Digital communities of inquiry: How online communities support entrepreneurial opportunity development

Figures & data

Table 1. Overview of entrepreneurial communities.

Community	Description (the sub-Reddit introduction used by the communities)	Number of members
r/start-ups	“Welcome to/r/startups, the place to discuss startup problems and solutions.”	Approx. 709,000 members
r/EntrepreneurRideAlong	“A community of like minded individuals that are looking to solve issues, network without spamming, talk about the growth of your business (Ride Along), challenges and high points and collab on projects together.”	Approx. 167,000 members
r/AppIdeas	“This subreddit is designed to be a professional environment where developers, entrepreneurs, and creators can come together to share their amazing app ideas.”	Approx. 20,100 members
r/Startup_Ideas	“This subreddit is for sharing innovative startup ideas … Share ideas. Improve ideas. Expand upon other ideas. Combine ideas. Implement ideas.”	Approx. 35,100 members

Table 2. Descriptive coding of the communities.

Community	Total number of comments	Median number of comments in each thread	Percentage of threads about opportunities	Level of detail and complexity	Emotionality	Types of opportunity discussions
R/start-ups	10,277	84	48%	Low = 33% Medium = 44% High = 23%	65% Emotional 35% Technical	10% Opportunity Recognition 52% Opportunity Enactment 38% Opportunity Reflection
R/Entrepreneur Ridealong	5,129	39	46%	Low = 40% Medium = 25% High = 35%	31% Emotional 69% Technical	15% Opportunity Recognition 11% Opportunity Enactment 74% Opportunity Reflection
R/Start-up_Ideas	1,735	13	84%	Low = 76% Medium = 21% High = 3%	18% Emotional 82% Technical	93% Opportunity Recognition 6% Opportunity Enactment 1% Opportunity Reflection
R/Appideas	1,529	12	75%	Low = 80% Medium = 20% High = 6%	3% Emotional 97% Technical	100% Opportunity Recognition

Table 3. Opportunity recognition representative data.

Types of questions and requests	Representative original posts	Types of community interactions	Style of interactions	Representative quotes from interactions
Testing out new ideas and looking for feedback	“How about a RateMyLandlord to help renters avoid getting screwed over?” (r/appideas) “Would you use this? A Kanban board for your bookmarks” (R/start-ups_ideas)	Feedback on ideas, such as highlighting competing products or showing interest in the product/service suggested	Often low on detail and complexity and mostly technical	Feedback on idea “I feel like your concept has at least one very distinct advantage over most other new social apps in that this concept could work with even a very small userbase.” (r/appideas) “I’ve had this idea for a few years and started building it out late last year. :) The hard part (as with most ideas) is hosting and marketing. Getting people to actually use it is the hard part. In the beginning, very few people would use it. When few people use it, the chances of them getting responses to their messages is low, which means they’ll start to use it less and less. K Also- this would likely more often be used as negative messages, as many of these things tend to be used for. Do you have plans for how to fix those issues?” (r/appideas) Showing interest in product/service “I would back this kind of kickstarter. The only issue is security, so I’ll likely only use it for not so important stuff like pictures and “homework”. (r/start-ups_ideas) “Good stuff! I’ve been messing around with this same idea. Definitely a need in the market.” (r/startup_ideas)
Searching for resources, such as beta testers	“Turn your USB into a full private cloud” (r/start-up_ideas) “Neighborhood Collective Bargaining – how to monetize?” (r/start-up_ideas)	Offering help, in rare cases members of the community show interest in joining the start-ups in question.	Often low on detail and complexity; mostly technical	Offering collaboration “I’ve thought a lot about this and almost pursued it. If you’re interested in talking more, feel free to hit me with a pm [private message]” (r/appideas) “I am trying to pick up Swift right now. I could pick up flutter as well and contribute. I love this app idea.” (r/appideas) Volunteering for beta testing “If this is something you actually have a prototype of for people to beta test, I’d love to be a part of that. PM’d” (r/start-up_ideas) “Really nice idea, it would be fun to code it.” (r/start-up_ideas)

Table 4. Opportunity enactment representative data.

Types of Problems	Representative original posts	Types of Community Interaction	Style of Interactions	Representative Quotes from interactions
Problems with work-life and working relationships	“Just had to skip an investor pitch meeting due to an anxiety attack. I feel like shit.” (r/start-ups) “Co-founder quits on start-up, wants me to pay back his capital” (r/start-ups)	The Community provides more emotionally oriented feedback, sometimes leading the original poster to self-reflect.	Often a medium-high level of detail and complexity while also being emotional	Emotionally Oriented feedback “First off, remember that anxiety is fear of the unknown. Your body is creating a flight mode because it doesn’t know what is going to happen. Investor meetings are a great example of “what if…” moments that will cause these reflexes. Its the same sensation that causes “omg am I having a heart attack?” (r/start-ups) “Great job! Fuck your partner. This was the most important lesson that I learned in my first startup experience. My partner had the idea, I was doing 90% of the work, and he wanted 70% of the equity (even before we built a product). He never included me in meetings with mentors, incubators, or even 3rd party developers. Threatened our friendship and my place in the company if I didn’t blindly obey his leadership. I promptly told him, that I could easily Zuckerberg him. We are no longer friends.” (r/start-ups) Emotional Support “100% keep going. In fact keep going harder, and if it is possible, play up user privacy, and if that means that you need to engineer some features to add some privacy talking points, then do it. A lot of people do not trust Google with their data – take advantage of that.” (r/start-ups) “29 years young, 2 PRETEEN kids and a wee one? Working starbucks and kripsy kreme, starting a business and in 2020 no less? You guys rock, no way around it. Honestly, true inspiration!” (r/entrepreneurship_ridealong)
Problems with learning new skills	“How do I learn the art of selling software?” (r/start-ups) “Consumer app startups: how long did it take for you to get 1,000 users and how did you do it?” (r/start-ups)	Community provides tangible and technical advice, sometimes combined with emotional support.	Often detailed, complex, and technical	Technical Advice “I work in SaaS sales, have done for around a year now, with 8 years sales experience … my tips for you are: When trying to book meetings, ask them how they currently perform the task your product solves, get them thinking about the pain, and tell them your product will help XYZ and that you’d absolutely love to show it to them” (r/start-ups) “It’s a delivery app using Google Maps/Place/Geocoding etc API + Stripe for all the heavy lifting, everything else seems like basic CRUD to me. Unless it’s generating a net profit (taking into account all his personal efforts) he will have a very hard time selling it.” (r/start-ups) Marketing Advice “If you want to go the free route, you should have started working on finding users as early as possible because things like SEO, content marketing or even answering questions on Quora will take time before they drive traffic to your app.” (r/start-ups) “I sell a different thing but I use 3 tier pricing. Very high middle and cheaper. I made sure every option meets their needs and mine. Offer one option at a time until rejected and start high. The very high price generally pulls their expectations up with it’s shock value. They almost always go for middle and if they go cheap then they don’t expect much so they are easy to please. Plus when I offer the lower cost options they feel like I’m saving them money. Never upsell, down sell.” (r/Entrepreneurship_Ridealong)

Table 5. Opportunity reflection representative data.

Types of reflections	Knowledge Shared	Representative Quotes from Original Poster	Style of Interactions	Representative Quotes from interactions
“How I built this” (Entrepreneurs sharing their success stories)	Advice on sales, marketing, product development, and working relationships	Advice on Sales: “We started with a single $200/month price point. We left so much money on the table that I still cry every time I think about it. The best thing we’ve done is increase our price and start selling annual deals … Same product. Different prices. More money” (r/entrepreneurshipridealong) Advice on Marketing “Instagram is very hard to grow organically, but TikTok is incredibly easy (right now at least) … ” (r/entrepreneurshipridealong) Advice on product manufacturing “PRO TIP: If you visit a Chinese factory, ask politely to use the bathroom. They will have to oblige, and if you find a really messy, disgusting bathroom, then it’s definitely a red flag … these factories have millions of dollars worth of machinery, if they can’t put together a decent bathroom for their workers, then they are probably corner-cutters.” (r/entrepreneurshipridealong)	Members ask follow-up questions or in some cases critique the original poster. Often detailed, complex and technical.	Probing and trying to learn more “Awesome post! If you don’t mind, what went in to learning how to create the software you are selling? Did you design it yourself or did you hire someone with the technical knowledge already in place to build it for you?” (r/entrepreneurshipridealong) “what was the process you used for facebook ads? Can you dive a little deeper into that? I’m launching a store soon and facebook ads is on the table for our strategy.” (r/entrepreneurshipridealong) “Great stuff! However, I’m not really sure I understood your partner channel -> you reaching out to agencies that build websites? Can you describe it a little more precise?” (r/start-ups)
“Lessons Learned” (entrepreneurs sharing stories of how and why they failed)	Advice on how to avoid failure	Advice on how to avoid failure “If you are being evaluated (by customers, partners or possible acquirers) define success KPIs beforehand. That way everyone will have the same common ground.” (r/entrepreneurshipridealong) “When I initially created my startup I realized that I needed someone to help me with the massive workload. I specifically needed someone with a lot of programming experience. So I decided to find someone at my school … I had found a cofounder (we’ll call him Cody, even though that isn’t his real name). While Cody was extremely talented in programming, his stubbornness proved to make him hard to work with. So, my lesson here is to find a cofounder who not only has skills and experience but one that you work well with.” (r/startups)	Often more emotional responses, not as complex	Emotional support after failure “Wow what a roller coaster ride. Hopefully you’ve recovered from the bruises and are back in the studio working on something even better, with these life lessons in mind!” (r/entrepreneurshipridealong) “You’ve done something amazing here. Don’t doubt yourself … .Own your expertise and learn to be comfortable admitting that there are other things you don’t know. That’s how you grow and learn.” (R/start-ups) “That was really inspiring. Thanks for sharing your experience and I wish you all the luck in your future.” (r/entrepreneurship_ridealong)

Figure 1. Model of how online communities support opportunity development.