After you have done the necessary steps to build and deploy a successful online community, there’s still one thing left to do – make sure that your community team is in place.
It takes more than just one person to build and maintain a community; it takes a team effort to successfully implement an online community. Numerous people in your company will be involved in the process, but the number of people will greatly depend on factors such as the structure and objectives of the community and the unique element of your company.
Regardless of whether you are creating a community for a Fortune 500 company or a non-profit organization, there are four team positions that should always be filled.
Let’s take a more in-depth look at each of these positions:
- Owner – Develops the strategy, cares for the community and is also measured on the success of the community. Your IT department may be involved in the deployment of your community; however, a more successful model for ownership comes from the business side.
- Sponsor–A senior executive who is committed to using community to execute corporate strategy. Try to think of someone who is a strong leader, has a strategic eye and understands how to interweave community into the corporate strategy.
- Champion– Who are those two or three people who consistently evangelize your online community in your organization? They should be your champions. Let them spread positivity about the community and get people involved.
- Community Manager– Lead social capital builder. Evangelist. Responder. Rule enforcer. Spam controller. These are all characteristics of the community manager. Initially this individual’s role is to establish the culture of the community. However, over time, the community manager’s role will shift to engaging and enabling influencers in the community and serving as the champion of the community within the company. Speaking of community managers, let me introduce you ours –Jenn Emerson. She does a fantastic job running our community and understands what it takes to be a successful community manager.
As you study the definition of each position, who do you think would be the ideal individual(s) to carry the title for each role at your company? It may be challenging at first to identify someone for each position, but it is essential to assign a name to each of the roles.
Find out more specifics of what each role in the community team entails bydownloadingour whitepaper, Strategies for Building World Class Communities.
