The Community Roundtable

Empowering global community leaders with research-backed resources, training, and tools.

Using MVPs to Power Effective Communities

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Community Conversations is a long-running podcast series highlighting community success stories from a wide variety of online community management professionals.

Episode #96 of Community Conversations features Michelle Mathias, Manager, Community Experience and Programs (Esri Community), and Brianna Ettley, Community Manager, Engagement and Content at Esri.

Hosts Jim Storer and Shannon Abram chat with Michelle and Brianna about the Esri Community program, including a deep dive in their award-winning community advocacy programs.

They also discuss cultivating community leaders, how they grew the MVP program in the Esri Community since its start in 2014, and what’s in store for the Esri Community as they plan a migration to Khoros’ Aurora platform.

Listen to Michelle Mathias and Brianna Ettley on Using MVPs to Power Effective Communities

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Cultivating Community Leadership - A Quick Learn Course for Community Managers

About Esri

Esri is the global market leader in geographic information system (GIS) software, location intelligence, and mapping.

Since 1969, they have supported customers with geographic science and geospatial analytics, what they call The Science of Where.

They take a geographic approach to problem-solving, brought to life by modern GIS technology. They are committed to using science and technology to build a sustainable world.

About Esri Community

Esri Community is an award-winning global online community of Esri users where you can find solutions, share ideas, and collaborate to solve problems with GIS.

Fostering a Productive Workplace Culture with Community

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Community Conversations is a long-running podcast series highlighting community success stories from a wide variety of online community management professionals.

Episode #95 of Community Conversations features Michael Watkins, Community Manager at Research Innovations Incorporated.

Hosts Jim Storer and Shannon Abram chat with Michael about his community building journey from gaming to engineering, fostering productive workplace culture with community, and ideas for effective programming across diverse office spaces.

Michael also shares best practices for the balancing a structured plan in place for community building in place, while also being willing to take risks and learn from mistakes.

Fostering Productive Workplace Culture with Community

Listen to Michael Watkins on Fostering a Productive Workplace Culture with Community

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About Michael Watkins

After starting his community career in the gaming industry, at organizations including Accelerate Gaming and GreyComm Studios, Michael now works in community at Research Innovations, Inc.

About Research Innovations, Inc

Research Innovations Inc. (RII) supports critical defense, intelligence, and cyber customers across the U.S. Government and with select international customers. RII is a leader in Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2) efforts with its cutting-edge solutions, rapidly delivering transformative technology to customers and end-users to achieve its core purpose of “Creating RIIdiculously Awesome® solutions that make the world safer.” By combining user-centered design and agile development methods, they create innovative products and solutions for our customers. They focus on performing cutting-edge research and development of information systems that support Joint Command and Control, Mobile Computing and Cyberspace. Research Innovations is headquartered in Northern Virginia with several work locations and provides an environment and culture that rewards talent and accomplishment. They are a company of mission focused people who are satisfied when they deliver excellence and success to our customers.

Community Ecosystem Map: My framework for mapping content and programs

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Community Ecosystem Map - Guest Post by Bri Leever
Community Ecosystem Map - By Bri Leever

Bri Leever, Community Builder and Contributor to the 2023 State of Community Management Report shared her framework for planning effective content and programs – the Community Ecosystem Map.

Call to Action

At the top is where we put the three calls to action. I like to start with 1) get started, 2) get help, and 3) get inspired. You can customize these headings with whatever three actions you think fit your community, but I advise that you leave “get started” because it will help prompt you to focus on onboarding as a key step in any member’s activation in your community. 

Size of Experience

Finally, we indicate the size of an experience using color. In any community you are facilitating big group experiences (open to everyone), small group experiences (open so a subset or segment of your community) and then 1:1 interactions. One-on-one interactions are much harder to offer programming for (beyond a matchup program), but I like to use the map to point out where we will prompt 1:1 interactions to happen. (For example, prompt members to find one person they have something in common with after they post their intro. This would sit in the “get started” and “conversation” box.)

Like all good ecosystems, the strength of your community ecosystem will come from the diversification of experiences offered. That does NOT mean more is better. It means thoughtfully crafting a range of programs that cater to different types of experiences and activate your members in different ways will result in a more robust and dynamic community.

Using the Community Ecosystem Map for a New community

I use this framework as the very first step in my process to build a new community with clients. If you are using it for a community that has yet to be born, be careful to not get caught up in how and where you will facilitate the experiences. This is a brainstorming session. Your dream girl in a dream world. Your first iteration will not include everything you have on this map (nor should it), but unleashing your brilliant ideas in this exercise will help create a vision for how your community could evolve in the future.

Using the Community Ecosystem Map for an Existing Community

If, on the other hand, you already have an established community, use this framework to map your existing experiences today and then work with your team to notice where gaps exist. Brainstorm how you can adjust existing programs or make additions that add diversity into your ecosystem. Maybe you notice the “get started” column is conspicuously empty – can you introduce a welcome happy hour event or create a welcome post (content). Maybe you notice you never prompt members to make 1:1 connections – how can you sow seeds to prompt them to make 1:1 connections at your existing events?

This framework is just the starting point to help you think about your community content and programs through a new light. Once you’ve completed the brainstorming, work backward to assess what are the elements of this map that need to be prioritized now (the next two weeks), what can happen in the next month, and what can go on the backlog to be reassessed at a later time. Don’t let perfect get in the way of creating something really good in your community and focus on making more tweaks over time than launching something perfectly from the get-go. 

Bri Leever is a Community Builder and contribued her perspective to the 2023 State of Community Management Report. Learn more and download your copy here.

Help Community Programs Scale

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The Policies & Governance competency of the Community Maturity Model™  details operational guidelines for successful online community programs. Policies refer to how a community interacts and can be divided into two areas: Terms of service – How a community is managed in legal terms and Guidelines – Articulate what behaviors are expected and why, plainly. Governance is how the community team is structured, operates within an organization, and supports community-related activities across the organization.

Most organizations could support multiple communities with myriad use cases. The most common include:

  • General employee communities for knowledge sharing and collaboration
  • Customer support communities for providing fast, inexpensive, always-on access to answers to product and service questions.
  • Membership communities for groups like students, patients, alumni, or association audiences

In 2021, we saw the emergence of the “Center of Excellence’’ (CoE) approach, where community work is decentralized, but supported with a host of resources. While responses from this year’s data suggest CoEs are falling out of favor, digging deeper shows a different perspective.

Help Community Programs Scale

Comparing the data from respondents who reported “one community” vs. “a network of communities” at their organization, we found a dramatic increase in CoEs once a network exists (i.e., once they’re past the initial use case). Also interesting, 17% of respondents (8% in networked communities) reported only ad hoc/informal governance. Question: Who’s in charge of the communities there? If this is you, please contact us. We want to feature you in a case study.

Interested in Growing Your Community? Become an Enabler!

On a related note, those with a network of communities are more likely to help communities programs scale by providing enabling resources to their organization than those with a single community. When comparing total data on community resources from 2021 to 2022 there isn’t much to report. Comparing responses from individual communities vs. a network of communities tells a different story (see pg. 45 of the 2022 SOCM or the image above).

It’s interesting to note: 30% of community managers representing a single community provide none of the resources mentioned in the survey, which likely results in a less strategic initiative. For those who want to grow beyond a single community, get out there and coach/evangelize.

Want to help community programs scale? Start a center of excellence?

Check out this short interview with Claudia Teixeira, Senior Knowledge and Learning Consultant at the World Bank Group.

Claudia and Anne Mbugua discuss what a center of excellence entails, the path to centers of excellence at the World Bank Group, and advice for implementing a center of excellence at your organization. Listen now.

Get more community ideas and advice in the 13th annual 2022 State of Community Management report:

Help Community Programs Scale

Kelly Munro on Content and Programs

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Community Conversations is a long-running podcast highlighting community success stories from a wide variety of online community management professionals.

Episode #87 of Community Conversations features Kelly Munro, Community Team Lead, Xero.

On this special State of Community Management 2022 episode, Kelly Munro and host Anne Mbugua discuss the trends in community content and programs. Kelly shares tips for designing effective content and programming for your online community and discusses topics including:

  • How thinking about content and programs affects her community work.
  • The importance of onboarding for communities.
  • Advice for community professionals starting to dig into content and programs for their organization

Listen to Kelly Munro on Community Content and Programs

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About Kelly Munro

Kelly Munro is the Community lead within the Customer Success team at Xero, managing their product development & discussion forums. She has an interest in using technology to solve user and business friction with a human-centric & adaptive lens.

About Xero

Xero is a New Zealand-based technology company that provides cloud-based accounting software for small and medium-sized businesses. Their online accounting software connects small business owners with their numbers, their bank, and advisors anytime. Founded in 2006, Xero now has 3.5 million subscribers and is a leader in cloud accounting across New Zealand, Australia, and the United Kingdom. Their team of over 4,500+ talented thinkers, creators, and educators helps make life better for small businesses globally.

About The State of Community Management

Now in its 13th year, our annual State of Community Management report provides strategic ideas and tactical benchmarks for global community management professionals.

The State of Community Management 2022 explores the state of the community management industry through the lens of the eight competencies in the Community Maturity Model™.

Each section includes data, ideas, and expert practitioner perspectives to give you new insight into the community management industry. 

Kelly Munro on Content and Programs
Download your free copy of the State of Community Management 2022.

Catherine Hackney on Member Onboarding

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Lessons from The NEW Community Manager Handbook is a limited-run podcast series, featuring the 21 community leaders showcased in the Handbook in conversation with Anne Mbugua.

Episode 12 features Catherine Hackney, Principal, Confident Communities Consulting on member onboarding.

Catherine and host, Anne Mbugua discuss the importance of member onboarding in online communities (hint: it’s really important!). They also share ideas on how to use automation to scale your impact, quick wins when starting an onboarding program, and the importance of involving members in their onboarding journey.

Catherine Hackney on Member Onboarding

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About Catherine:

Catherine Hackney is an online community management consultant with over nine years of community experience. She has demonstrated expertise in increasing member engagement. She is a proven expert on the Tradewing and Higher Logic platforms. Catherine was a recipient of the Higher Logic MVP award in 2016-2022.

About Confident Communities Consulting

Confident Communities Consulting consultants ensure your success in supporting and retaining customers through compelling online communities that house up-to-the-minute resources, thought leadership, continuing education, mentorships, and networking. We have worked with organizations in several different industries with their own unique online communities, including non-profits, B2C, and B2B. Our consultants consistently demonstrate value to community members across the globe through the connections and knowledge sharing that are found in successful communities. Communities, like gardens, require continuous care through seeding and weeding to grow into something prosperous. We care for communities by implementing creative solutions to obstacles such as technical issues, functionality limitations, inappropriate usage, user and staff inquiries, etc. Increase the confidence your members and customers have in your organization with the help of our experienced online community management professionals.

About The NEW Community Manager Handbook

The NEW Community Manager Handbook features 21 profiles of community leaders sharing advice and ideas on everything from accessibility, hiring, strategy, gamification, defining the digital workplace, technology, and more. Each profile is paired with research from the State of Community Management reports and includes tactical advice for implementing what you’ve learned.

Learn from community management experts at Easterseals, Glencore, Microsoft, UKG, the World Bank Group, Analog Devices, Inc., AAMC, Zapier, Doctors Without Borders, and more.

A gray rectangle with the words No Available The NEW Community Manager Handbook. Below that is an orange button image with the words Download written on it. Next to it is an image of the cover of The NEW Community Manager Handbook.

5 Tips for Launching an Advocacy Program

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There’s no better feeling than knowing someone has your back. Your community can get those same warm fuzzies with an advocacy or leadership program. No formal leadership or community advocacy program in place? It’s time to consider starting one.

What’s an advocacy program?

The easiest way to picture a community advocacy program is as a bridge. One side is the active and engaged community, like a block party. The other side of the bridge is dark and quiet, this is where your target audience — the less active members — lives. No block party here, more like everyone’s home. Advocacy program members are the bridge between the social butterflies and the lurkers/learners. They’re engaged and sing the community’s praises while welcoming others to the party (without scaring them away).

Beyond bridging, community advocacy and/or leadership programs can also be a good indicator of your overall community health. Communities with advocacy programs are often more mature, have more dedicated staff, can show value, have executive buy-in, engaged product team and subject matter experts, greater amounts of user-generated content, higher levels of conversation vs. content sharing, and more robust community tools. Whew!

TL/DR: Community advocacy programs are a sign of a healthy community.

Sounds good? Onward!

Starting your program

  1. When building a community advocacy or leadership program, KISS your policies. (Keep It Seriously Simple.) If you try to make the rules and guidelines around the advocacy program too complex at first, you’ll scare away potential community advocates. Instead, add policies, guidelines, and expectations as your program grows.
  2. Set expectations from the beginning. This is critical to protect your program participants from feeling used and abused. As Brené Brown says, “clear is kind,” and setting expectations from the get-go is about as clear (and therefore kind) as it can get.
  3. Ask questions and listen. You know who your super users are already, these same members will be great candidates for your first participants! Ask them for feedback on your plan, and then LISTEN to their responses. Looking for a smash-hit program, this is how you accomplish that! When your super users like the program (and can refine it) your built-in advocates will be excited about it, and share with those who could benefit.
  4. Recognize advocates’ contributions. Go back to the lessons you learned in kindergarten and remember to thank your advocates and community leaders for their help. No need for complicated or in-depth, just ensure it’s heartfelt.
  5. Have a member entrance and exit plan. Burnout’s real; even your most enthusiastic members will need a break. That’s where clearly defined onboarding and offboarding processes helps. When you have these plans documented, you can help smooth the transition between new and “retiring” advocates.

We want to know: Do you have a formal community advocacy or leadership program in place? What tips would you add for someone starting a new program from scratch? Let us know!

Leverage external sources for low-lift community programs

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The Content & Programs competency of the Community Maturity Model™  examines the resources and interactions a community offers its members, and is the lifeblood of a successful community program. Content gives people a reason to visit (and return to) a community, while programs create opportunities for members to connect, creating tighter bonds. Content & programs must reflect the shared value of the community and its members, while a program plan tied to the larger community strategy can lead to valuable engagement behaviors.

Savvy community teams leverage external sources to create content and facilitate programs for their members — whether SMEs, executives, or strategic partners.

Leverage external sources for low-lift community programs

Using external sources is a “work smarter, not harder” way to scale your community team. Two notable examples of external community contributors that jumped in 2022:

  • Peers from other areas of the organization (50% vs. 43% in 2021)
  • Vendors/partners (20% vs. 15% in 2021)

Member participation in content & programs dropped year over year, likely due to fatigue and burnout associated with COVID-19. While this would normally be seen as a negative, it’s actually a balanced approach to content & program development, and member participation remains at a healthy level.

Reminder: You won’t successfully attract (and retain) outside voices to your content & programs without a formal plan. This is the year to formalize a content & program plan.

The community budget for content & programs has more than doubled in the last three years (3% in 2020 vs. 7% in 2022). This is a win for a critical piece of the community-building puzzle. As your content & programs budget grows, ensure you’re moving toward a formal plan aligned with your community strategy – which might include paid programs for external contributors. This will allow you to show your content & program efforts are growing engagement and meeting (or exceeding!) your community’s goals.

Content Pro Tip from Kelly Munro, Lead Community Advisor, Xero, and member of TheCR Network

If you’re at an organization with an existing marketing team you might have a goldmine of content at your disposal.

"Don’t forget about all of the content support that you’ve got within your business. If you have a great content team already, they may already have a good structured understanding of user behavior. Make sure you aren’t creating conflicting content or programs, so just make sure that everything works harmoniously."

“Don’t forget about all of the content support that you’ve got within your business. If you have a great content team already, they may already have a good structured understanding of user behavior. Make sure you aren’t creating conflicting content or programs, so just make sure that everything works harmoniously.”

Get more community ideas and advice in 13th annual 2022 State of Community Management report:

4 Things to Consider When Launching a Community Mentorship Program

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Mentorships have existed, well, forever, and they’ve always been an excellent way to share knowledge. But with the COVID-19 pandemic, loads of mentorship programs have had to shift from in-person to virtual, and that’s not always an easy feat. Not easy, but not impossible — especially with these four tips to help bring mentorship programs to your Community!

Survey says: gauge interest

Much like with any new idea, what sounds good on paper could flop on execution. To avoid disaster it’s best to determine if a mentorship program could be valuable to your Community. 

No need to reinvent the wheel to do so. Simply share a poll to the relevant channel in your Community asking if mentorship programs are of interest. Be sure to set clear expectations around when the poll closes, so your data is as robust as possible.

Not getting enough organic engagement to tell? No worries! 

Aside from pinning the poll to the top of the channel, you could also send out email communications (or social posts if relevant for your Community) inviting Members to participate. Essentially any way to get a true idea of feelings around the program, and possible number of participants, is a must-have to avoid a problem commonly found in mentorship programs: an abundance of mentees and not enough mentors to go around. Remember, you need to have both components for a mentorship program to work! 

Once you’ve determined the program has enough interest to move forward, it’s time to start the matching process.

A match made in [mentorship] heaven

Much like with any relationship, you want to ensure both mentor and mentee feel a spark, a connection … anything so as to avoid a bad match! So while it may be tempting as program manager to just start assigning mentors to mentees and calling it good, doing that will only set you up for failure.

Instead, mindfully create your mentorship program application process. Ask robust enough questions to ensure the right fit. When possible, partner people with others who have similar interests, career paths, goals, etc. 

Some other things to consider when building out your program:

  • Length of the mentor-mentee relationship. Not everyone has the same amount of time available to dedicate to a mentorship (or as in-depth of a need). As a result, consider offering some shorter-term mentorship programs so more people can be involved. Timeframes to consider: 3-6 months; 6-9 months; 9 months-1 year. 
  • Provide a partnership policy. By clearly setting all expectations around the mentor-mentee relationship (frequency of meetings, preferred communication methods, end date, etc.), both parties will be able to determine if they’ve been successful. 
  • Work toward a common goal. Have the individual mentor-mentee teams determine a goal to accomplish during the relationship. Once it’s been met, the pair can then reassess to determine if the relationship needs to continue beyond or not. 

By having a thorough application process, you’ll be able to ensure more productive mentoring relationships. Bonus: You can avoid any recurring nightmares around randomly assigned group projects from college. No dead weight allowed in a mentorship program!

Work with what [the platform] gave you

Interest? Check.

Mentors and mentees? Check. 

Staying on top of things as the Community Manager? We’ve got you. 

A lot of community platforms now come with mentorship modules built in. Use them! Especially if they can help automate a lot of the program management aspects (sharing resources with newbies, reminding mentors to schedule kick-off calls, etc.). Because the reality of it is, mentorship programs should only take up a small portion of your time each week. Automation helps ensure that’s the case.

If automation isn’t your jam, don’t fret. You could also set up recurring calendar reminders to reach out periodically based on the duration of the program length. Don’t overthink it!

Count what matters

If your mentorship program is net new, you’ll want to ensure you adjust expectations around ROI. Yes, sadly, it can be difficult to tie dollar amounts to what mentorship programs can accomplish. Instead, it’s better to help leadership see and understand the metrics that actually count in this instance, like: 

  • Active number of participants (both mentors and mentees)
  • Active relationships currently running through the program
  • Increased number of visitors to the platform 
  • Total number of new Members

If your leadership still isn’t convinced, consider using testimonials from program participants. After all, there’s no better way to show value than to let those who are using the mentorship program explain exactly how it’s benefitted them since joining.

Community Conversations – Episode #82: Chris Catania on Community Leadership

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Chris Catania on Community Leadership

Community Conversations is a long-running podcast highlighting community success stories from a wide variety of online community management professionals.

Episode #82 of Community Conversations features Chris Catania, Head of Community at ESRI

On this special State of Community Management 2022 episode, Chris Catania and Anne Mbugua discuss the importance of thoughtful leadership programs in online communities. Chris shares the role community leadership programs, including executive leadership and customer champion programs, play in the ESRI community and explores the most surprising findings from the 2022 report.

Chris Catania on Community Leadership

Chris also shares advice for aligning your community program with other internal programs to drive revenue and boost customer satisfaction.

Listen to Chris Catania on Community Leadership

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About Chris Catania

Chris is an award-winning community and collaboration leader, who always thinks “people first, technology next.”

For more than 20 years, he has helped organizations build relationships with their audiences through strategic communication, community management, content development, and global business strategy.

He believes in the proven power of community to deepen trust, increase loyalty, lower costs and grow revenue. And that power comes when you align community with real business goals to design meaningful online experiences and deliver measurable business results.

He is driven by a passion to empower companies to leverage the power of community as a strategic asset and competitive advantage in the marketplace.

About ESRI

Esri is the global market leader in geographic information system (GIS) software, location intelligence, and mapping. Since 1969, we have supported customers with geographic science and geospatial analytics, what we call The Science of Where. We take a geographic approach to problem-solving, brought to life by modern GIS technology. We are committed to using science and technology to build a sustainable world. Learn more about ESRI.

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