In our Clubhouse 101 post we shared some of the terminology used in Clubhouse, how to set up your profile and begin getting connected and how to join a room. If you are new to Clubhouse and you didn’t see our previous blog, please check that one out first.
Now that you have listened in on a few rooms…let’s get you talking!
Getting started
Let’s start with just being in a room. In the hallway, you can see rooms that are actively happening when you open the map. You can jump into any room instantly. Be sure to join a topic that interests you. You are in the audience (I suggest sitting in on a few rooms before you start moderating any rooms of your own).
Once you enter a room, you’ll first see the people listed who are on “stage”, meaning they have the ability to unmute their microphones and speak. The stage includes two types of participants: moderators (aka mods) and speakers. Moderators have green stars by their name and will always be on stage since they set it up the room. Then, there are people on stage who are speaking without a green star. They are speakers (typically, either a guest presenting something to the group, or an audience member who has been invited on stage to speak). Finally, below the folks who are on stage, you’ll see the audience section. They can’t speak unless a moderator grants permission, though audience members can “raise their hands” to ask a moderator for permission to speak. The button to request to speak is located at the bottom of the screen for you. There will be a hand sign – to notify moderators that you would like to say something, and a + sign, where you can invite your followers to join in on the room.
You will notice a common etiquette about speaking on Clubhouse. In more “formal” discussions, the moderator begins a talk with introduction of the club, the topic, and any guests who will presenting. After someone speaks, they mute their mic (out of respect for the other speaker and to avoid unnecessary feedback that may be heard by the whole audience). Since there are no visual cues or body language that we rely on with visual forms of interaction, it is helpful to explicitly mention some important information. For example, experienced members state who they are, ask people to view their profile, and verbally express whenever they are finished speaking to avoid interruptions and overlap delay in the audio. So when I’m done speaking, I would say, “My name is Kendel and I’m finished talking.” This makes it clear that the mod can move onto the next person.
Hosting your own room
Now that you’ve been in some rooms and you know what it’s all about, it is your turn to put your voice out there…literally! Begin by hosting your own room and inviting some of your contacts to join you.
You can start a room with the big green button that says “Start a Room” at the bottom of the Hallway of the app. Invite people in to join you by pressing the plus button once you are in the room to let people know you are hosting a room.
Now that you are moderating, you are leading a room! Some rooms are a “lecture” style, where there is not as much audience participation. This is typical within scientific communities, for example. They hold a panel discussion or lecture style room so people can learn or listen to what they have to say.
Other rooms are based all around audience participation. Nearly every morning (in US time zones), there is a Clubhouse Q+A for inexperienced users. They invite audience members up to the stage to ask questions on how to use the app (and where I learned so much about Clubhouse!).
Starting your own club
To start your own club (a community of likeminded “members” who are interested in whatever your club has to offer), you need to have hosted 3 rooms and then you can apply to establish a club. Head to your profile, scroll to the bottom where your clubs are located, and you will see a plus sign where you can apply for a club. Currently, you can only “own” one club per profile, although there can be numerous co-moderators that help manage your club (this is highly recommended). For example, the Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) club has several trusted and vetted moderators that run their own rooms within the D&D club. You can find their schedule of weekly rooms with times and topics within the bio of their club. You also find that the moderators show up and support each other in other rooms, creating brand consistency that these moderators are people you can come to if you have questions regarding the club or rooms.
Now that you learned the basics of Clubhouse, you can confidently navigate through the app. There are some additional advanced features we didn’t cover here since they are not needed to begin using Clubhouse. And new features are being adding all the time since this is a new platform.
Want to know more? Did we miss something? If you are interested in learning more about Clubhouse, feel free to reach out or drop a comment below. I look forward to connecting with you on Clubhouse and please join us every Tuesday at 12PM (Central US time) in the FWTX Startup Community Room.
