As a community manager, you carry a lot of responsibility. Especially in a starting community, it is important that you have an active role within this community. The success of your community depends on your input as a community manager! Will you ensure that your community flourishes? In this blog you will find out about the most important tasks you have as a community manager.
What does a community manager do?
There is a lot of confusion about the role of community manager. Actually, it is a job that can be performed in many different ways. As a community manager, your responsibilities include building, maintaining and growing your (online) community. The tasks of a community manager can vary considerably, depending on the organisation you work for and the purpose of the community.
Nowadays, more and more organisations have a community. The objectives of these communities therefore vary enormously. Some examples of objectives within communities are:
- Sharing knowledge within a professional group;
- Building up a business network;
- creating a sense of community, e.g. within a company
- influencing, e.g. in communities with a political objective.
The size of the community also affects the tasks of the community manager. A community manager in a large community will be far more concerned with activating and connecting members, while a community manager in a small community will be more concerned with content creation and outreach.
What tasks do you have as a community manager?
Here are some of the tasks you will be responsible for as a community manager.
1. Define a strategy
As a community manager, you will need to develop a strategy to build and grow your community. That involves formulating objectives, setting KPIs and working out a strategy for achieving them. This starts with a bit of preliminary research, knowing what your target audience wants and identifying how you can respond to it.
If you do not define a strategy as a community, as a community manager you are basically ‘just doing something’. Without a goal to work towards and a corresponding strategy, as a community manager you will soon find yourself in a knot. After all, there are a lot of things you can do, the question is of course whether you are doing the right things. So setting up KPIs and reflecting on them is extremely important.
2. Content creation and management
Content is an important part of your community. As a community manager, you are responsible for the content in your community. Make sure you share news updates, posts or other content from time to time. However, as a community manager, be careful not to become a content creator. In a community, it is important that your members also share content themselves.
As a community manager, you naturally have a facilitating and controlling role in this. Encourage your members to create content, but set clear rules. This way, it is clear to everyone what can and cannot be shared in the community. Keep in mind that a community is not the same as social media. Content must be relevant to the members of your community, that is what they join for.
3. Community engagement
A community manager needs to make sure community members feel engaged. You can achieve this by responding to questions and comments, stimulating discussions, moderating and collecting feedback from the community. In communities that are also ‘physical’, as a community manager you will also have to organise events from time to time. This is how you keep members involved in the community and create connections between your members.
4. Connecting ambassadors
As a community manager, you are naturally also an ambassador for your community, but you can’t do it alone! Community management is mostly about connecting new members. The larger the group of active members in your community, the greater the value of the community becomes for the members. When you connect not only new members, but also new ambassadors, your community will expand a lot faster.
Ambassadors are members who help you build the community. For example, ambassadors help you write and post content, connect new members and spark discussions.
Connecting ambassadors requires a lot of care and attention. You will need to find good partners for this, people who are intrinsically motivated to grow the community. Identify these people and find out how you can help each other further. Also come up with a nice quid pro quo for your ambassadors. That way, you will not only create new ambassadors but also retain them!
5. Starting discussions
A new community always takes some getting used to. Conversations, networking and discussions still need to get going. As a manager, you have a facilitating role in this. Respond to messages from your members and spark healthy discussions. Let members know that their reactions and contributions are appreciated within your community!
6. Bringing members together
As a community manager, knowing your members is essential. You have a connecting role that you should use to bring your members closer together. If every member answers a few questions upon registration, you as a community manager will already gain more insight into what drives your members forward.
7. Data analysis
A community manager needs to analyse data to understand how the community is growing and what efforts are most effective. This includes monitoring traffic and engagement on the website, social media and other channels, and reporting these findings to the organisation.
Build your community with Bundeling
Bundeling is the online communication platform for communities. Our app makes it easy to stay in touch with your members, and we have developed several cool features that are perfect for increasing engagement in your community. Would you like to know more about the Bundeling platform or how you can use it for your (online) community? Contact us for a free demo!
