Setting and enforcing community guidelines: What you need to know

Guidelines set the tone for all interactions inside your online community. They ensure that every member feels respected and valued. 

However, creating and enforcing community guidelines can be challenging. It requires a balance between providing structure and allowing room for your members to have meaningful engagement.

What makes community guidelines valuable?

It starts with understanding the core purpose of community guidelines—they should create a welcoming and safe environment while empowering members to interact freely. 

Some of the critical elements of well-designed guidelines include:

• Clarity. Your guidelines should be easy to understand with straightforward language.

• Provide purpose. Explain why each rule exists in the guidelines. For example, instead of stating ‘No hate speech’, clarify that this rule is in place to ensure members feel safe. 

• Actionable rules. Specify what behaviour you expect and what is unacceptable. A great way to do this is by outlining what constitutes respectable behaviour. 

• Alignment. Your guidelines should reflect your community mission and values. If your community manifesto emphasises collaboration and empathy, your guidelines should echo these principles. This reinforces your community's identity and makes the rules feel purposeful rather than arbitrary. 

• Concise. People are more likely to read and follow a short list than a complicated document.

When you incorporate these elements into your guidelines, everyone knows what’s expected of them. It also allows community members to participate without fear of harassment or misunderstanding.

How to balance guideline structure with flexibility

While guidelines are essential, they shouldn’t feel overly restrictive. The overarching goal is to create an environment that encourages meaningful interactions while curbing any harmful behaviour. Two ways to do this is:

Allow for organic interaction

Your community guidelines should give members the freedom to express themselves and interact in creative ways. The focus should be on setting boundaries for negative behaviour rather than trying to control every conversation. 

Community guidelines should also make it clear that you welcome (and encourage!) diverse opinions—so long as members can do so respectfully. 

Nobody wants stagnant or repetitive conversations in communities. In fact, 77% of people join online communities to learn new things. 

Different perspectives will ensure rich and engaging discussions regularly take place.

Adjust as needed

You need to ensure you stay open to feedback. 

As your online community evolves and adapts, so should your community guidelines. You need to regularly review your guidelines and make adjustments based on member feedback and any other observations. 

When you make updates, always communicate the changes to your members and explain why you’ve made them.

You also help to create a sense of ownership by involving members in refining guidelines. 

Enforcing guidelines with fairness

Once your guidelines are in place, the next step is enforcement. This is where many community managers struggle, because enforcement can feel pushy and can act like a deterrent. 

Nearly 1 in 5 community members say the main benefit of an online community is it provides them with an escape. Constantly enforcing guidelines can make a community feel very regulated and strict, therefore losing its appeal as somewhere to go for entertainment and distraction. 

You need to find the balance between enforcing guidelines without pushing people away. 

Tip 1: Be honest!

As always, transparency is key to a thriving community. When it comes to your community guidelines, be clear about what will happen if someone violates them. Whether it’s a warning, temporary ban, or permanent removal, having consequences helps members understand what’s at stake. 

You should record any infractions with the relevant actions taken. This provides you with clear documentation should any disputes arise. 

Tip 2: Be consistent

Make sure rules are enforced equally for all members, regardless of their status or contribution to the community. Inconsistency can lead to resentment and a lack of trust in community management. 

To stay consistent, you may use a tiered approach. For example, one of the ways YouTube will terminate a channel is if it accrues three community guideline strikes in 90 days. TikTok also introduced a warning strike system in 2024 to alert creators of rule violations so they can understand and correct behaviour. 

Start off with a polite reminder for minor infractions and escalate as needed. For example: 

• For a first offence, you might send them a private message explaining the infraction and a reminder of the guidelines. 

• A second time, you might issue a warning and a more formal notice of potential consequences. 

• If it happens a third time, you might choose temporary suspension or another serious action. 

Fair enforcement builds trust and shows members that your online community values respectful behaviour. 

Can community guidelines create a self-sustaining environment?

Yes! For many community managers, a goal is to create an environment where members take ownership of maintaining the culture.

You can do this by:

Empowering members

We recently spoke about the value of peer personal outreach in an online community, and member involvement is just as important when it comes to ensuring guidelines are respected. 

Your highly-engaged members should set a positive example to newcomers and other members, gently correcting behaviour if necessary. Having role models who can implement peer enforcement can also be a lot more effective than top-down policing from community managers. 

As such, you might consider designating trusted members as community ambassadors or moderators. At the end of 2023, Reddit reported having 2,013 full-time employees as well as a staggering 60,000 volunteer Reddit moderators who were active on the platform daily. These moderators help keep the Reddit community safe and ensure everyone follows the guidelines.   

Providing a status such as Community Moderator can help these members to enforce guidelines, answer questions, and model the desired behaviour. (If you’re unsure who these members are in your community or how to incentivise them, read more about the participation ladder!)

Create a reporting system

If you want members to report violations, make it as easy as possible for them to do so! The more accessible your reporting system, the more likely members will use it. 

Finally, if members are reporting community guideline violations, don’t let them go unnoticed. You should acknowledge reports, take action, and follow up with members who submitted them. This will reassure members that their concerns are being addressed and taken seriously.

How to build a lasting community

At Steadfast Collective, we’re community builders who are focused on building apps and sites with your members at the forefront. If you’re ready to improve or grow your online community, reach out to our team!