Building An Online Community Team: The 5 Roles You Need To Fill

An online community manager plays five roles. Friend, recruiter, editor, enforcer and entrepreneur.

1. The friend: engages people individually. He participates in an online community, he messages lots of people to get them involved, he takes the time to cultivate loosely interested members into regulars.
2. The recruiter: persuades people to join the online community. He finds people that have something to contribute and builds relationships with them to join and invite others to do the same. He ensures steady supply of members to replace those that leave.
3. The enforcer: The enforcer keeps things clean. He removes the naughty posts, scolds the bad members and ensures nothing gets in the way of members participating in the online community.
4. The editor: Implements much of the community strategy. He solicits content, decides who/what matters. He has the power to shine a spotlight on members of the community and reward positive actions. Whenever you want the community to do something, he motivates them to do it.
5. The entrepreneur: is to an online community what a business development manager is to a business. He looks for opportunities to add value to the community. Creates alliances, advocates on behalf of the community and generates the income.

If you’re community is growing and you need to recruit more people, it makes sense to split these roles. Let the editors focus on content, the entrepreneurs focus on business development and the recruiter recruit.

Comments

[Haroldkip]

Good to see us reminded of our duties Rich :o)

Would you agree that the entrepreneur would act as a bridge between company and its audience?

And having said that where would you position the 'brand managers' role?

[Aerin Guy]

Hi there,
I like how you've broken down some of the roles. Many non-profits have extremely engaging cause-oriented communities, but hiring 5 people for 5 roles is unrealistic, unfortunately. More often than not, this role is falling to an underpaid, under-resourced communications person. Your post is great content to take to the "board" to justify the resources needed for an effective community program.
Thanks!

Aerin

[Nick]

Well stated Richard, you captured the essence of community management succinctly. The only thing I might add is "The Researcher" since much time is spent staying up to date on the new and important. If we stop learning and monitoring, we lose the ability to trendcast and stay ahead of the market for our client(s).

[Beverly]

Thanks - You've just made my task of writing a job description for my relatively new responsibilites as "Community Manager" MUCH easier! Great post. - Beverly aka @TravelMaestro

[Katie]

Thanks for this article! It's super helpful for us peeps starting out (:

[Waters Denison]

Great post!

[Lauren]

First of all, not all Community Managers are "he's" ;)

As Community Manager for Context Optional (http://contextoptional.com), a social marketing company in San Francisco, I find myself falling into many of these roles -- and even more. Along with these five roles, you're also a Customer Service Representative, a Brand Advocate, and a Linguist. You wear many hats as a Community Manager and if you manage more than one online community, you often need to switch hats quickly and make sure they don't get mixed up.

There are a lot of balls in the air, but if you keep yourself in check and your duties aligned, Community Managers are the strongest online communicators.

Thanks for the post!

[Steph]

Prior to the friend, what about the listener? Key in building community.

[Sergio Zaragoza]

Nice article, but indeed all of them have to play the role of the listener, also you have to add the public relationships and the community enhancer to amp up any recomendation to the site or community.
congrats!

[Ray Hartjen]

Good, quick read on challenges to anticipate as communities grow. Excellent. Thanks!

[Wieger Waardenburg]

Great post! Easy to read and understand, usefull for anyone making business out of communities!