Successful Follr Community managers share many qualities, but for blogging purposes we decided to share just nine of the most effective. For our second installment we follow up with four more of the traits that make our community administrators so great. See the first five in Part 1.
They Have Solid Communication Skills
Community managers must know how to communicate concisely and effectively with their members. If communication fails, it’s the first of many dominos on the path to community derailment.
They Have a Background in Analytics
Successful community managers know the importance of metrics and how to use them. If you can’t measure the success of your community, you can’t expect to achieve it.
They’re Level-headed
The best administrators are calm, cool and collected through it all. Whether the day brings an amazing milestone or troublesome issues, a successful manager keeps a level head and doesn’t let emotion take over.
They’re Flexible
This is a biggie. Some community managers can feel tempted to stick to a plan or vision with iron rigidity, but it’s important to be adaptive to users’ wants and needs. If you listen to your community and heed their advice, success is within reach!
We hope you’ve enjoyed these tips for being a successful online community manager. Let us know in the comments below if you exude another quality that makes you a great manager!
Do you ever feel out-of-touch or disconnected with your online community? It can be difficult to feel connected to your online community in the same ways you feel connected with your physical community. Members need to not only feel like their input is valued, but also feel like they’re tapping in to a place of valuable content and information. In order to cultivate some of that same closeness and camaraderie, try one, two or all of these online community engagement ideas!
1. Caption Contest
It may seem silly, but think about it – no matter how old you are or what your interests may be, coming up with a funny or clever caption is hard to resist! Consider posting of photo of your pet checking out what you have cooking in the kitchen if you have a recipe or cooking group. Members with pets will relate to you, and they might even feel obliged to share a similar post in the future.
2. Give-Away
Everyone loves things that are free, especially if the thing being given away is of particular interest to your community members. Engage them by posting about a give-away. You could give away a favorite product of yours: say you have a community revolving around books and literature, give away a new copy of an old classic. Or it could simply be a piece of original poetry if your budget is tight. Encourage members to comment on the post to be entered and pick randomly 3-5 days later. Once you’ve found your winner, tag them in a follow up post to offer congratulations!
3. Internet “Scavenger Hunt”
This may sound daunting, but it’s really just a sneaky way to get your members visiting another one of your sites. Say you have a blog in addition to your online community. Engage your members by giving them 2 or 3 specific posts of yours to find and read, and ask them to prove they were successful by leaving a short comment on each. Who knows, you may even pick up a few more followers!
4. Controversial Question
This is a bit of a no brainer, but rookie online community builders can sometimes be afraid to rock the boat. What tentative community builders aren’t taking advantage of is the fact that we, as citizens of the internet, L.O.V.E. a good controversy. Pick a recent political or business-related scandal and post a link to an article summing it up. Don’t give hint as to where you stand on the issue, just encourage members to leave comments with their thoughts and opinions. Members will feel heard and perhaps you’ll learn something new!
If you have a chance to give one of these Online Community Engagement Ideas a try, let us know how it went! And feel free to share your own community engagement ideas!
