#ClubChat: What does a typical day look like for you as a Community Manager?

I spend about 50% of my day explaining what community is. This is both a curse and a blessing for me because I'm so glad people are taking an interest but of course in our jobs, everyone thinks they are the expert! Pulling metrics (active community members, new members, etc) answering product-related questions that have yet to be answered by a peer (we have a 2 day SLA) I also always have about 2 long-term campaigns going on at a time. Many of the metrics we pull are automated, either through the platform or using GA. Unfortunately, our vendors' engagement tools, such as list building and automation rules, are pretty much non-existent making engagement campaigns time-consuming.

I'm learning that typical days are hard to come by in this job haha but, the most common tasks would be onboarding new users to one of our forum communities, updating content on each forum, and moderating comment sections.

As I' m sure many folks on this thread will agree, my day-to-day varies. However, it's all laddering up to building a brand new tutoring community. It's a lot of sourcing and creative strategy. Basically auditing what's working now in current communities and tutoring efforts and what needs to be tweaked to directly impact this emerging community. A ton of research, MVP set-up, and making the case as to why certain features should be prioritized.

Every time this question has come up, my answer is always the same - there is no ‘typical’ day. There are tasks that are repeatable, but all vary in frequency and scope. Then there are always projects and programs on the go that will impact what the day looks like. This may sound harsh, but from my experience, if someone is looking for a ‘typical’ day, it’s a flag to dig deeper and look for the reasons it’s being asked. Again, just from my experience but great CM’s typically have traits that embrace chaos, thrive in changing environments and have a curiosity that is rarely satisfied in a typical day.

This is difficult!

Ranges btw:

• auditing processes [ie. slack workflows] and reassessing
• planning 1-2 bigger, long term projects meticulously
• writing analyses for our intracompany blog, to keep other teams updated
• reaching out to teammates for input & etc
• creating content on canva
• automating messages / scheduling emails
• calls! lots of 1x1s
• twice monthly, at least, i host a sort of town hall & all the planning that comes w that
• lots of backend work [not coding though, just sourcing] through our third party community dashboard

things like this

I've been a community lead for almost 2 months. So far I am following the strategy that was in place before I started, which is community emails, webinars, and LinkedIn posts.

• I plan, organise, and execute 2 webinars per month. This includes slide design, script writing, and a lot of research.
• Plan long term projects (updating resource page, creating evergreen content)
• customer/ user research
• meetings with the internal team (marketing, product, and customer success)
• meeting new people (potential customers, other community leads, and current customers)
• creating promotional materials
• learning about new strategies and outreach
• Strategy to increase engagement