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The Community Roundtable

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

Do I need a community playbook?

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By Shannon Abram, Relationship Manager at The Community Roundtable.

If you’re just getting started in community management you might find your self asking “why isn’t there a how-to manual I can consult?” Of course there are tons of great resources on the internet (from places like CMX Hub, FeverBee, SocialFish and of course right here at TheCR) – but sometimes it would be nice to just reach over and grab a community playbook.

For most best-in-class communities this isn’t just a dream. Through the State of Community Management 2014 research we found that 85% of best-in-class communities have a community playbook already.

​Community playbooks are hallmarks of mature community programs.

​In addition to enabling policies, best-in-class communities are more likely to document organizational standards for community management in community playbooks. Best-in-class communities are more than twice as likely to have playbooks as the average community. We have found that comprehensive community playbooks act as enablers to scale community management responsibilities.

Creating a Community Playbook

If you don’t already have a community playbook it can seem like a daunting undertaking. Our friends at Enterprise Hive shared five great tips for getting started. Tips include understanding that the playbook is meant to be an organic document and ensuring that the playbook structure has flexibility. Check out the whole post here for a great outline on how to get started.

SOCM 2014 Fact #7 - Community Playbook

You can review more findings related to community maturity in the State of Community Management 2014. This post is part of a series highlighting some of the most thought-provoking data from the SOCM 2014 – brought to you via a fun poster – perfect for sharing on Twitter, hanging at your desk, or printing out and waving around your next community strategy meeting.

Want even more community facts? Check out the full SOCM 2014 here:

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Looking to take your career in community management to the next level? 92% of members agree that TheCR Network supports and advances their personal and professional goals. Learn how our research, access to peers and experts, targeted content and exclusive concierge service can help you achieve your goals.

Infographic: Drive Success with Basic Executive Coaching

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This is a guest post by Dennis Shiao, our partner at DNN Software. You can learn more about DNN here. 

executive-participation-requires-a-little-coaching

According to the State of Community Management 2014 report from The Community Roundtable, members are more engaged in communities with executive participation. In fact, communities with executive participation see 42% of members actively participate, while those without executive participation see only 37% active.

EXECUTIVES ARE NATURAL COMMUNICATORS

Think about typical executives: they’re transparent, they’re strong communicators and they lead by example. Sounds like a killer combination for a community member, right? Yes. That being said, just like the CEO who needs some “101 training” before she joins Twitter, executives will need coaching on rules, conventions and guidelines for online community participation.

Have your community manager(s) sit down with executives to provide coaching around the following.

1) SHARE CONTENT AND PROVIDE FEEDBACK

Executives are used to commanding the ship and speaking to large audiences. Their first inclination may be to write lengthy posts, to share their thoughts with the community. While there’s certainly a time and place for that, the first step is to navigate through the various areas of the community and provide feedback.

The analogy is the President who walks through a neighborhood and shakes everyone’s hand. Executives should actively share content they find interesting. They should also provide feedback in the form of liking posts and up-voting ideas.

2) BLEND IN WITH THE CROWD

At an in-person gathering, it may be difficult for the company CEO to blend in with the crowd. It’s easier in an online community. Executive participation is more effective when executives are perceived to be “one of us” and engage naturally and organically with other members. By engaging naturally, executives will gain the respect of community members and they’ll encourage non-active members to become active.

3) PERFORM ACTIVE LISTENING

Some executives have an open door policy. Others hold “town hall meetings” to engage with employees. Executives value employee feedback. An online community brings together the best elements of an open door policy and a town hall meeting. But for it to work well, executives need to visit the community often and do a good job of active listening.

4) PROVIDE AN OFFICIAL COMMENT WHEN NEEDED

An executive has the authority to provide an official answer (from the organization) when needed. In an employee community, perhaps there’s angst over rumored layoffs. An executive can issue an official statement about that. In a customer community, member unrest may unfold over a pricing increase. An executive can publish a blog post to explain the company’s reasoning behind the pricing change.

AN INFOGRAPHIC ON COACHING EXECUTIVES FOR ENGAGEMENT

The Community Roundtable created an infographic. It includes interesting statistics on the benefits of executive participation. You’ll also find tips on how to coach executives around online community participation.

Infographic-Executives and Online Communities_Final

Infographic-Executives and Online Communities_Final

This post was originally published at https://www.dnnsoftware.com/blog/executive-participation-in-online-communities-drive-success-with-basic-coaching-infographic.

How can I get lurkers to participate?

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By Shannon DiGregorio Abram, Relationship Manager at The Community Roundtable.

No matter how much strategy building and content planning you do there are still going to be lurkers hanging out in your community, not contributing. The big question is: how do I convert those lurkers into engaged community participants? While there are no silver bullets for community engagement, the SOCM 2014 did uncover a number of strategies for increasing engagement and reducing the percentage of lurkers.

For example: we found that community advocacy and leadership programs had one of the most significant positive correlations with community engagement in this research– lurker rates for communities with multi-tiered leadership programs were 54%, compared to the survey average of 63%. Of course developing, launching and maintaining an advocacy program is a serious (though very worthwhile) undertaking.

For a more immediate impact try hosting a regular events series – online or offline. We found communities that host offline events have a lurker rate of 56%, and communities that host regular online events have a lurker rate of 57%. Not only did both types improve on the survey average of 63%, but regular events also boost active participation, increase networking and contribute to an overall feeling of goodwill in the community. You might start small with a regular chat, happy hour, new member meet-and-greet or a program more specifically tailored to your community. It’s not the type of events you pick that matter, as long as you’re picking the types of events that make sense for your community.

Do you currently run regularly scheduled online or offline events? We’d love to hear what works for you!

community lurkers

 

You can review more findings related to community maturity in the State of Community Management 2014. This post is part of a series highlighting some of the most thought-provoking data from the SOCM 2014 – brought to you via a fun poster – perfect for sharing on Twitter, hanging at your desk, or printing out and waving around your next community strategy meeting.

Want even more community facts? Check out the full SOCM 2014 here:

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Looking to take your career in community management to the next level? 92% of members agree that TheCR Network supports and advances their personal and professional goals. Learn how our research, access to peers and experts, targeted content and exclusive concierge service can help you achieve your goals.

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Do I Need a Community Strategy?

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By Shannon DiGregorio Abram, Relationship Manager at The Community Roundtable.

You’ve heard that practice makes perfect, but what about planning? In our State of Community Management 2014 research we found that the foundation of a successful community really is the presence of a well-defined strategy- one that integrates social tools and methods with business goals and processes. A good community strategy also aligns an organization’s goals with member needs setting you up to succeed in both keep engagement high and provide ROI.

​72% of communities surveyed indicated that they have an approved community strategy, a sure sign that organizations understand how to justify a community approach. However, of that 72%, only 40% of those strategies are operational and measurable. In best-in-class communities, 100% have an approved strategy and 79% have strategies that are operational and measurable – an indicator of why best-in-class communities are twice as likely to be able to measure value.

strategy

You can review more findings related to community maturity in the State of Community Management 2014. This post is the fourth in a 10-part series highlighting some of the most thought-provoking data from the SOCM 2014 – brought to you via a fun poster – perfect for sharing on Twitter, hanging at your desk, or printing out and waving around your next community strategy meeting.

You can view Fact #01, Fact #02 and Fact #03 or download the whole report today. If you are particularly interested in community strategy insights jump to page 26 of the Report.

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Looking to take your career in community management to the next level? 92% of members agree that TheCR Network supports and advances their personal and professional goals. Learn how our research, access to peers and experts, targeted content and exclusive concierge service can help you achieve your goals.

Is Having a Community Strategy Important?

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By Shannon DiGregorio Abram, Relationship Manager at The Community Roundtable.

This year’s State of Community Management research showed what we’re suspected for along time: ​the foundation of a successful community is a well-defined strategy that integrates social tools and methods with business goals and processes. It follows that a community’s strategy also aligns an organization’s goals with their member’s needs.

​Another prevalent idea that was confirmed by our research is that overall community strategies are maturing. Of course this makes sense – as more companies define and grow their practice of community management the industry becomes increasingly developed. This brings us to our community management fact of the week. We found that 72% of communities have an approved community strategy, signaling that organizations increasingly understand how to justify a community approach. That’s the good news! We also found that of that 72%, only 40% of those strategies are operational and measurable.

Fewer than 50% of communities with an approved strategy have an approved and resourced roadmap, suggesting a significant gap between community ambition and the ability to execute on it. This gap in understanding what is required to fully realize a community strategy is a barrier to community success. Best-in-class communities have a smaller gap between those with an approved strategy and those with a fully resourced roadmap – only about 25% of those with an approved strategy lack a roadmap.

SOCM Fact #4

 

Looking for more insights into community strategy? Download the State of Community Management 2014 report and check out the section on strategy – starting on page 26.

Does your community have an approved strategy? We’d love to hear more  in the comments!

This post is the fourth in a 10-part series highlighting some of the most thought-provoking data from the SOCM 2014 – brought to you via a fun poster – perfect for sharing on Twitter, hanging at your desk, or printing out and waving around your next community strategy meeting. You can see the first three posts here: Fact #01, Fact #02 and Fact #03 or downloadthe whole report today.

 

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Did you know that 95% of TheCR Network members agree that the content and peer input improves the quality of their work? It’s true! Membership in TheCR Network saves community and social business leaders time and improves the quality of their work by connecting them quickly with peers, experts and curated information. Learn how joining TheCR Network can improve the work you do.

Executive Engagement Matters

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By Shannon DiGregorio Abram, Relationship Manager at The Community Roundtable.

We’ve heard a lot of talk in the last few weeks about the link between executive support and community success  It seems like executive adoption is on the mind of many community practitioners, and with good reason. In our State of Community Management 2014 research we saw that communities with CXO participation are more likely to have a fully-funded community roadmap.  We also found (and were a little surprised) by how much executive participation increased general engagement, particularly when the CIO participated.

In best-in-class communities, 58% include CEO participation vs. average CEO participation rates of 36% – those are the same communities that are most likely to be able to measure value, have a fully-funded roadmap and have advanced community leadership programs. This brings us to Community Fact #03 – executive engagement matters.

SOCM Fact #03

 

You can review more findings related to community maturity in the State of Community Management 2014. This post is the third in a 10-part series highlighting some of the most thought-provoking data from the SOCM 2014 – brought to you via a fun poster – perfect for sharing on Twitter, hanging at your desk, or printing out and waving around your next community strategy meeting.

You can view Fact #01 and Fact #02 or download the whole report today.

​

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Looking to take your career in community management to the next level? 92% of members agree that TheCR Network supports and advances their personal and professional goals. Learn how our research, access to peers and experts, targeted content and exclusive concierge service can help you achieve your goals.

 

Industry Interview: Dennis Shiao, DNN

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By Shannon DiGregorio Abram, Relationship Manager at The Community Roundtable.

dennis-shiao-headshot-croppedWe were able to publish the State of Community Management 2014 through the generous support of our sponsors. We are lucky enough to work with a number of partners in the community space that are helping advance the business of community, including DNN. Today I’d like to share an interview with Dennis Shiao, DNN‘s Director of Content Marketing .

Dennis is a contributing author to the book 42 Rules of Product Marketing and is Editor of the DNN blog. Feel free to reach out to Dennis via email, dennis.shiao@dnnsoftware.com or find him on Twitter, @dshiao.

Hi Dennis, can you start us off by telling me a little about DNN. How do you fit in the overall community market space?

We’re a marketing solutions (software) company based in the Bay Area, California. Our products and technology are the foundation for 750,000+ websites worldwide. In the online community market, what makes us unique is the tight integration between our Content Management System (CMS) and our online community solution.

Evoq Content (our CMS) and Evoq Social (our online community solution) sit atop the DNN Platform. When customers run our “suite” (Evoq Content+Social), their online community doesn’t need to sit on a separate subdomain. Instead, the online community and the website are one and the same. One user experience, one login (for end users) and one integration point to your back-end systems, such as CRM and marketing automation.

As a sponsor of the State of Community Management 2014, you clearly care about community. How do your customers typically use DNN to support their community business?

Our customers typically use our online community solution to solve a problem or to meet a business need. The specific use cases are varied. To start with, we often see customer communities, support communities and product communities (e.g. a community for a product’s end users to ask questions, solve problems and recommend product enhancements). We also have customers using Evoq Social for member communications (e.g. associations) and employee communications (e.g. sales intranet or sales extranet).

That’s a lot of use cases! It sounds like you support both internal and external communities?

Correct!

The SOCM 2014 shares insights through the framework of the Community Maturity Model. Of the eight community maturity competencies, which resonates with you as being most crucial?

Community Maturity Model

I view the eight competencies much like a parent sees their children: you try not to play favorites (and thankfully, I have less than eight children). But if you’re going to make me pick, I’m going to put my content marketing hat back on and select Content & Programming.

Sometimes with online communities, it becomes all too convenient to think that “user-generated content” will fuel the flames (of engagement) over the long term. Well, sometimes those flames start to die out and a little bit of kindling is needed to resuscitate it. That’s the role of content, as organized by the community manager. I wrote about this topic in a CMSWire article, “Online Communities Need a Spark? Turn to Original Content.”

We’d love to hear your take on some of the findings from the SOCM 2014 – what research surprised you the most?

The fact that internal communities have 33% more full-time community managers (on average) than external communities. I’ve always thought of internal communities as those that “managed themselves,” or were shepherded by a set of internal champions.

I’ve thought of external communities, on the other hand, as growing children who need a fair amount of supervision, direction and hand holding. Your research seems to show that the exact opposite is true: that external communities may be more effective at “self-management” (by its members), whereas the internal communities are ones that need a bit more hands-on management.

You mentioned that DNN provides a platform, a CMS and a community solution. How would you say DNN specifically supports community and social business professionals and helps them achieve their goals?

I’m responsible for content marketing at DNN, so my first answer is going to be “content.” In the past nine months, we’ve created a lot of content for community managers, in the form of blog posts, SlideShares, webinars, e-books and playbooks. Last year, we collaborated with TOPO on an Online Community Playbook, which was a popular resource for community managers.

At the same time, our products and services are well suited to community managers and business professionals. In the latest release of our online community software, we created a “Community Manager Experience,” a set of analytics dashboards that were uniquely designed for the community manager.

Last (but not least), we partner with leading organizations (like The Community Roundtable!) to collaborate around community management topics and research. We participate in online and face-to-face events as attendees, speakers and sponsors.

We talk a lot about company culture – what is something about DNN that makes it a unique place to work?

It’s the way in which disparate groups work and socialize so naturally with one another here. During my first month at DNN, we were at a social outing. I glance across the room and see our CTO and Co-Founder (Shaun Walker) casually chatting with three sales execs. At many companies, inter-group conversations don’t happen as naturally as they do here.

Also, we’re distributed geographically. Our main offices are in the Bay Area (headquarters) and in Langley, British Columbia (Engineering and Customer Success). But that doesn’t stop us from keeping everyone informed, because we use an internal community. We call our internal community “Catalyst.” My colleague Clint Patterson wrote about how it improved our internal communication.

We’d love to hear a case study about a client that uses DNN.

Microdesk, a leading information technology and software consulting provider, runs an online customer support community using Evoq Social. In the community, Microdesk customers are able to help one another. When needed, a member of Microdesk’s consulting team will jump in to help. Microdesk sees the community as not only a customer support channel, but one that builds thought leadership for its expert consulting team. It also drives higher customer retention.

Visit our website for more details from Microdesk.

If you were’t working at DNN what would you be doing?

I’d be the starting center fielder for the New York Yankees. Short of that, I’d be the Yankees beat writer for a New York newspaper.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve been given? It doesn’t need to be community related.

I had a third grade teacher (Mrs. Brannick) who encouraged us to go the extra mile. She did this by instituting an “Extra Credit Award,” which was given out a few times a year. Participation was optional. But I just HAD to win this award! So I worked hard and made sure to always do more extra credit than anyone else. Classmates started to ask me if I’d let them win just once. That early exposure (to working hard) helps drive me to go the extra mile, even today.

That’s such a great story! I bet Mrs. Brannick would be proud of you! One last question – we joke a lot that successful community professionals are like super heros. So, what’s your super power?

I have an unheralded sense of humor. You might spend an entire week with me and never see it, but then it’ll catch you during the moment you least expect it. Please laugh when it happens.

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We are also very excited to be co-hosting a webinar with Dennis and the DNN team focused on highlights from the State of Community Management 2014. Learn more:

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The Community Roundtable is pleased to work with some of the best names in community and social business. Interested in working with us? We’re always looking for unique partners across the community ecosystem. Drop us a line if you’d like to explore partnership opportunities.

Friday Roundup: The SOCM 2014 Edition

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By Shannon DiGregorio Abram, Relationship Manager at The Community Roundtable.

SOCM 2014 SponsorsAfter months of surveys, number crunching, chart perfecting and copy editing the State of Community Management 2014 was finally released this week! It feels a little bit like our baby bird has flown the nest – but we couldn’t be more excited to share it with you. We’ve already seen a few interesting articles analyzing the data – and we’d love to hear from you. If you have a perspective on the data or the findings please share it with us and we will feature it in a Friday Roundup post!

This week was understandably SOCM heavy for us, but there are some other great links from around the web and of course – the latest and greatest community and social business jobs we could find.

 A few SOCM focused articles from around the internet: 

Other great links: 

And as always, the coolest community and social media jobs available this week: 

  1. Director of Community Solutions at Small World Labs – Austin, TX
  2. Online Community Consultant at Small World Labs – Austin, TX
  3. Social Media Community Manager/Editor at DoctorDirectory.com – Asheville, NC
  4. Senior Community Manager at Reputation.com – Redwood City, CA
  5. Community Manager – at Firebase – San Francisco, CA
  6. Technical Community Manager at Famo.us – San Francisco, CA
  7. Community Manager, Turkey New York at Foursquare – New York, NY
  8. Global Community Manager atUBM – New York, NY
  9. Online Community Manager at National Institute for Children’s Health Quality – Boston, MA
  10. Social Media Community Manager at Creative Circle – Dallas, TX
  11. Manager, Community Mgmt at DigitasLBi  3 reviews – Illinois
  12. Director of Social Listening/Community Manager at Freeman Leonard – Dallas, TX
  13. Senior External Community Manager at Jive Software – Palo Alto, CA
  14. Senior Community Manager – Internationalization at Mozilla-  Remote, OR
  15. Sr Community Manager at CA Technologies – Islandia, NY
  16. Community Manager, Design Focused – Chicago at Uber – Chicago, IL
  17. Digital Analytics and Community Manager Job at The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation – Seattle, WA
  18. Content & Community Manager at eCommerceFuel.com – Bozeman, MT
  19. Senior Director, Community Operations at deviantART – Los Angeles, CA
  20. Principal Community Management Associate Social Media at Capital One – McLean, VA
  21. Social Media Strategy Manager at Kforce – Plano, TX 

 

Have a great weekend – we’ll see you next week with a news Faces of Community Management profile, the monthly Network recap with Hillary and a new Community Fact poster!

 

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Looking to take your career in community management to the next level? 92% of members agree that TheCR Network supports and advances their personal and professional goals. Learn how our research, access to peers and experts, targeted content and exclusive concierge service can help you achieve your goals. 

 

 

Announcing The State of Community Management 2014

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SOCM 2014 SponsorsBy Rachel Happe, Co-Founder of The Community Roundtable.

The fifth annual State of Community Management report is here!

A lot has changed in the five years we have been publishing this research and the State of Community Management 2014 continues to push the boundary of what we collectively know about community management. As the discipline has matured we have been able to translate much more of it into quantitative data. This year’s report is chock full of data, segmented and delivered in ways that will help you plan and act.

The report includes:

  • Key Findings
  • Findings by Community Maturity Model competency
  • Guidance on using the research, by competency
  • Best practices from TheCR Network, by competency
  • Additional resources

What you’ll see in the data is that community management is standardizing – but still not mature or completely integrated into core business processes. Most community initiatives now have approved community strategies, which is fantastic – and quite a change from the early days of shiny object syndrome. However, all to often those strategies are not mirrored by approved and resourced roadmaps, pointing to one of the biggest challenges in the space today – funding the resources and programs that will translate aspirations to reality.

Also encouraging is that the vast majority of best-in-class (most mature) communities can measure value, indicating an important shift in the market from something that was considered innovative and unproven to something that is understood and measurable.

This research was the result of a community effort that included TheCR Network members who guided our exploration, experts who helped tease out best practices, TheCR team who all contributed in ways large and small and finally our sponsors – DNN, Enterprise Hive, Jive, Lithium, and Sitrion – who made it all possible.

The collaboration across our community allowed us to bring this rich data to you. We hope you find it interesting but more importantly, we hope this data helps you succeed. If it does, we would love to hear about how you used it to plan your roadmap, educate stakeholders or justify your budget.

Happy reading!

 

 

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Did you know that 95% of TheCR Network members agree that the content and peer input improves the quality of their work? It’s true! Membership in TheCR Network saves community and social business leaders time and improves the quality of their work by connecting them quickly with peers, experts and curated information. Learn how joining TheCR Network can improve the work you do.

 

 

Friday Roundup – Spring is Here Edition

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By Shannon DiGregorio Abram, Relationship Manager at The Community Roundtable.

Spring

Photo credit: 3rd House Pary

Spring has finally sprung in Boston! Today there are crocuses blooming, marathoners training in shorts and the Red Sox open their season at Fenway Park – so many things to celebrate! I hope you’re enjoying spring whereever you are – even if it’s been warm for longer than three days!

This week we celebrated April 1st and kicked our month-long anniversary celebration, leading up to the release of our 5th annual State of Community Management report on 4/22/14. We are so excited to share a look back at the last five years in the community management space, and doubly excited to share the results of our 2014 research. In the meantime, you’ll have to wait it out with this week’s links. We’ve got a few new community jobs, an interview with long-time TheCR Network member Heather Strout, a recap of our March Community Manager spotlight webinar, an interesting look at community-driven game development and more!

Thanks for reading! We’ll be back on Monday with the first in a three-part community retrospective with Rachel Happe and Jim Storer. Have a great weekend.

 

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Looking to take your career in community management to the next level? 92% of members agree that TheCR Network supports and advances their personal and professional goals. Learn how our research, access to peers and experts, targeted content and exclusive concierge service can help you achieve your goals.