Jobhop Jobhop's blog : Community Managers Don't Just Tweet

“I’d like to be a community manager because you get to tweet all day”

How many times have I heard that? No! Community managers do a lot more than just tweet all day and if you think you’d like to be one then you’d better read on.

The best way to describe the community manager would be to call them “The online face of the company.” The community manager does exactly what the title suggests, they manage the community, the job they do can be very involved.

Community managers live in the moment, they have their finger on the pulse, they’re proactive and they know how to handle a crisis in a calm manner.

Let’s pretend that the community manager has to be in charge of a massive department store all by themselves, what would their daily duties be?

The new customer

The community manager would be there to meet and greet all new customers.

They would find out the needs and wants of the customer and sign post them to relevant products or information.

The regular customer

The community manager would recognise them, ask them how the family is, share a bit of interesting information, have a laugh with them and show them some exclusive photos of a new range of bed linen due in next week. ( It doesn’t have to be bed linen it could be anything the department store stocks )

The lost customer

This customer has been told to come in by her friend, who’s a raving fan and has been pestering her for ages to pop in. Now she’s there though she can’t find what she wants. The community manager takes the customer by the hand and leads her to the product she wants.

The complaining customer

This customer may have bought something that’s gone faulty, a delivery may not have arrived, another member of staff may have promised the customer a phone call but then forgot, what ever it is, this customer isn’t happy. The community managers job is to acknowledge the customer isn’t happy, calm the customer down, take the customer to a comfy room, away from the shop floor, then try to resolve the situation. The community manager may also call in customer services or a department head if required.

The potential customer

The windows are open and two mums are chatting outside, one says to the other that their baby just doesn’t sleep and she’s constantly lacking any energy. The community manager pops their head out of the window, says a friendly hello & then hands the lady a brilliant guide on how to soothe babies for a restful night.

The following day the mum comes back to say thank you. Over the next few weeks the mum and the community manager chat regularly and build a strong relationship. The mum sends all her mum friends into the store and not only are they taking free guides but they’re also buying baby products.

So you get the picture, a community manager will:

Meet and greet new people online. Chat with the regulars and look after them because they are the advocates of the brand. Make sure any new enquiries are dealt with immediately and never let anyone feel lost or ignored. Turn someones negative experience into a positive one, make sure onlookers know that complaints are always dealt with immediately and professionally. Show onlookers that the brand genuinely cares.

The community manager will also use tactics to attract and source potential customers.

These tactics could include:

Watching conversations online
Blog posts
Guides
Competitions
Surveys
Group discussions
Twitter chats
Infographics
Video
Podcasts
Webinars

And so on.....

The community manager may work alongside a social media manager and a content manager. If that’s the case the social media will set the strategy for the community manager to follow and the content manager will provide the content to be used across the social networking platforms.

As you can see the community manager does a lot more than just a few tweets!

JOIN Jobhop and spread the word.

Julie Bishop Jobhop.co.uk

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