It’s interesting how many people that I’ve gotten to know are shifting to positions in social media. Following the evolution of the industry is also fascinating. Two have become social media specialists in advertising/PR firms. I’m not sure what Chris Brogan’s new title is? And most recently another friend is pressing his exec’s to add the Community Manager role to his company. This is indicative of a trend.
People need resources to explain & justify the role. Where should they begin? What does this position look like & what type of person is best suits it? What information are you looking for?
Today Jeremiah Owyang published the Four Tenets of the Community Manager:
- Community Advocate
- Brand Evangelist
- Savvy Communication Skills, Shapes Editorial
- Gathers Community Input for Future Product and Services
I have referenced resources on his Web Strategy blog many times because it’s a treasure trove of information definitely worth mining.
If you or your company is interested in this role, you may be interested in joining the International Online Community Management Association. Sascha Carlin started the mindmap below & it is a collaborative effort. It offers a nice visual. (Click on it to go to the original). 
Sascha’s call embodies the spirit of the role of Community Manager:
This call is intended to gather professional community managers and community builders working in the field of online communities.
We are working in a field that has many different aspects. Community professionals have varying backgrounds, work in different industries and aim to fulfill different business goals. We work with all kinds of communities, all sizes of them and different topics and missions.
Since the take-off of Web 2.0 and with it user generated content the term community was enlarged to nearly all ventures on the web. Publishers, producers, service providers, more or less everyone who sells something, strive into creating communities.
Online Community Management is a challenging profession. It involves facilitation and moderation, selling the community idea within the company as well as to its customers. We depend on our superiors to grant us resources. We need to convince other departments to work with us. We need to evangelize where the community idea is new and to join efforts where it already is.
In fact, we are a product managers. But of a special kind. There is not a boxed product called community which you put on the shelves. We have a potential audience of millions. We have to know how to reach these people, what services to offer to them, how to get them involved in our companies’ business goals. It is about business and brand. Brands carry emotions, and what is a community other than people having emotions.
Until now, we were scattered. We sought help in the little literature that exists about online communities. We searched the web and found single pieces of information. We ventured into psychology and communication sciences, play theory, marketing and advertising.
But we missed something essentially. A place to go to when all else has failed. A place where we can find people who are in the same position as we are, who we can ask for guidance, best practices and ideas, who understand us.
There are more reasons yet to be addressed: education guidelines, lobbying and many more.
These are the reasons why we need something like IOCMA – International Online Community Management Association.
IOCMA seeks to become that one place. It’s time to engage.
Join us if you’re interested in contributing & building a professional organization for Community Managers. It may be an excellent way to bring together resources & make them available to everyone. That just gave me a great idea! (The Community Manager position is all about ideas – and that’s one of the things I love about it!)
What information are you looking for?
Thanks Connie, I updated my post to point to these resources and even the upcoming IOCMA, thanks!
[…] Update: Also see this association of community managers (IOCMA) that are now calling for members (link via Connie) […]
I updated the fourth Tenet, could you please update your text?
Jeremiah and Connie both refer to “community manager” while the referenced mindmap refers to “online community manager.” Depending on the organization and industry, there could be major differences in roles and responsibilities for the two.
I started out thinking that one might be a subset of the other (e.g., http://www.ddmcd.com/real_world.html) but I’m not so sure that’s the best way to conceptualize the relationship between the two.
Dennis: As I understand it, Community Management (w/o “Online”) is a role typical for the US. Here in Germany we don’t have such strong locally focused communities – they are there, but not as professionally organized or managed as in the US.
Beside, I strongly believe the difference is not as big. It’s the people, online and offline, who make a community become a community, so to speak.
Of course the doing is different and the tools are not the same. But in the end it’s the facilitation of communication, sharing and “togetherness”, regardless which medium you look at.
Sascha: thanks for the response. My question originates from the need to navigate relationships where some people use online tools (such as social networks) and some don’t. Plus there’s the fact that aspects of a relationship with a given individual can be handled both via online techniques as well as via other (e.g., face to face, telephone) means. I know this sounds obvious but when social networking systems proliferate (and overlap) you need to step back now and then and figure out how best to relate to a given “community,” and that usually requires a mix of media and channels. Hence, my concern that “online community manager” is a too-narrow concept.
Thanks for the post Connie. I swore I wouldn’t use PPT in my presentation tomorrow about Hiring Social Media Managers, but these resources keep popping up. I think I’ll refer to it and they can come and see the map, as it does provide a pretty detailed list.
I updated the 4th tenet.
Dennis – I agree that the ‘online’ does narrow the scope. My company has Community Meetings & dept’s report on their projects. It’s an awesome internal function & I report on the external community. Operations, QA, customer service & my marketing manager also report on interactions with the community at large.
Sascha – I’m not sure if any of this is ‘typical’ in the US yet either. My ‘formal’ community is our product forums & I would think that most companies have them?
Jim – Isn’t that mindmap just a great resource? Maybe not enough for you to use a PPT, but certainly worth referring people to.
And Sascha & I have an idea to make it even better! stay tuned… :)
At Fast Company readers’ network that title used to be “coordinator” when I started that role back in early 2000. Now I call myself curator. It seems a better fit for the role than “manager” (with all its history in corp. America). Just my .02, words matter.
That’s one I haven’t heard Valeria.
Customers perceive the efforts of a person in this position & are grateful of their presence (no matter the title). They appreciate personalized customer service & the community participation.
[…] wonder that a whole segment of specialists are building a separate identity as community managers, community liaisons, or even community curators. There’s more of a hint of social work in […]
[…] http://conniebensen.com/blog/2007/11/25/community-manager-role/ […]
I’ve recently taken on the role as a Community Manager, which I think is an ok title. But I agree that managing a community is just as hard as managing knowledge (knowledge management has always been har as well…)
The best term I’ve heard so far is gardening, it’s also a good metaphor to use.
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