What Are the Differences Between Mighty Networks and Discord?

What is the difference between Discord and Mighty Networks? Both allow you to create a community centered around a dynamic chat, but aside from that, these platforms are very different. Discord is a voice, video and text communication service that makes it easy for you and your community to talk every day and hang out more often. Mighty Networks is a cultural software platform that allows you to help people build relationships with each other on the path to results and transformation and build a business around it. In in this video, we'll be comparing Discord versus Mighty Networks in depth to help you decide which would be a better fit for the community you want to create. Let's get started. First, let's take a look at what you can build and how you can design your community on these platforms. On Discord, your community is called a server which is organized into topic based channels. There are two types of channels you can create. A text channel is a chat based channel where messages are displayed chronologically. Members can share text images and links, and other members can also react to each message. Next is a voice channel where members can connect via voice chat, which is audio only video chat where multiple members can show their cameras, screen sharing and live streaming. If you enable Community for your Discord server, you'll have access to three other types of channels. An announcement channel is where server staff can share announcements and important info. A forum channel which uses posts so discussions can be more organized. And then there's the Stage channel, which is a type of voice channel for audio only conversations where some people can talk and others can listen as the audience. There are requirements for enabling community for your Discord server, including complying with Discord's community guidelines and allowing Discord to check your server contents for violations. Privacy and permissions can be set for each channel. You can also organize your channels into categories where the permissions set for a category will apply to the channels contained within. In a Mighty network, spaces are your building blocks, and then you can group spaces into containers called collections. The difference between Discord's Channels and Mighty Spaces is that instead of having to choose one type of space like a chat or a forum, each space you create can be customized with eight different features. So you can have a space that has both a chat, a feed with posts, as well as additional features. Here are all the features that you can enable in each space. First, you can have a chat which is similar to Discord's text channel. This is where members can chat in real time, share images, attachments and links. You can also enable a feed which is similar to Discord's forum channel. This is where you and your members can share posts as well as create interactive polls and questions. And for each post, members can also like and comment. There's also a Discovery feature where you as a host can curate content and and highlight and feature posts. This is great for helping your members find important content within each space. Next, if you're on Mighty's business plan, you can enable the Table of Contents feature. This allows you to build and sell courses, create lessons, have a course curriculum, and upload all kinds of content for each lesson. You can also have a single event which is great if you want to create a space around a signature event. Or you could enable an event see Siri space where members can browse and RCP to multiple events. Next, you can enable a member directory. This will display the profiles of the members that are a part of this space. Lastly, you can have a standalone webpage which is great if you'd like to include something like an introduction page, a page describing a new offering you want to sell, or anything that's more about delivering a single piece of content. All of these features are natively built into Mighty Networks, and for each space you create, you decide which of the features to turn on or off. You can have a space that only has one of these features or all of them. When it comes to privacy and access, you can set each space to be public, private, secret, paid, or even token gated. Next, let's talk about what you and your members can do. Both Discord and Mighty Networks help you bring like minded people together, but then what? Both platforms have similar capabilities like being able to livestream, host events, chat in real time, have threaded conversations, create member profiles with external links, and send and receive direct messages. You can also upload video files to both platforms, but there's a big difference when it comes to file size. But what else is different? One thing that's unique to Discord is being able to do things like play games and interact through Discord at the same time. You can talk, chat and even share your game screen to your server so anyone who's online can experience the game with you at the same time. The same time. Discord also has a feature called Activities, which is a way to instantly enjoy shared experiences with friends on Discord itself. One activity is a Watch party where you and your members can be on a voice chat While watching a YouTube video at the same time. If you're on Discord Nitro, you can host other activities including poker night, chess in the park, and Blazing Eights. All of your Members can participate in the same activity together or multiple activities can be going on simultaneously. On the other hand, Mighty Networks is optimized for bringing anyone together who are on the same path of results and transformation, whether that's being more physically fit, making more money as a business owner or being more productive. Members are united because they're on the same journey towards progress. It doesn't matter if they were friends before joining. Mighty has other unique features that will empower, inspire and motivate your members to achieve progress. For example, if you're on Mighty's business plan, you can create an unlimited number of courses and dedicated course communities. Members can learn from your course content and connect with the other students in a course. Mighty also has other optional features that will help your members meet, connect and network, such as Member Location, which allows your members to find others near them, or member Categories. This allows members to self select into custom categories so they can immediately tap into relevant members. Now let's talk about acquiring and onboarding new members. Discord servers are invite only by default, so someone would have to have the link to your server in order to join it. There is a server discovery feature where potential members can search for new communities, but a server would need to meet certain requirements in order to be included in the results, such as having at least 1,000 members. Also, Discord recently launched the ability to create server subscriptions. These allow you to create subscription tiers for paying members and offer premium experiences with unlockable servers and channels. However, it is only currently available to US based creators. You need to create a minimum of one subscription tier and you can only have a maximum of three tiers. You can also enable the free trial feature where you can give subscription membership benefits for free for a trial period so members can see if they want to continue subscribing. Discord also has no real way to screen members. You can set up the rule screening feature where people would have to read and agree to your server's rules and guidelines. But anyone who clicks to agree to these guidelines is automatically added now onto Mighty Networks. First you can create a landing page which serves as the front door to what you're creating. This is where you can describe what you're offering and who should join your Mighty network. You can also set your privacy setting to public. That way anyone can join and even explore before they join. The content within your Mighty network will be easy to share and it'll be indexed by search engines. You can also keep things private, have screening questions, or even secret or charge for access right at the door when it comes to charging for your Mighty network, you have a lot of options. You can charge for your entire Mighty network and all of the spaces within it, or you can charge for a specific space. A bundle of spaces offer memberships and sell courses. You can also set payments to be a monthly or annual subscription or a one time fee. If you set up a subscription, you can offer a free trial so people would be able to try before they commit to paying a recurring fee. There's also the option to token gate a space. This will require an NFT or tokens in a connected wallet for a member to access your Mighty network or a part of it. You can do this on Discord too, but you would have to set up a different app to enable it and there are a lot of hoops to jump through for you and your members in terms of finding new members. If you set your mighty network to public, potential members would be able to search for it right in the Mighty Networks app. You can also set up an Ambassador program which rewards members for referring new members to join for onboarding. There are a couple of things that you can set up to help your new members feel welcome. First, you can enable the welcome Checklist, which is a customizable way to introduce your members to your community. The welcome Checklist allows you to easily curate content and features for your members to explore. You can also enable the Discovery feature in each of your spaces. This will allow you to highlight and showcase important content specifically to new members. Next, let's take a look at customizations and integrations. Discord is extremely customizable. One thing that's a big part of Discord culture are emojis and personalized emotes. Every server by default can add up to 50 custom emojis that any active server members can use within the server. Discord also wouldn't be Discord without apps and bots. There are thousands of Discord apps and bots developed by Discord users that allow you to customize, automate and moderate your server. If you already use Discord, you probably know off the top of your head which bots and apps that you want to install on your server. But if you don't, it can be super confusing because you'll have to do the research to figure out which ones you need, what they do, how to install them, and whether they're actually going to do the thing that you're intending them to do. So even though you could really personalize your server, there could be a big learning curve and a lot of work to get things up and running for you and your members. Mighty Networks, on the other hand, has the most impactful features natively built in, which means no apps, no bots, no research, and nothing to install. It's just a matter of deciding which features to turn on and off for each of the spaces that you create. When it comes to spaces and the features within them, you can rename everything. So if you want to call the discovery feature a dashboard, you can do that. You can also reorganize everything and you can set which feature that members will see first when they enter a space. So if you want to have events front and center, you could do that or the feed. Same thing. All you have to do is drag and drop. When it comes to branding, there are a lot of options to help you design a look that's cohesive, consistent and fun. You can change the colors and icons and add imagery for your entire Mighty Network. And for each space that you create, you can also add custom links to the navigation bar. So for example, you can link to an E commerce store, a website, or your podcast. Also, Mighty Networks integrates with Google Analytics, slack, and through Zapier, you can connect and automate tasks with over 2,000 other applications like Mailchimp, ActiveCampaign, and Salesforce. Lastly, with the Mighty Pro plan, you can white label the entire experience so you can have your own app in the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store. Next, let's talk about ease of use. Discord is accessible via desktop, iPhone and Android apps. It's really common for Discord users to be members of multiple servers, and Discord makes it easy to switch between servers with one click or one tap. You can even watch multiple streams from multiple servers at the same time in a grid view. But I think the thing that Discord makes really easy is getting you and your members to hang out in real time. You can easily chat, play games together, or jump on a call all within Discord. The drawback here is that if you have members who are on different schedules or different time zones, they may never be able to participate in these real time hangouts. So they completely miss out on the experience and the value of your community. For for these members or members who take a few days off, Discord can definitely be overwhelming since they'll just have to go through every single thing they missed in chronological order. And as I mentioned earlier, Discord apps and bots really make the possibilities endless. When it comes to Discord, however, not only will there be a learning curve for you as the admin, but your members will have to learn what each app does and how they affect your server. A network on Mighty is designed to look familiar. The experience is intuitive whether you've used Mighty Networks in the past or if this is your first time. Also, you and your members can access your Mighty network through a browser or the fully featured iPhone and Android apps. Now, when it comes to connection and interaction, your members can hang out in real time and participate in conversations asynchronously. Mighty's Activity feed makes it really easy for your members to find the content that matters to them. So each of your members may enjoy different spaces in your network, follow other members and sign up for courses, but each member's activities feed will be personalized to their experience so nothing gets buried as the host. There are also a lot of built in features that make it easy for you to manage your Mighty network, like being able to schedule posts. With Mighty networks, you have a lot of freedom and flexibility to really design an experience that's as unique as your brand, but there's also enough structure so that it gets out of the way and connecting within your community is frictionless. Overall, Mighty makes it really easy to design something that's purposeful. Your members can hang out as well as get support, resources and encouragement as they progress towards their goals. Lastly, let's talk about how much it costs to build on these platforms. Discord is free whether you want to create a server or become a member of a server. As a server owner you can have 500 channels and I think up to 250,000 members. If you want more, you can submit a request and as a member you can join up to 100 servers. Discord has two paid plans, Nitro Basic and Nitro. The prices vary depending on your country, but for me, Nitro basic is $2.99 a month and Nitro is $9.99 a month. These plans do unlock a few features that you can use on your server, like more custom emojis and stickers or bigger file sharing, but they're not necessarily just for Discord server owners. Even a Discord user or someone who doesn't own or manage a server to could benefit from these paid plans like being able to join up to 200 Discord servers or send longer messages up to 4,000 characters. There's also server boosting where you and your community work together to unlock collective perks like more emoji slots, better audio quality and better video quality for streaming games. You could also just buy a level and pay the equivalent of remaining boost so that your Server can level up right away. Mighty has three paid plans when billed annually. There's the community plan at $33 a month and the business plan at $99 a month. There's also Mighty Pro, which I mentioned earlier. All of Mighty's plans come with unlimited spaces, hosts or admins and members. If you want to be able to create and sell courses, you have to be on the business plan. But from there you'll be able to have an unlimited number of students, courses instructors, moderators and dedicated course communities. So as a host of a Mighty Network, you're not being charged on how much you scale or grow you. It's just a flat fee tier depending on the features that you want. So who is Discord for and who should choose Mighty? Both Discord and Mighty Networks are great platforms, but I think it really comes down to goals. What are your goals as a business owner? Why do you want to create a community? And then what are the goals of your members? Why do they want to join a community in the first place? Discord is a great option if your primary focus is to hang out with your friends online in real time. Being able to play games with your friends at the same time or hang out in a video call all for free is awesome. However, I do think that that if you and your members are unfamiliar with Discord, it's going to be a huge disadvantage and I think there's going to be a big gap between your members and the value that you're trying to provide them now. If your goal is to bring people together who are on the same path towards results and transformation and help them see progress, Mighty is the way to go. With Mighty, you can share content to inspire your members. You could also build courses to help your members apply these ideas in their lives. And the community aspect isn't just there so that your members can meet and hang out. With all the native features built into Mighty Networks, you can design an experience that makes it easy for your members to share their motivations, perspectives, experiences and daily practices. So if you want to build an experience that's purposeful, productive, motivating and fun for your members, Mighty Networks is the platform for you. And if you want to learn more about building on Mighty, check out this video next. Thanks for watching.