How can businesses build a reputation for being original, relatable, and reliable while maintaining their Soc? ial media has changed the relationship between people and organizations. This is why community management is so important.
What is a community manager?
A community manager is the link between an organization and their audience. The community manager is the brand’s voice, tone, and moderator through digital engagement,
This position is critical to your marketing strategy because it builds trust and brand personality.
How to become a community manager
The backgrounds of community managers are varied, ranging from journalism to recruiting. They all have the
Community managers must be well-versed in and understand the entire business. Community managers can rely on the experience they have gained within their organization in order to address their audience confidently or to tap into internal resources for any issues that might arise.
Managers need to have a good understanding of their business and build professional, productive relationships internally and externally to become more reliable and authentic brand ambassadors.
Community Manager Job Description
Community managers need to have strong, soft skills in order to promote and protect an organization’s branding. To promote a positive impression of an organization, it is important to have empathy, good listening skills, and adaptability skills.
The best community managers go beyond interpersonal skills to actively research trends and hot topics. By engaging with the latest developments in the industry, community managers can better connect with relevant audiences and provide them with the most up-to-date resources and best practices.
Krystal Wu highlighted adaptability as a key characteristic of success. Since the role is still evolving and community managers often create their job descriptions and are expected to be flexible, it will benefit you to be able to adjust to changing trends and expectations.
Great community managers know that they are ultimately responsible for providing excellent customer service. Listen to your customers, respond to their concerns, maintain a positive social presence, and build productive relationships with them. Be a good person for your brand and your audience.
What is the role of a community manager?
The role of a community manager is to build and maintain a brand’s community, both online and off.
It is important to engage audiences in a variety of outlets, including social media, online forums, Slack, face-to-face groups, and more.
Community managers are responsible for ensuring that the voice and tone of the brand are consistent across all digital spaces, which have their own cultures and best practices.
Krystal Wu says, “When I speak on the phone, I’m speaking for HubSpot.” I am not Krystal. I am HubSpot.
All your content, messaging, and crisis management should be consistent with your brand and empathetic in order to build a loyal community.
Manage Public Relations
The PR aspect is also a fundamental part of managing and expanding a brand’s audience. Community managers engage with all types of media — positive and negative — that are generated about their company.
The way managers handle legal issues and negative press can make a difference between good and great community managers.
This role is critical to the success of a company’s brand. Mistakes can be costly, so working with your organization’s legal, public relations, or other related teams will help you mitigate issues and ensure that you are responding appropriately.
Create strategies.
Great community managers also constantly experiment with new ideas.
Krystal Wu, for example, has learned that progress is not made overnight. Community managers need to think long-term. The more money you put into a new strategy, a new direction, or even the position, the better you will do.
A network of other community managers can be a valuable resource that is often overlooked. It can be helpful to find others in similar roles. This will allow you to crowdsource solutions and rely on others with experience who have handled similar situations before.
Brand presence is important.
Community managers should use their PR skills to assess their brand’s presence and evaluate the possible consequences of corporate communications.
Consistency of voice is important to maintain brand presence and target audience engagement.
The consumer should be able to recognize the brand voice on all platforms, whether it’s a Quora question or an Instagram post.
Track engagement.
Community managers record and report engagements they see at least once a month.
It’s important to get feedback from the community manager, who is the one who sees how consumers react. They can track whether or not followers are confused and what changes they see within digital communities.
Krystal says she has developed an intuitive understanding of the psychology and motivations of HubSpot’s audience. She can then adapt and tweak her approach to engage target audiences.
Community managers also keep their ideal audience in mind, focusing on the right audience and modifying content to reach them rather than just building a large audience.
Offer Resilience.
Krystal said that when I asked her if she had any unexpected challenges, she didn’t anticipate the “emotional ride I experience every day.”
Engaging with a community online can be unpredictable. One day, you might find yourself surrounded by positive discussions and satisfied users. Next, you might encounter complaints and angry users.
In order to deal with the different issues, community managers must control their emotions.
Delight in the community
Finally, the best community managers are those who delight their community.
Krystal Wu encourages her audience with gift cards, small gifts, or “delight boxes” filled with fun HubSpot swag.
Great community managers are able to resolve problems and send gifts when they occur.
Building positive relationships with members of your community, whether they have a positive or negative impression of your brand, will help you create a reputation and trustworthiness for your brand.
How to be a great community manager
To be a great manager of a community, you need passion and dedication.
You can develop the necessary skills to become a community manager who knows how to manage your brand online effectively.
Set yourself goals.
It’s crucial first to set some goals and objectives.
Good community managers are able to balance the empathy and compassion required for their job with the ability to remain organized and objective.
Community managers may have objectives that relate to the speed of response, brand sentiment, and engagement rates.
Community management, in conjunction with customer marketing and revenue goals, also contributes to the achievement of revenue goals.
Laurie Aquilante Faiola is the vice president of marketing at HubSpot. She says: “If you consider your customers as the end of the marketing and sales funnel, then you are leaving an opportunity.”
When you reach your objectives, it is easier to prioritize your work and your strategic initiatives. It also allows you to show the value of your job.
Listening skills are important.
The human element is crucial to community management. Data are important, but they cannot be overlooked. Listen to your community’s members instead of generating a standard response to their comments.
This is true for positive, neutral, and negative remarks. Positive comments should be met with the same amount of energy.
Encourage your community to be excited about the contributions they make and encourage them to engage in their thoughts or opinions actively.
Your response should demonstrate that you understand the challenges facing your community and are committed to solving them.
Encourage inclusivity.
Managers can do a lot to make sure the community is a safe, inclusive place for all.
All community members and contributors must be aware of the communication and behavior rules, as well as any consequences for violating them.
It’s important to enforce these guidelines, whether it means deleting comments or removing users from the community. This will help the members feel safer and show that the brand respects their values.
Be quick to the mark.
Community managers should be visible and present in all discussions.
It is important to respond promptly to all posts, reviews, and comments. It can be not easy to keep up with larger communities. Community managers should strive to respond as quickly as possible.
Encourage discussion by providing value.
Content marketing is an important aspect of community management. You can provide valuable resources for the community, and it is often the spark to a lively conversation.
“Consistently creating content is the cornerstone for community growth,” says Lucy Alexander, senior marketing manager at HubSpot. To keep community members coming back, you need to offer them something new every time.
Content marketing can be anything from interesting articles or industry news to webinars and events. Community managers who incorporate content marketing in their strategy will see an increase in engagement and brand sentiment.