This post is primarily intended for companies wondering why they should create a Community Manager position? But it also gives those interested in the occupation a high level overview of the position & it’s responsibilities. Companies that have a Community Manager have engaged a person with exceptional communication skills. This person provides a human voice for their products, brand & the company in general. In order to be effective, they need to have a good overview of the corporate mission as well as be connected to teams at all levels. Some key benefits of this role:

  • Humanize the Company: ability & opportunity to create powerful lasting relationships with the customers
  • Build Brand: initial contact with customers that sets a tone for the brand
    • proactive to establish a tone for the products & brand
    • reactive to remedy problems the customer has voiced online
    • collaborate with marketing to provide an integrated approach
  • Customer Service: issues are routed efficiently to the appropriate department meaning that the customer receives help & as quickly as possible
  • Product Improvement: patterns are identified & communicated to development & quality assurance
  • Executive Level Interaction: proactively represent the customers & their ideas in regard to issues, future opportunities, and insights

As you can see the role spans a number of areas in a company. I definitely need to comment that the Community Manager NEEDS to be empowered to communicate at all levels for the role to be effective (and powerful). That is imperative. Also, employees at the company need to realize that the Community Manager is there for customer advocacy. There will be times when the community will test this. My experience with this resulted in a new precedent established internally. It took some time, but the patch for the issue was released last week. A community manager needs to be a multi-tasker, work independently and also enjoy providing leadership in working cross-functionally. I tend to initiate the majority of my contacts with appropriate team. Being detail oriented is a must. And as mentioned earlier communication skills are inherently important to accomplish it all. What have I missed in terms of the benefits of a company having this role? *Update* If you found this post helpful you may want to browse my Resources page. I have many links there to my favorite articles. Enjoy!