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Ben Lang

I'm Ben Lang, Head of Community at Notion. AMA ๐Ÿ‘‡

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Back in 2018, I launched Notion Pages on Product Hunt, it was the #2 product of the week. Shortly after, I joined Notion to support the community. Our community has written books about Notion, created mascots, hosted hundreds of events, started full-time businesses around Notion, and much more. Many of the highest-ranking products on Product Hunt in the past two years have been Notion templates. Going back in time, Notion launched on Product Hunt in 2016 as one of the most upvoted products of all time. More than 20 million people use Notion today. I was user #1880 on Product Hunt and I've hunted more than 360 products. AMA!
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Harish Kumar
CrawlQ Audience Research
It is amazing to hear your Ben Lang...you are absolute crusher here when it comes to highlighting what is Notion and how it delivers great value to marketers and fouders.
Ivรกn Fanego
Hi Ben! I am curious, how did you manage to explain what Notion was in its early days? I mean, I use Notion, but at it was difficult for me at the beginning to understand what was it (and to be honest, I am still missing 95% of its potential!) What I mean, how did you start communicating its value proposition?
Ben Lang
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@ivan_fanego This is something we think about a lot. Candidly, early on, the best way to describe our value was to talk about how Notion combined the functionality of many other tools together - this is a common way just to anchor a product in people's minds. As collaboration tools have become more critical for all teams, this messaging has evolved and become more sophisticated. Today, we call Notion collaboration software, and when it comes to value props, we underscore the benefits of speed and alignment that get unlocked when people have the ability to tailor their own tools to fit their needs. Still, though, the most helpful description tends to be the one that just says outright that it combines docs, wikis, and project management in a single, customizable space.
Ivรกn Fanego
@benln Thanks a lot. The value of the analogy (docs, wikis, and project management) is underrated hehe.
Elie Steinbock
Inbox Zero
Hi Ben! Love what youโ€™re doing at Notion. What tip would give you founders starting a community today?
Ben Lang
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@eliezer_steinbock1 Hi Eliezer ๐Ÿ‘‹ First, try to understand what exactly your core users want. - Where could you provide value - What could they learn from each other - What could they learn from you - What do they love about your product Set up as many calls with your early fans and users to build this framework together.
Nina Hรถdlmayr
Unlined
Hi Ben! Wat I'm curious about is - why do you think Notion has such an impact on the Product Hunt community? What are the common similarities within the community that Notion received such wide positive responses? Cheers!
Ben Lang
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@ninayodel Hi Nina! I think there are a few reasons Notion has resonated strongly with the Product Hunt community - You can build powerful tools/products - It's quick and easy to build - There's a growing ecosystem of early adopters using Notion The team and I have been amazed to see so many talented makers here launching template packs, individual templates, and apps built on Notion โœจ
Atul Ghorpade
@ninayodel @benln Wow. Great explanation, Ben.
Donia Ahmed
Hi Ben I love notion and would like to get some tips as I started my community management career in Premast. How could you keep the flow of the community and how to increase members number .. Thanks in advance and your help is appreciated
Ben Lang
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@donia_ahmed I'd highly recommend checking out communities and resources for community managers, there are some great ones - https://www.community.club/ - https://www.community.club/c-school - https://cmxhub.com/
Donia Ahmed
@benln thank you so much
Sofia Silva
Ben, hi Thank you so much for doing this, congrats on the incredible work. For early-stage startups that want to build communities, what are the: - top 3 do, - top 3 donยดt - 3 main differences between B2B & B2C communities - what stack would you use today to build a community Thank you! _SMB
Dawn Veltri
RAEK
@sofia_de_mello_barreto Commenting because I definitely want to see this answer.
Ben Lang
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@sofia_de_mello_barreto @dawn_veltri1 Hi Sofia! Good question! Do - Talk to your power users, get to know them - Listen to what your users want, empower them - Test and iterate all the time Don't - Force adoption of a certain tool without getting feedback - Try to do everything yourself, outsource/delegate where possible - Move too slowly Differences - Platforms, where users hang out - Purpose of connection with others Tools I love - Notion ๐Ÿ™ƒ - Swagup - Zapier - Slack - Commsor - Luma
Roi Ziko
Hi Ben ๐Ÿ‘‹ Can you pick a project you've been involved in that you're especially proud of?
Ben Lang
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@roiziko Hey Roi! I'm quite proud of International Hummus Day http://hummusday.com. It's been a lot of fun seeing so many people celebrate hummus over the years.
Johann Molinari
Hi Ben, when did you feel that Notion had the right product market feel? What was the key difference vs what you had before?
Ben Lang
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@johann_molinari That's a great question! I joined Notion after we had product market fit, so I missed that part of the company growth. I will investigate and see what I can find out ๐Ÿ•ต๏ธ
Johann Molinari
@benln thanks for the AMA and any info you can get on this! Super useful and interesting
Ben Lang
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@johann_molinari Thanks Johann! Appreciate it.
Dafni Chontou
Hi Ben ๐Ÿ‘‹ Iโ€™m a big fan of Notion and the engagement of the community is really impressive! How do the very early days of community building look like and what are key points founders/ community builders should keep in mind as theyโ€™re growing them? This is particularly interesting from the angle of product+community (eg Notion community) vs. community as a product company (eg Product Hunt). Many thanks!
Ben Lang
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@dafnihnd Hi Dafni, I'd say having as many conversations as possible would be tremendously valuable early on. Talk to power users, anyone who's really excited about what you're building and try to understand: - What do they love about your product - What kind of value are you unlocking for them - How could they learn more from you and other users As you understand and learn more, you could start to build a framework to grow your community.
Dafni Chontou
@benln thanks, Ben! We recently starting onboarding our users via short 1-1 calls and collect so much valuable feedback. These are some great questions to bring into these conversations.
Jordi Mon Companys
Ben please do ask how your Product Marketing colleagues manage their remit with Notion and, hey, if they want to open their templates that would help any product marketer big time! ๐Ÿ˜‰
Ben Lang
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@jordimonpmm Hey Jordi! I don't quite know what you mean by remit?
Jordi Mon Companys
@benln Me neither, to be fair. I'm on holidays and probably switched all systems off. I just want to know how Product Marketing at Notion uses Notion templates and workspaces internally. That's all.
Ben Lang
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@jordimonpmm Ah good question! Have you seen this post? https://www.notion.so/blog/how-n... We share how we use Notion at Notion.
Jordi Mon Companys
@benln Thanks! I did. It's not specific enough. I'm thinking of message houses, positioning frameworks and stuff like that that typically product marketers manage and update.
Ben Lang
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@jordimonpmm Got it! Will share with our blog team, that would be fantastic material for a future post.
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