What the Flywheel?

Happy Friday and farewell, October. 🌸 

While my brain recovers from workshop mode, the community has been buzzing behind the scenes with what members are up to — from new podcast launches to redefining success.

And today’s essay is a biggie: my updated model just for you!

The Community Growth Flywheel

If you’ve ever felt like growth only happens when you’re posting, pitching, or paying, you’re running a funnel. Funnels need constant feeding. Communities deserve better.

A flywheel makes every good interaction add momentum so the next one costs less, moves faster, and lands warmer.

In a previous article, I mapped out the 10 systems I believe every community‑led business needs. That model worked.

But in practice, I kept seeing teams treat “systems” like silos, and I’m sure you’ve been droned onto enough about the intrinsic danger those pose to your business.

So I’ve re-organised those 10 into one engine: the Community Growth Flywheel.

Strategy

The upfront choices that make the rest of the plan clear.

• Strategic Operating Model: What the community is for, why it exists, and how it delivers value consistently.

• Offer Architecture: The products and services you sell, from entry to step‑up.

• Positioning: The brand and messaging that make your fit obvious to the right people.

Operations

The layer that keeps the plan alive and light.

• SOPs, workflows, and tasks that make work predictable.

• Lead Capture and Routing, Nurture to Purchase Automations that remove repeat manual steps.

• Analytics that feed decisions in short learning loops.

• Platform setup and maintenance.

The Growth Cycle

Three stages that compound momentum, with the old systems mapped in.

• Attract: Earn attention through proof and partners, not noise.

  Includes these systems:

  • Lead Acquisition: Clear initial step and value exchange for contact details with leads.

  • Campaign and Editorial Marketing: Planned demand built from beliefs and proof

  • Partners, PR and Paid Reach: borrow trust to reach warmer audiences

• Engage: Deliver a first win fast, ideally in hours.

  Includes these systems:

  • Onboarding: Get customers their first rapid "first win"

  • Engagement Strategy: Predictable moments to show up and succeed together

  • Conversion: Connect their small win to the right offer

• Delight: Make staying, upgrading, and sharing the natural next step.

  Includes these systems:

  • Retention: Make staying the default,

  • Upselling: Make stepping up the obvious

  • Affiliates and Referral: Turn outcomes into warm introductions, testimonials or case studies

The Audience

As you can see in the graphic, your audience moves alongside the flywheel:

The point isn’t to push people through stages. It’s to invite the next useful step and let proof pull the next person in.

Why a Flywheel Beats a Funnel

Funnels optimise for throughput; flywheels optimise for momentum. In communities, momentum matters more.

• Compounding proof: Every public "tiny win" reduces friction for the next person.

• Decreasing acquisition cost: Partners, referrals, and member stories create warmer demand.

• Shorter loops: Operations can quickly identify which actions create momentum and which obstacles slow things down.

• More humane: People don’t like being pushed through stages. They like being invited to a next useful step.

Weekend reading:

💗 Build Community as A Product: Here are the 5 tips that Tasha shared from our interview together on how to build community touchpoints that makes members feel seen.

🛍️ Is Fast Fashion Flopping? Or more importantly, do you want it in your future? Share your opinion on circular fashion in The Big Thrif Survey.

🧠 Success ≠ Moving Goalposts: “I’ll be happy when…” keeps shapeshifting, try “I’ll be proud because…”. Learn how Two Girls Strong active enjoy their wins.

🧪 Cool, But Useful? Without access I can’t tell how Google’s new Pomelli tool actually works - but apparently it can do all your marketing for free?!

📆 Do you even plan? Daily, weekly, monthly, or “vibes only”? Share how you map your time in the community; so we can all improve together!

🤯 95% MAU for TWO months? AI Venture Lab ran hot, the community showed up, and the team celebrated like champs. Also me, loudly in the corner. See the LinkedIn recap.⁠⁠​

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