There’s a weird little hot dog stand that’s been in Portland as long as I have.

It sits in a parking lot, with a drive-through and a walk-up window. Somehow it’s remained in business all this time.

Here it was, busy as ever, when the StreetView car went by:

Surely people know about Franks A Lot now, but what about the early days?

I’m sure it was tempting to choose a larger building. Something with room for a full condiment bar. The sort of hot dog place that would get people talking about your hot dog place.

You may remember another ​hot dog-related memo​. It was about the freelance concessionaires roaming outside a baseball stadium.

Those hot dog vendors didn’t create a new crowd. Instead, they moved their carts to where the fans already were. They were scrappy, like the little stand in Portland.

Developer communities work the same way. It’s tempting to create a space, name it after your company, and put in the community equivalent of a full condiment bar. You may have the best intentions, but it doesn’t come across. ​Developers don’t want you to impress them​, they want you to support them.

You don’t create a community. You join one.

Many marketers have proudly shared their plans to “create a community of developers.”

And I understand why someone would want to gather excited fans around their product. But even the largest companies need to earn that distinction.

First, find the excited fans. Then gather them. There’s no skipping steps.

You start with the communities that already exist and go to them. Maybe you’ll earn the right to be the center of a new community. But in the meantime, you’ll listen, educate, and inspire the developers you find within existing communities.

That starts with knowing what developers care about before they discover your product (the spot ​where we can help​).

You’ll build trust when you take the product-agnostic approach. And developers will thank you for it, too!

Nobody at Franks A Lot is missing that condiment bar.