The Online Community Research Network is kicking off our next research project to study how online community cultures form, what factors effect change, and how hosts maintain a desired culture.

We have found that the best source of information about community best practice and strategy comes from the collective experience of real-world practitioners.

If you would like to participate in the study, you can find the research survey here:
http://moourl.com/occulture

Again, the survey is intended for experienced community managers and strategists only, please.

Unfortunately, there has been a lot of very grim economic news of late. The purpose of this post isn't to give an overview of the current economic situation, but rather to highlight possible implications of a slower economy on business, and by extension, on online community budgets. More importantly, I want to start a discussion about Community Managers can help their community's survive and thrive during the downturn.

We have seen this cycle before, and relatively recently. When the web 1.0 bubble burst, many "community"-based startups ceased to exist, and spending on online community development in the enterprise all but dried up. From personal experience, most of the community initiatives at Autodesk were suspended in the closing months of 2001, and we shifted focus to our discussion groups and some customer-generated content activities.

What was different with Community 2.0?
By late 2004 and early 2005, key changes in in the marketplace, in organizations attitudes and in customer (user / people online / etc) behavior led to an explosive growth of social media, use of social networking and increased online community building activities by many organizations.

Key factors were (IMHO, I won't list all):
• Cost of platforms dramatically decreased, and in some cases fell to zero
• Consumer and workplace broadband reached ~100% penetration
• Consumers accepted less formal content, trust in "people like me" exceeded authoritities
• A certain segment of the group formerly known as "the audience" decided they wanted to actively create, participate and connect
• Many companies started to accept and practice the principals outlined in the Cluetrain Manifesto, and in the many key books, blogs and conference that followed, evangelizing the metaphor of conversation

Things Were Going So Well, What Happened?
Earlier this year, we started to hear significant rumblings from wall street that things were not ok, particularly with the credit markets. Over the last two weeks, the markets have been in turmoil. Many organizations are seeing the dark shadow of a recession. Some argue we are already there. One thing is clear: most organizations have shifted to a more conservative outlook for 2009.

As organizations take a more sober look at the last quarter of 2008 and make projections for 2009, there are some likely implications for online community programs:
• Budgets will likely shrink
• Headcount will likely be frozen
• Positions may be consolidated (merging of roles)
• Layoffs may happen
• It will be harder to upgrade / make improvements to infrastructure
• Pressure will increase quickly and dramatically for some articulation of value
• Programs may be cut back
• In extreme cases, some community programs may be abandoned

Thriving in the Downturn
I want to be very clear here: I don't think the global economic circumstances mean gloom and despair for the entire online community sector. The circumstances for Community 2.0 that I outlined above still generally hold true, and I still believe most organizations can create real value by engaging in online community activity. Signs that interest in online community is still high are all around. For instance, demand for qualified community managers and strategists is at an all time high (even though we are starting to see the first hints of staff reduction).

However, I do think that Community Managers have some work to do in order to navigate some of the potential challenges I outlined above. I've outlined the following tactics that can help (and I'd love to here your suggestions via the comments).

• Focus on Defining / and Reporting Value
In order for your community strategy to be sustainable, you need to be able to articulate value back to the organization. This value has to be articulated, at least in part, in the cultural language of your organization. In some organizations, it's all about impact to customer loyalty, it some organizations, this value is growing an audience (member registrations). You will likely wind up with a report that is a mosaic of quantitative and qualitative sources. We've studied this issue in the Online Community Research Network, and you can see a report excerpt here:

Online Community ROI and Revenue Techniques

• Reach Out to Other Departments (CSR / Marketing / Support)
Online Communities offer value to almost every department in the organization, from HR (recruiting), to Support (call avoidance), to Marketing (awareness / reach), to the Product team (feedback, customer led innovation). Now is the time to reach out to other teams and create cross-organizations ties, and involve other teams in community building and engagement activities.

• Show the Cost of Not Participating
One way to show value back to management is to paint a picture of not having a community or community engagement strategy, and the associated costs and losses. These hypothetical costs can range from increased awareness of competitors to decreased customer satisfaction and loyalty.

• Be Honest About Your Strategy
Take a look at the community touchpoints and programs you are engaging in. Are there a few that have little or no participation? Are there features that score consistently low on your community research? Now is a good time to look at shedding these features and programs that are not creating value for your community. This is also an opportunity to involve the community in continuing to shape the experience and ongoing direction. Lastly, are there features or programs that you are struggling to maintain, that would be better served out in the community ecosystem? For instance, a particularly strong, independent Facebook group for your brand that you have been struggling with, or a user group that has a competitive feature on their site? Let it go.

• Stick Together
The worst feeling in trying times is feeling alone and isolated. If you and / or your team don't have peers at other companies to talk to and share strategies and tactics with, start making those connections now. There are lots of meetups (like my Online Community Roundtable), conferences and organizations (like the social media club and the online community research network) to help support you.


What do you think?
I would love to hear what you think, either via comments or email. Are you seeing changing attitudes towards your online community initiatives? Have you been affected by the downturn? Do you have advice or suggestions to help other navigate these issues?

Please join me and Mike Pascucci of Mzinga for a webcast about best practices in community moderation.

Best Practices for Moderating Your Online Community
A Webcast Co-sponsored by Mzinga and Forum One Networks

Date & Time: September 30th at 2 pm ET

Join online community expert, Bill Johnston of Forum One, and Mzinga moderation guru Mike Pascucci for in-depth examination and discussion on all aspects of community moderation, including key best practices. Session highlights will include:

- Developing effective community member guidelines and policies for appropriate content
- Ensuring a welcoming and risk-free online community environment, without hindering member activity and discussions
- Multiple moderation techniques, from proactive monitoring to content seeding and post-moderation—and practical advice on which approach to take
- Featured business cases that explore how leading brands are using moderation to support and grow their community initiative and membership.

Register now

This month's Expert Interview is with Tom Diederich, social media/Web community manager at Cadence Design Systems in San Jose, Calif. Tom recently relaunched the Cadence online community with great success, and he shares insights from the launch in this interview.

Tom was drawn to online communities during the Internet's early days. He began "blogging" in 1996 (though he called it his "online journal") when working in Tokyo as a journalist to keep friends and family informed of his adventures there. Since then, Tom has worked to build online community at various companies including Intuit, Symantec and Cadence Design Systems. He holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the Ohio State University.

Q: You recently re-launched the Cadence community, and have had a great success in attracting members. Can you talk about the techniques you used for launch and growth?
I spent a lot of time working with power users – educating them about the new community (which unlike the old site incorporates Web 2.0 technologies). Many of the enhancements came from the community, so they were eager to see their ideas brought to life. Once they had a sneak peek, they became evangelists and really did most of the promoting.

But I also spent a great deal of time talking to bloggers in Cadence’s market, the so-called “electronic design automation” space, often referred to simply as “EDA.”

We also introduced blogs – Cadence employees, mainly engineers, architects and product managers. I have spent (and it’s an on-going process) a lot of time recruiting bloggers and also reminding them to post regularly. The content they produce resonates with the community, so in this case it really was a matter of: “If you build it, they will come.”

Our new Website also puts “community” front and center – right on the landing page of cadence.com. I don’t think there is another company in our industry (or many others) that does that. It’s the first thing visitors see and it pulls them in.

Q: What plans do you have in place for fostering ongoing member engagement?
A few things. Right now I’m working on a program for super-users. I’m also planning to roll out a ranking system that will correlate with the point system currently in place (that is also new to the community). For community members, striving for that next bump in rank can be addictive!

Q: Can you talk a little bit about the Cadence strategy for integrating community into the corporate site?
Sure. We wanted to get more out of our corporate site than the usual one-way delivery of information. We wanted to leverage the site to connect Cadence with our customers and get successful customers connected with other, creating a vibrant community. Visitors can now interact with each other and with Cadence in a more conversational way, sharing and learning from the collective participation. This will help us better understand our customers' needs more quickly and develop solutions that will more closely meet their needs.

We feel confident that our incorporation of ‘New Social Media’ into the corporate site is accomplishing our business objectives both in terms of metrics and community interaction. Better for our visitors, and better for Cadence, so a win-win result.

Q: What general online community trends are you paying attention to? What is on the horizon for the industry 24-36 months out?
It’s a brand-new community (launched in mid July) so it will take a little more time to really dig into trends. But on a high level, I’m looking at new registrations, page views, RSS subscriptions, incoming links, thread volumes, post/thread tone, blog comment traffic compared to posts …

I’m also working on sharing some key conversations (customer-driven innovation) from the community (lessons learned, product enhancement ideas, new product and services ideas, etc.) with product management and customer support.

I’m not sure what’s in store for the EDA industry, but 24-36 months from now I’d like the Cadence community to be seen as “the” go-to place for Cadence customers – and non-customers alike. I’m going to propose some pretty cool features and functionality in the meantime to help make that happen. ☺

The agenda for the Marketing & Online Communities conference is coming together nicely. The conference will be held November 5th at the Tribeca Grand in New York City. The event is intended to be an informative and interactive discussion of the intersection of marketing and online communities. If you are an agency seeking to better understand the possibilities of online communities, a brand manager looking to engage in community-building activities, or a community expert seeking to expand marketing relationships, this conference will be of value.


Session and Breakout Topics will include:
• Designing for Conversation
• The Social Web: How Consumers and Brands are Connecting Online
• Secrets of Successful Community Campaigns
• Community Generated Media: Giving Customers a Voice and Companies Insight
• Integrating Customer Communities in to the Marketing Mix
• Measuring Social Marketing Programs
• Best Practices for Adding Advertising to Your Community
• Engaging with Mass Social Media
• Worst Case Survival: What To Do When Things Go Horribly Wrong

Confirmed session leads include:
• Heather Gold – subvert.com
• Elisa Camahort Page – BlogHer
• Deb Shulz - Independent
• Heather Lutrell – 3jane / indieclick
• Belinda Lang – American Express
• David Rubinstein - ExpoTV
• Peter Friedman, Moderator – CEO - LiveWorld

To learn more about the conference, including a summary of topics, presenters and attendees from last year, check out the official events page on the Forum One Networks site:
Marketing & Online Communities 2008

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me.

The tag for the event is #moc2008

The Online Community Compensation study was initiated in July of 2008 as part of our ongoing research efforts with the Online Community Research Network. Our intention of the study was to get a broad look at online community compensation, factors that effect compensation, and the current environment of the community team and community staff roles.

I posted key highlights from the report a few weeks ago.

Since then, we have been looking at other cuts of the data. One of the most interesting has been how salaries differ by region.

Key findings from the data
• The highest average / median annual salary in the USA comes from the research participants located in the northwest region. The average salary for the northwest region was $90k with a median of $90k.
• The lowest average / median annual salary in the USA comes from the research participants located in the southeast region. The average salary for the southeast region was $72k and the median was only $67k.
• There were general peaks on both the low ($0-$25k) and high ends (more than $150k) for all regions except the southwest regions.
• The northwest region peaked at the higher salary ranges than that of the other regions, peaking at both $65-75k and $85-105k
• The midwest region peaked at the lower salary ranges, peaking at both $45-55k and $65-85k.


As you can see below, our highest concentration of respondents was from the West, and in particular, CA.

Response Distribution by US Region:



Salary Averages and Medians by US Region



If you would like more information about the Online Communities Compensation report, feel free to contact me. The report can be purchased here.

Two "Friends of Forum One", Kaliya Hamlin and Joi Podgorny, are hosting separate but related events in November. The invitation from Kaliya follows, please give them a look.

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I am writing to invite you to the next Internet Identity Workshop. This will be our 7th one.
November 10-12 in Mountain View.
http://www.windley.com/events/iiw2008b/announcement.shtml

There is an independent but related event on Nov 13th - Kids Online: Balancing Safety and Fun
http://kidsonline.eventbrite.com

The community that comes together at the workshop is really amazing. It is a working meeting for a range of groups focused on the technical, social and legal issues arising with the emergence identity, relationship and social layer of the web. The key thought leaders in the area are all there in a highly interactive environment.

We have been focused on "user-centric identity" - considering how end-users, regular people, can manage their own identity across the range of websites, services, companies and organizations that they belong to, purchase from and participate with.

A lot has happened since we first met in the fall of 2005 in Berkeley:
We have several foundations that have formed around key technologies - OpenID and Information Cards.
LIberty Alliance continues to be actively involved in the community
OASIS TC's have started actively participating.
The Vendor Relationship Management project has sprung up out of the community continues to evolve.
OSIS - (Open Source Identity Systems) was founded at IIW and is working on its 4th major interop event happening at DIDW next week (#3 was at RSA in the spring).


As a community we have been exploring these kinds of questions:
How are social networking sites and social media tools applying user-centric identity?
What are the open standards to make it work? (identity and semantic)
What are technical implementations of those standards?
How do different standards and technical implementations interoperate?
What are the new social norms and legal constructs needed to make it work?
What tools are needed to make it usably secure for end-users?
What are the businesses cases / models that drive all this?

You can check out our community aggregate blog http://www.planetidentity.org

Who comes to IIW?:

Anyone interested in identity (user profiles, social linking, user history & metadata etc) on the web and in digital systems.

Entrepreneurs who are working companies about people and their identities online - profiles, social linking, group formation. Basically those doing ANYTHING with the word SOCAIL in it.

Product Managers who are trying to figure what to do now and plan for interms of user-identity and information sharing in your product.

Engineers/Programmers who have to implement the emerging standards that are covered at IIW.

Researchers/Academics studying identity online.

Lawyers who are interested in end-user agreements and how new technologies change/improve how people interact with companies.

Sociologists, Anthropologists who are considering online life and the implications of identity online.

This is a conference where you get out of it what you want. If you have something to present you are most welcome to. If you have questions you need answers to you can find them.

You can read what community members have said about the quality of the event.
http://iiw.windley.com/wiki/What_is_GREAT!

Cost:
The event is VERY affordable for a 2.5 day high quality conference with the leading professionals in the industry.

Students - $50
Independents (small startups, nonprofits)- $200
Corporate - $350

The Online Community Compensation study was initiated in July of 2008 as part of our ongoing research efforts with the Online Community Research Network. The intention of the study was to get a broad look at online community compensation, factors that effect compensation, and the current environment of the community team and community staff roles.

We received approximately 225 responses. Participants represent a healthy swath of the types of organizations participating in online community building activities, including: large software companies, large community destination sites, niche community sites, platform providers, interactive marketing firms and independent consultants.

Key findings from the report:
• The majority of the respondents are: Female (55%) vs. Male (45%),
• The majority (61%) of respondents ranged in age from 31-50 years of age.
• Most of the respondents have more than 5 years of experience, completed a Bachelors Degree, and work 41-50 hours per week.
• The average Salary of the respondents was $81k with a median of $72.5k. There were peaks on both the low ($0-$25k) and high ends (more than $150k), and then also at $60-$65k.
• Women are earning only 91% of what men are earning; women averaged $77k, and the men averaged $85k. The average annual salary for all participants was almost $81k.
• Most participants are satisfied with their jobs with an average satisfaction score of 4.2 and a median score of 4 (on a scale of 1-5).


Gender
This is the first time we have asked a gender question in our research, but this answer, combined with anecdotal data from our events supports a slight tendency towards females being in community roles vs. males.



Age
Most of the particpants skewed towards the 31-40 y/o segment.



Department
The responses indicate Marketing “owning” Community teams, or organizations creating a dedicated team. “No formal structure” and “Throughout the company” were also popular responses. The placement of the community team seems to be very much in flux, with a bias towards the marketing department.



Experience
The respondents generally represented a senior and seasoned body of practitioners. The dip in responses in the 3yr to 5 yr range likely represents the general waning of interest in online community during the 3 years after the Internet bubble, and the relatively recent resurgence in interest and investment.



Salary
The average Salary the research participants was $81k with a median of $72.5k. There were peaks on both the low ($0-$25k) and high ends (more than $150k), and then also at $60-$65k. The salaries reported represent a disparate, but generally healthy, range. Spikes in the “$0 to $25k” can be accounted for by volunteers, part time staff and C-level staff not currently taking compensation in startup environments.



Salary by Gender
Women are earning 91% of what men are earning; women averaged $77k, and the men averaged $85k. The average annual salary for all participants was almost $81k.



Satisfaction
It is encouraging to find that overall satisfaction with Online Community positions is well above average. This indicates the combination of salary, benefits, work environment and subject matter is working for most of the respondents.



Full Report
The full Online Community Compensation report contains a good deal more information on the topic, including:
• Community team size
• Respondent education
• Hours Worked
• Benefits
• Salary by Country (US, UK, Canada)
• Salary by Title
• Salary by Experience
• Salary increases in last 12 months
• Full write in comments from Survey

The report available for free to members of the Online Community Research Network, or available to purchase for non-members here:
Online Community Compensation 2008

Jake McKee of CommunityGuy.com interviews Paula Drum of H&R block about their community & social media strategy, and working with legal. Great insight from a big brand.

This video was originally released to Online Community Research Network members. For information on joining, click here.

One of the biggest challenges for those leading the community efforts for large organizations (or really, orgs of most sizes) is ensuring that the hosted community efforts of the organization are appropriate, valuable (both to the org and to the member / customer) and sustainable.

First, a little context. I worked at Autodesk for 6 years as the Online Experience Manager (basically a chief IA). The internal web team was structured as an agency within the company, and each division was a "client". This approach has pros and cons that I won't go in to now, but for the purposes of the conversation today, the effect was that we had oversight over most online activities, including any hosted community activity. One of the tools we used to ensure a quality online experience was to have our clients fill out a simple project brief describing their vision for the community.

Specifically, the brief covered:

• Client Team and Stakeholders


• A Summary of the initial community vision and purpose / rationale


• Executive sponsorship


• Community Manager and extended staff


• Desired features and content


• Goals "what does success look like?"


• Budget


• Launch date

I'm attaching a heavily modified version of the brief I used, updated with the benefit of a bit of hindsight.

I'd really love feedback on this, and would love to hear if you actually find it of use in your day to day practice.

You can download the brief template here:

oncomm_project_brief_v1

Jake McKee has been conducting a series of interviews with Online Community experts for the Online Community Research Network.

The latest is with Sean O'Driscoll (formerly of Microsoft) about working with the legal team on building communities.



Please let add your thoughts via comments.

Also - drop me a line and let me know what you think about the value of these interviews - bjohnston@forumone.com

Over the last 3 years we've conducted research with over a 1000 organizations actively engaged with online communties, including Fortune 500 companies, cutting edge community-based startups and some of the world's leading non-profit organizations.

We are currently conducting 6 studies annually, and we typically release the research reports (for a limited time).

Currently available (free) research reports include:
Identity, Reputation & Ranking:
The Identity, Reputation & Ranking research project studied current practice with online identity, member reputation (including reputation systems and programs) and content ranking techniques.
Key findings from the study include:
- Members typically don’t fill out non-required profile fields;
- Slightly less than 1/3 of the respondents (32%) have, or plan on making member’s profiles portable in the next 6 months;
- Slightly less than 1/3 of the respondents (32%) have, or plan on implementing a universal ID solution in the next 6 months;
- The majority of respondents have, or are developing a reputation system for their communities.
Download this report (free).

Online Community Revenue and ROI Techniques:
The Online Community Revenue and ROI Techniques research project studied revenue streams of online communities as well as monetary and non-monetary measurements of value.
Key findings from the study include:
- Respondents generally valued non-fiduciary dimensions of value, like loyalty, over direct revenue.
- The most effective revenue generating techniques were advertising and charging for community subscription.
- A member-first attitude is needed when considering the addition of fee-based or revenue-generating services. The best way to find out what your members do or don’t want? Ask them.
Download this report (free).

Marketing & Online Communities:
The Marketing & Online Communities research project was intended to study the intersection of current marketing practices and online community building.
Key takeaways from the study include:
- A list of community marketing tactics that community hosts engage in;
- Feedback on the most effective marketing tactics;
- Host policies that marketers must adhere to;
Download this report (free).

Research Reports Available to OCRN Members:
Online Community: Marketing, Growth and Engagement Report / July 2008 (also available for purchase)
Online Community ROI: Models and Reports / February 2008
Online Community ROI Research Report / April 2007
Online Community Metrics: February, 2007
Online Community Metrics: Best Practices Survey / March 2006
Blogs, Wikis and Workspaces: June 2006

Our Research Calendar for this quarter includes:
Online Community Compensation (team structure, titles and compensation packages from over 250 community professionals): to be published August 2008
Community Vendor Satisfaction (Platform & Services): to be published September 2008

In addition to all the research reports, OCRN members get an active say in steering the research agenda, and also help shape the research instruments.

To find out more about the OCRN, please feel free to ping me.

We conducted the Online Community Marketing, Growth and Engagement research study in May of this year, as part of the continuing efforts of the Online Community Research Network. Our goal was to gain insight into how people are measuring engagement in their online communities and to understand how many organizations were using an elite / influencer program, and how those programs were structured.

One of the most interesting findings was around the concept of member engagement. Both the definition as well as the process of measuring engagement varied across the respondent organizations.

Highlights From the Report:

Most people determine the level of engagement based on the amount of activity and the amount of content created (forum posts, reviews, discussions, diggs, links added, comments and content, etc.). They also look at the amount of time spent on the site as one of the main measurements of engagement. Another important dimension, which only a few respondents mentioned is the number and quality of connections that a member has with the host organization (in some cases brand) and other community members.

Leading Indicators
A few respondents were using a set of "Leading indicators" to benchmark and track engagement:
• "1) Logged in/accessed the site; 2) Posted comments to the site; 3) Posted substantive content (e.g. conversation-starting forum topic) to the site; 4) Completed profile/member survey"
• "Engagement encompasses not only logins to the site, but activity: Digging/burying stories, submitting content and engaging in discussions on specific stories."

An ideal Engagement Metric
Based on aggregate responses, the following metrics would be ideal for rolling up into an engagement metric.
• Amount of activity on site: page views, logins, searches, feature usage
• Number and type of content items created: discussion posts, tags, shared content, etc.
• Number of connections / relationships created: friends added to network, or inferred via frequent discussion exchanges
• Time on site: Total time per month
• Frequency of visits: / per month
• Recommendations: Members referring new community members, passing along community content outside of community, blogging about / promoting community

A perspective on member engagement:
One Fortune 100 Financial Services firm that responded to the survey uses the following definition / measurements of “Engagement”:

“We define engagement in a few different ways.

1) Very tactically in the community. Tactically: How many have registered? What are their posting rates? How often are they are engaging in the community?

2) Strategically with higher-level brand metrics: looking at how this pays off for our overall brand goal. [Company] uses a Net Promoter Score to measure the health of the brand.

We ask “Would you recommend [Company] to your friends?” on a scale of 1-10.

Then we subtract the people who answer low (either 1-3 or 1-5), from the people who answer high (9-10) that yes, they definitely would recommend [Company] to their friends.

That gives us a percentage and we measure it for the [Company] brand and at each of the product levels.

The community is about overall brand engagement and how the community drives loyalty and membership within the [Company] brand.”

Fostering Engagement
All of the responses to the question about fostering engagement raise the point that as community host, you have responsibility for half of the conversation with community members. Themes of regular communication, active listening, strong moderation, fostering discussion and recognition emerged in the responses.

The most popular ways to improve member engagement include:
• Regular and easy communications:
“Send email – ones that are targeted and provide interesting news. We found over our 500 or so communities that those who send regular (monthly) email to members have 7x engagement numbers compared to those who did it less than once every other month.”

• Skilled moderation:
“Keep the forums on topic and firm but fair moderation. “

• Keep content fresh.

• Fostering discussion:
“Encouraging conversation. Sometimes, this means highlighting a potentially divisive, opinionated comment and inviting response. Sometimes, this means asking questions that everyone has an answer to, and nobody minds sharing.”

• Listening to participants:
“Seek member feedback and perspective, build meaningful connections”

• Recognizing members who participate:
“Create a sense of value to their participation.”

The full report is available to Online Community Research Network members. If you are interested in this report (and others), please consider joining the Network. Details are available here: http://www.onlinecommunityresearch.com

This month's Expert Interview is with Mario Anima, Director of Online Community at Current. Mario was kind enough to spend time answering a few questions about Current, the unique community that he helps manage, and the intersection of traditional, new and social media.


Mario Anima
Director, Online Community
Current

"I’m obsessed with online communities, products, and technology. I love when these three things converge, but i’m also a huge film geek, avid reader, and have been known to enjoy video games and music."

photo by Scott Beale / Laughing Squid



Q: Can you tell us a little bit about Current?

A: Current is a television station wrapped up in an online social media site at Current.com. Essentially, our community submits videos, news stories, blog posts, and anything else they find around the web (or create themselves) to Current.com, and then our community votes on the submitted stories to help collaboratively determine what gets made into TV segments (called pods) and aired on Current TV. We also have a full swing production team that produces regular programs like infoMania and Vanguard.

Q: What has surprised you most about managing a community of newgatherers and newsmakers?

A: Everyone involved in a social online community has a dedicated interest, and these interests range from the constructive to the destructive depending on who they are. Seems obvious enough. On Current, however, things can be uniquely rewarding and difficult. Diffusing situations is commonplace in communities, but more often than not, our team finds themselves diffusing dustups between community members who are undergoing an ideological clash of greater proportions. It’s both rewarding and challenging to be caught in between two people who really are committed to being informative, but are on the polar opposite sides of the spectrum ideologically.

Q: What has been one (or some) of the most difficult issues to manage in your community? How did you handle?

A: Censorship. We are largely a social news site, so issues with the censorship crop up frequently. It’s an ongoing issue, but one that we are trying to manage this with transparency and openness. We have a group of online programmers who help facilitate the transition of content from the Internet to TV. Things crop up, sometimes sources are not credible, other times we don’t have the rights to use video that our community really found compelling. We are trying to get better at messaging these decisions in a way that doesn’t leave the community scratching their heads.

Q: What advice would you give to someone interested in becoming a community manager?

A: You really, really, really have to love being online, being socially active in online communities, and being willing to jump into just about any situation as called for. In addition to that, you also need to have a keen eye and understanding of when and when not to dive in. It takes dedication and patience, but those are two of the most commonly shared attributes I’ve found amongst other community managers.

Q: What online community and social networking trends do you see on the horizon that are the most interesting to you?

A: Well, the whole micro-blogging thing is extremely powerful, although it’s been talked to death lately. I really think aggregation of social content/profiles still has a way to go, but there are some opportunities there. I think overall, media as we know it will continue to evolve thanks to the Internet and the social networks that continue to crop up. I’m very excited about the mobility and portability of identity and content.

The wiki for the Online Community Unconference 2008 is now open to all for reading / commenting. Of particular value are the session notes.

The wiki can be found here:
http://www.socialtext.net/ocu2008

Selected session notes include:
Worst Case Scenerios - What to do when things go terribly wrong

Cross Networking Madness - How are niche communities using data portability

Building the Collaboration Ecosystem - All components for community building success

Community Management 101: How to get started in this big wide world

Managing communities across multiple sites - Twitter, FB, MySpace, etc...

Community Year One - Phases, Activities, Successes

The platforms for community are SH*T. Discuss

Managing Entitlement - wrangling with the elite & noisy

There were over 40 sessions, and most have some level of documentation on the wiki.

Enjoy!