarded for being part of the community. That could be early access, Q&As with founders, insider content or peer-to-peer support spaces.

4. Create Feedback Loops

• a. Use community insights to inform product decisions, content strategy, and messaging. Members often offer the best ideas if given a voice.

In 2026, community is where brands are winning real influence, not merely by accumulating followers. While audiences still play a role in awareness, communities deliver real connections, measurable ROI and sustainable growth.

Instead of chasing vanity metrics, marketers who invest in community understand that depth matters more than breadth and that a loyal network of engaged people creates far more long-term value than a large pool of passive followers ever could.

At 2MRW Media, we help brands move beyond surface-level growth and build strategies rooted in connection, culture and conversation. From community-led social strategies and creator partnerships to content ecosystems designed for long-term engagement, we work with brands that want to grow with their audiences, not just in front of them.

If you’re ready to shift from building attention to building belonging, 2MRW Media is here to help you do it, intentionally, creatively and sustainably.

Because the future of social isn’t just about who’s watching. It’s about who’s staying.