Facilitators are community creators. Their primary citizen marketer tool is a web-based bulletin board or community software. Facilitators are like the mayors of online towns, and some online communities exceed the populations of small cities.

Facilitators create online communities for several reasons. For products such as the Palm Treo smartphone or the TiVo digital video recorder, those product communities are de facto support groups where customers act as call-center technicians. Some Facilitators create communities simply for fans to connect with other fans. Some communities do both. The size or demographics of some Facilitator-created communities becomes attractive enough to interest advertisers.

Communities for specific models of cars are a particular favorite of the Facilitators. Online you'll find citizen-created sites for Chevrolet's Corvette, Ford's Thunderbird and Explorer (one Ford Explorer club is organized solely to conduct charitable work), and Nissan's Maxima and Z28, and the list goes on. If there's a model of car, there's probably a citizen-created forum for it.

A Facilitator-created forum for BMW's Mini Cooper is called MINI2.com. It bills itself as the largest online community for Mini owners. Paul Mullett was a 24-year-old full-time dad in Bedfordshire, England, and Casey Swenson was a 25-year-old programmer at IBM in Rochester, Minnesota, when they launched MINI2.com in January 2001 as an independent venture.

Over the years, their community grew to 20,000 Mini enthusiasts from around the world who share in the ups and downs of owning the petite car. The MINI2.com community is more elaborate than comparable communities; members can pay $17 (that's 10 British pounds or 15 Euros) to become a MINI2 Privilege Member. The fee allows members to upload images, access a private forum for other paying members, create a personal blog, and get discounts from Mini aftermarket companies.

For Mullett and Swenson, being Facilitators means catering to paying members and policing the community in search of those who would disrupt it. The "Pits" section of the site lists members who have been banned from the community; right there, like a bulletin board in a public square, are the handles of 171 people. The site even does the math: the banned members represent "0.054 percent of all users" since the site's founding.

BMW pays attention to this forum. Considering Mullet's strong marketing skills, it's smart of the company. In July 2006 it invited him and 79 journalists to test-drive the 2007 Mini, but Mullet kept the news from his community. After his secret test-drive experience, Mullett launched his own marketing campaign for unveiling the new model to his community. He posted a banner ad in the community: "27.07.2006: MINI2," with no other explanation.

For two weeks, members speculated about its meaning. In the hour before the announcement, the community was buzzing with excitement. Members from around the world reported sitting in front of their computers, snacks and beverages nearby, waiting for the announcement.

At midnight and every five minutes thereafter, Mullet became a Mini marketer, posting an insider's peek at the 2007 edition. He had detailed reviews of every new feature in the car. He posted close-up photos and videos of the interior and exterior. He posted videos of him test-driving the car on an off-track course.

Community members were ecstatic. Some were so taken they said it clinched their decision to buy the 2007 model.