2012 State of Community Management

State of Community
Management 2012
From Exploration to Evolution

Principal sponsor

How do 40% of the FORTUNE 500
®

solve their critical business and
technology problems?
They ask Protiviti.
Social technologies offer new ways to acquire and serve customers. Protiviti helps organizations
create social business strategies to engage –not manage–their customers. We also help companies
build internal communities that improve business processes. Protiviti will benchmark your
current state of social business to what others are offering and work with you to build a plan to
get to the next level. Learn more at protiviti.com/socialbusiness.

© 2012 Protiviti Inc. An Equal Opportunity Employer. Protiviti is not licensed or registered as a public accounting ﬁrm and does not issue opinions on ﬁnancial
statements or offer attestation services. PRO-0212

The Community Roundtable is committed to
advancing the business of community. We are
dedicated to the success of community and
social business leaders and offer a range of
information and training services. We facilitate
TheCR Network – a community of business
leaders that provides access to experts, programs,
curated content, relevant connections and a trusted
environment in which to share.

For more information, please visit us at
community-roundtable.com.

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2012 State of Community Management
Sponsors
Endower

Protiviti
Protiviti helps organizations create social business strategies to engage – not manage –
their customers. We also help companies build internal communities that improve
business processes. We value our association with The Community Roundtable
because we too are committed to uncovering objective measures of maturity to
advance community management—and many other business processes. In fact, our
3,000 professionals have been formally evaluating the maturity of our clients’ business
processes for as long as we have been in business.

Because we are a risk consultancy, clients engage us to work with some of the most
challenging communities, such as those where conversation is regulated by FINRA or
other laws and regulations. Even in this setting, open, honest exchange still takes place.

management maturity help us energize our clients to get to the next level, even when

drawing from current practices we have cataloged by industry, by process.
Protiviti KnowledgeLeader community and others to
obtain valuable insights to better your operations

goals, and build plans to advance your social business capability

For more information, visit the Protiviti website at www.protiviti.com/socialbusiness

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Supporting Sponsors

Ektron
Ektron Social Collaboration and Community helps organizations embrace
customer relationships, enhance brand loyalty, and build and maintain vibrant
social communities. Connect with your customers, foster new ideas and
innovation, and allow community members to collaborate. Your members can

and share across social networks. Monitor popular social communities and
respond in real-time to changing sentiment.

Combined with the Ektron Web Content Management platform, organizations
can create and manage a seamless blend of corporate-, user- and community-
generated content.

For more information, please visit the Ektron website at
http://ektron.com/Products/Web-CMS/Social/

Enterprise 2.0 Conference

-
ductivity. Attend Enterprise 2.0 Conference to learn how to leverage social business,
focused on how real customers use the latest technologies in a comprehensive confer-
ence. Visit leading companies showcasing the latest collaboration tools and services in
the expo pavilion. Bring the power of Enterprise 2.0 to your organization.

For more information please visit www.e2conf.com

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built its reputation on creating integrated solutions that deliver what its clients value
-

culture founded on teamwork, integrity and personal commitment. Based in St. Louis,

.

IBM

IBM helps you unlock the potential of communities to collaborate, innovate and drive

set of capabilities that allow your business to become more social. From social soft-
ware, content services, and social analytics – to process management, and risk and
security solutions, IBM not only helps you encourage community involvement and
contributions, but also ensures that you capture, grow and share the value of that
engagement.

For more information, visit www.ibm.com/socialbusiness

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Table of Contents
Introduction .....................................................................................................1

Perspectives....................................................................................................2

About The Community Roundtable ......................................................9

About this Report ........................................................................................10
Methodology .......................................................................................................10
Community Maturity Model .................................................................................11
2011 Roundtable Schedule & Topics ..................................................................13

Overview .........................................................................................................16
Social Media is Mainstream ................................................................................16
Community Management Is Continuing to Mature .............................................18
Internal Employee Communities Are On the Rise ...............................................18
It is No Longer About the Technology. It is Always About the Technology. .......20
...............................................21

Patterns in Community Maturity ..........................................................23
.............................................................................................23
Artifacts ..........................................................................................................24
Organizational Patterns .................................................................................24
Initiatives ........................................................................................................27
Reading & Resources ....................................................................................28
Stage 2 – Emergent Community .........................................................................29
Artifacts ..........................................................................................................31
Initiatives ........................................................................................................36
Stage 3 – Community ..........................................................................................39
Artifacts ..........................................................................................................41
Initiatives ........................................................................................................46
Stage 4 – Network ...............................................................................................49
Artifacts ..........................................................................................................51
Initiatives ........................................................................................................53

Appendix.........................................................................................................55

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Introduction
Welcome to the 2012 State of Community Management, an all-new look at the interac-
tions and insights we uncovered with members of TheCR Network. In past incarnations
of this report we focused on highlighting best practices observed within the eight com-
munity management competencies outlined in our Community Maturity Model. This
year’s report takes a different path, exploring the insights by organizational maturity,
uncovering “artifacts”, “patterns”, and “initiatives” to look for as you develop your
community and social initiatives from one stage to the next.

Since we started The Community Roundtable in 2009, we’ve seen community manag-
ers go from working in relative obscurity to being the linchpin of so many social initia-
tives. With that spotlight, comes added pressure to succeed. This report is intended to
help all of you, both the veterans and relative newcomers alike, achieve success.

The 2012 State of Community Management Report would be a shell of itself without
our members. While some work at the largest brands in the world, others are with small
companies you’ve never heard of, but all are doing amazing work. We’re thrilled to have
the opportunity to work with them to help shape the vision and future of community
management as a discipline. On the following pages, you’ll hear several members
perspectives on what they get out of being part of TheCR Network.

We also depend on the generosity and expertise of experienced practitioners, who
share their knowledge with us nearly every week. They challenge us to think differently
and get us out of our comfort zone. We appreciate their willingness to contribute to the

Appendix.

Conference, we’d be hard pressed to pour so much energy into this report. We thank
them for their generosity and support to help bring the 2012 State of Community
Management Report to you.

manager for ten years or are just getting started, this is your report. Whether you’ve
been following what we do at The Community Roundtable since we started or just
stumbled on this report by chance, we appreciate you giving it your time. We look
forward to the continued growth and success you’ll bring to the community manage-

Co-Founders
The Community Roundtable

community-roundtable.com | Join TheCR Network 1

Industry Perspectives

tangible skills like accounting, inventory management and lead generation – and there
are intangibles like leadership, vision and core values. The discipline of community
management blends the tangible and intangible – discrete activities, platforms and
tools right alongside the values, beliefs, and business goals native to every community.
In 2012, community management isn’t new and it’s no longer an option – managing
communities is a business imperative to succeed.

Community managers are all about creating and fostering an environment ripe for
meaningful interaction where the art of digital
communication fuses with real world relationships, is what the community manager

measurement. The Community Roundtable brings that together by providing members

101; it’s 501. It’s a resource for people who practice the discipline daily and want to
succeed.

The 2012 State of Community Management Report is a resource that captures the
essence of The Community Roundtable. In its third year, the SOCM is hitting its stride
-

the rise. Like that album, this is arguably the best effort to date from TheCR. This is a
powerful resource to help practitioners learn from others in the discipline and become
masters of the tangible and intangible, a treasure trove of conversations, guides,
how-to’s, and thought leadership. Forget the rhetoric, roll down your windows and put
the volume on 10.

Adam Cohen
Partner, SVP Social and Digital Media


What I enjoy the most about consulting is sharing with executives what everyone in
their organization is thinking, but no one is saying. As we continue to consult with
clients, though, we will eventually need to do less of that. Communities will mature to
a level of openness and honesty where all members come to realize that Bad News is
Good News. Management will have more time to respond, not just react, to what they
are learning in their communities.

“Transparency” is of course a critical element of success in even the least mature com-
munity. Communicating without fear, though, is something more than transparency. An
unvarnished, open, honest exchange of ideas that is reinforced over time with positive

Generating relationship-based engagement in a community is challenge enough. The
research in this report challenges us further. It suggests we advance the maturity of
-

blocker.

I most enjoy helping companies explore breakthroughs in business process advance-
ment by introducing communities into otherwise linear business processes. Marketing
and Customer Service, Product and Service Development, Supply Chain, Operations,

-
vative answers.

When we suggest an approach like this that seems to make objective business sense, it

prove our value at the expense of the people we are trying to serve.

So how might communities overcome political barriers that stunt their maturity? Con-

we fall short.

change.

Managing Director
Protiviti


TheCR Network Member Perspectives

As a Social Business and Community Strategist at a Fortune 200 global consulting

offers excellent programming, access to industry leading experts, value added con-
cierge services and research and conference programming that adds to our collective
knowledge in community management. I am so excited to see the launch of TheCR,
WOMMA, ComBlu community management training program this year. It will address a
tier of digital literacy training that I need to deliver to my organization.

It’s been easy to make the case for not only my own personal membership in TheCR,
but also to make the business case for several other CSC Community Managers as part
of our corporate membership in TheCR Network for the second year in a row.

I have been grateful for the relationships, and yes friendships, I’ve formed through
this network. If you’re a Community Manager, and you’re not a member, you need to

will, too.

Claire Flanagan
CSC Director, Social Business and Community Strategy
And TheCR Network member, fan and friend

For me, valuable programming, content creation and curation by dedicated, experi-
enced and professional community leaders is a key differentiator of The Community
Roundtable. I can meet and network with community professionals many places these
days, both in person and online, but TheCR Network provides the best service and
leadership that I’ve encountered.

Ted Hopton
Global Community Manager


I’ve long believed that the best source of information about building healthy and valu-
able online communities is the community of community practitioners. The Community
Roundtable has assembled some of the best and brightest practitioners in the industry,

The value of The Community Roundtable ranges from the regular member calls, to
research and reports, to the actual online community of community practitioners. Jim
and Rachel do an excellent job of industry analysis, content programming and member
engagement.

I believe one trend we will see in 2012 is a resurgence of interest and investment in
building on-domain communities, as brands begin to feel stretched by extended social
engagement and realize the value of hosting their customer conversations. The im-
portance and value of building online communities is only now beginning to be fully
realized. It stands that The Community Roundtable and their TheCR Network will only
become a more valuable and necessary resource for community managers and
strategists.

Bill Johnston
Director of Global Online Community
Dell

resource for myself and our community management team. Rachel and Jim ensure cov-
erage of a broad range of relevant and timely topics, so we are able to arm ourselves
with information related to our current hot-button topics such as governance, advocacy,
funding and analytics. TheCR Network is an active, social network of community and
social practitioners across industries all with the shared goal of improving and furthering
-
ing and looking for ways to increase our knowledge through active participation.

JJ Lovett
Director Community Management
CA Technologies


be invaluable and enjoy participating in the group discussions. It is exciting to see the
profession mature and programs like The Community Roundtable, WOMMA and Com-

to the role of community manager.

Sarah Mahoney
Innovation Community Manager

As the sole community and social media practitioner in a small company, The Com-

in this role two years ago, I wasn’t even sure what I did had a name. TheCR Network
provided a professional framework that legitimized the work I was doing both internally
and externally. As our company grows, TheCR continues to be a source of information
-
cial strategy. The roundtable calls give members access to the country’s leading social
business experts, and the knowledge base of Rachel, Jim and TheCR Network commu-
nity of practitioners is second to none.

Cindy Meltzer
Director of Community & Social Media
Isis Parenting


The actions of community managers, both personal and professional, are exposed for
internal and external communities to observe. We choose the role of community man-
ager knowingly because we are driven by a passion to serve, connect, educate and
learn from others. The battle scars of lessons learned are numerous, but we still show

and exclusive haven for community managers to learn from each other and experiment
with new ideas. As this role evolves and becomes a more prominent and integrated,
strategic position within the enterprise, I know I can count on The Community Round-
table to keep my growing team informed and educated.

Lauren Vargas
Community Management Strategist
Aetna

I joined The Community Roundtable in 2011 after following their publications for a
while. The Community Roundtable helps me to connect to other community and Social

their companies. What I really like about TheCR Network is that we cover topics from
-
velopment, Governance and Training as well as Support. Their publications help me to
stay up to date on the discussions in case I can’t join the live calls. In 2012 I am looking
forward to expand our membership to my whole team to make even better use of the

Lasse Wasserman
Social Media/Community Program Manager
Google


About The Community Roundtable
The Community Roundtable is dedicated to advancing the business of community. We
offer information, education, and professional development services for community and

TheCR Network - Our annual membership-based peer network of community,
social media, and social business practitioners. We run strategic, tactical, and
professional development programs and curate content and interactions in a
private online community for our members.
Our members are leading the discipline of community management at organi-
zations big and small – from Fortune 500 organizations like SAP, Aetna, CSC,

-
-

typically social business owners, social strategists or community managers.
TheCR Focus - Our monthly report subscription is perfect for busy community
leaders and people interested in staying on top of what’s happening in commu-
nity management. TheCR Focus is designed to keep subscribers in tune with the
tools, tricks and topics we’re talking about in TheCR Network.
TheCR Advisory - Our advisory services and workshops are custom designed

strategies, priorities and plans based on our own experience managing online
communities and our experience working with a wide variety of companies on
their social media and community initiatives.
Community Management Training - We partnered with WOMMA and Com-

management is both an art and science. While the roles in community man-
agement are growing and evolving rapidly there are established best practices

Specialist, Community Manager, and Community Strategist.


About This Report
We publish this State of Community Management report annually and it compiles and
curates the lessons we learned with members from the previous year. This report
extends and adds to both our 2011 report and 2010 report.

our members and visiting speakers by competency, this year we organized and curated
what we’ve learned over the past three years by maturity level. The report covers what
we’ve seen applied most commonly by members of TheCR Network.

If you are relatively new to community management, this report will provide great insight
but we also suggest you look through many of the free resources we publish and
curate.

The perspectives provided in this report represent those of various experts and practi-
tioners and may not necessarily be the best practice for every context. Because of that,
-

practitioners with whom we work.

Methodology

This report lays out a collection of artifacts, patterns and practices, initiatives, and
resources we have found to be practiced at different stages of enterprise community
maturity. We use the maturity stages of the Community Maturity Model, a framework
we developed to help organizations plan for and develop their social business and com-
munity competency.

each of which is transcribed into a detailed report.

associated with each stage of maturity.

-
out this report who have shared their expertise and wisdom with our members and we
encourage you to familiarize yourself with their work. We hope this report gives you a
valuable reference tool in your own social business initiatives and we hope you will
consider joining TheCR Network or subscribing to TheCR Focus.


Community Maturity Model

We developed the Community Maturity Model as a way of organizing and making sense
of the issues, associated competencies, and information relevant to community man-
agement as the discipline matures and extends across an enterprise. It aligns on two

Community Maturity Model
TM

Stage 1 Stage 2 Stage 3 Stage 4
Hierarchy Emergent Community Network
Community

Strategy Familiarize & Listen Participate Build Integrate

Leadership Command & Control Consensus Collaborative Distributed

Culture Reactive Contributive Emergent Activist

Community Defined roles & Integrated roles
None Informal
Management processes & processes

Content & Some user Community created Integrated formal &
Formal & Structured
Programming generated content content user generated

Policies & No Guidelines Restrictive Flexible Inclusive
Governance
Consumer tools Consumer & Mix of consumer ‘Social’ functionality
Tools used by individuals self-service tools & enterprise tools is integrated throughout

Metrics & Anecdotal Activity Tracking Activities & Content Behaviors & Outcomes
Measurement

www.community-roundtable.com

The eight competencies in the Community Maturity Model are those that must be
addressed in order to build either a successful community or a social business


Stage 1: Hierarchy – ad hoc use of social technology or community structures.
Stage 2: Emergent Community – experimental or pilot use of social and
community tools and/or processes, along with considerable investment in
creating structure to better evaluate and manage social opportunities.
Stage 3: Community – explicitly chartered, funded, and staffed social or
community initiatives resulting in measurable business outcomes.
Stage 4: Network – a corporate strategy driven by a networked market
perspective.

These stages refer primarily to the information and relationship environment of an orga-
-
zation with Emergent Community, pockets of individuals are starting to experiment with
many-to-many communications. In a Community, there are successful many-to-many
communications environments existing for a variety of different constituent groups. In
the Network stage, an organization views its markets as a set of relationships, and is
linked to the majority of market participants regardless of whether they do or do not

While these maturity stages are a continuum, certain behaviors are emerging as estab-
lished patterns of particular stages. For example, Emergent Community suggests that
-
gets, community management resources, and policies are hallmarks of an established
Community. Finally, being in the Network stage suggests integration between employ-
ee, customer, partner, and even competitor constituencies – and that the company fo-
cuses on the strength of these relationships as the foundation of its corporate strategy.

These segments inform the way we organize community management content. The

-
ers across an organization.

This report addresses the stages in the Community Maturity Model as our members
experience them. While this may not always align with the most current discussions
about each stage, we feel it represents the leading methods employed by practitioners
today.


2011 Roundtable Schedule & Topics
-
ming. These calls often include an independent expert that joins the discussion to
share their best practices and facilitate a member discussion. For members, we publish
roundtable reports summarizing the discussion and highlighting the best practices, ad-
vice, and lessons learned. Below are the roundtable calls that were held in 2011 and are
used as source material for this report, with the featured expert and core Community
Maturity Model competency listed.

January

Valeria Maltoni – PR/community management

Allen Bonde
Jacob Morgan

February
Jeremiah Owyang
leadership/community management

Thomas Vander Wal

Sara Roberts

March
Alexa Scordato – strategy/culture
Lee Odden
Andrea
Weckerle
Ken Burbary


April

Reality, and Storytelling – Paula Thornton – community management
Erin Traudt – metrics &
measurement
Neela Sakaria & Kim Gaskins –
strategy

May

community management

strategy
CV Harquail – culture
Sean O’Driscoll

June
Jeff Schick –
leadership

Paul Greenberg – strategy
Jane Hiscock

July
Cindy Meltzer – metrics & measurement

John Smith, Etienne Wenger & Nancy
White - tools/community management

August

Josh Bernoff


September

management
Bill Johnston
leadership

October
Chuck Hemann

support
Ryan Garcia

Lauren Vargas
management

November

Maddie Grant & Jamie Notter – culture

December
Lasse Wasserman & Adrienne
Bernakevitch Ludwick
Jeremiah Owyang
community management


Overview
We are in the midst of a perfect storm of market and social upheaval that is driving
profound changes in how organizations operate. The power of communities has never
been greater and it is driving organizations and governments to undergo leadership
changes at the highest levels. Those who ignore their communities do so at their own
peril. We’ve seen this in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya. We’ve also seen this happen with
Occupy Wall Street and the protest over SOPA/PIPA. And we’ve seen this in response

successes, this trend is likely to increase.

The best way for organizations to hedge against community revolts is to be an active
participant and supporter of the community itself. That can take many forms – from
listening to general online conversations, to participating in any of the many online
conversations related to the organization or its markets, to hosting the community
itself. Regardless of the approach, communities need to be integrated into the leader-
ship, culture, and operations of your organization so that decisions – whether they are
tactical or strategic– are informed by the perspective of an organization’s communities.
Crisis may be the best way to understand the need for community management, but
many organizations are seeing dramatic reduction in operational costs and increases in

align large groups of individuals – whether internal or external to organizations.

Most companies now understand this at a conceptual level, but are still struggling to
-
cal changes needed to foster better alignment with their communities. Because of this,
2011 was a year of growth in the community and social business space. There were
more case studies, more community managers, and more discussions about how com-
munities are being effectively used to deliver business results.

Social Media is Mainstream

-
cial technologies or organizations that do not have a social networking presence. This
is both good and bad news for those of us working to bring an understanding of online
communications to our organizations. We no longer have to explain social networks

can also heavily skew and limit individuals’ perceptions of how social tools can be used
effectively for business.

One of the challenges that we see is that the word community is used indiscriminately
and often applied to any group of people online. We believe online communities exhibit


A group of people with unique shared values, behaviors, and artifacts

Communities are not just a social audience of people that converse with an organiza-

relationship density much higher than you would see for a general group of people
using a common social network. These shared characteristics, common goals, and

general network of people. This sense of community is what encourages more complex

business outcome will help organizations decide what type of online network to foster.
It’s one of the most critical and basic things to understand before creating a social
business plan.

Communities are morphing however, and we see three common community structures,

Exclusive

-

retention groups

Discrete

participation

Distributed


-
munity managers and/or content curators.

As online communities become more mainstream, they are colliding with corporate cul-
tures that reward perfection, completeness, planning, and control. The cultural hurdles
that this creates will greatly limit the success of communities and social business at
many organizations. In large complex, opt-in environments, perfection is rare and com-
munities become sustainable only when members feel they – not the organizations that
sponsor them – have a say in the future of the communities. This is perhaps the biggest
challenge that organizations face as they try to adopt a more holistic social approach.

Community Management Is Continuing to Mature

in a handful of areas – online gaming, open source engineering, online media platforms,
and specialized technical support – and while a wealth of expertise developed, it was
not generally well understood or needed in broader markets. That has changed as
everything digital is also becoming social and most organizations are looking to under-
stand what community management means for them. The need has developed to help
-
ciently shared with more individuals.

In the past year a number of new community management education initiatives have
sprung up – Twitter chats, Facebook groups, conferences, unconferences and formal
training programs, including one we’ve developed in conjunction with WOMMA and
http://womma.org/communitymanager/
these resources are helping individuals at all levels of responsibility understand com-

community management means. We encourage you to explore all the resources avail-
able, learn the patterns of community management applied in different contexts and
use your own organizational needs to assess the patterns that will work in your environ-
ment. There is a considerable portion of community management that will always

there are also many things we have been able to learn together, document, and share.
The great news is that there are more sources than ever from which to learn.

Internal Employee Communities Are On the Rise

One of the most active areas of community growth is in internal communities for em-
ployees. Many organizations moved from a relatively small internal social software pilot
to enterprise-wise roll outs in 2011, bringing with it a high demand for internal commu-

internal community managers come from IT collaboration groups, internal communica-


While internal and external community management initiatives share many similar

of these complicating factors, adoption patterns and the needs of the participants are
much different than in external communities for marketing or customer support.
Employees need better ways to work, not only so that they can manage information

become comfortable with new approaches.

One of the concerns organizations have the most trouble articulating is how

communities can be used to make any of the following internal process elements

Process Type of Community Metric
Element
Research & Market Network, Communities of Quality
Discovery practice, Customer communities, - Better inputs
Partner communities - Better alignment with
markets
Productivity
- Faster time to
answer/insight

Status Updates Team networks, Functional Productivity
communities - Reduced meetings
- Micro-mentoring
- Alignment
- Focus on issue resolution

Data Analysis Team networks, Functional communi- Productivity
ties, Communities of practice, - Shared ownership of
Customer communities, analysis
Partner communities - Broad buy-in of issues &
framing
- Faster awareness and
buy-in for analysis

Content Team networks Productivity
Development - Ongoing alignment as
content is development
- Less wasted work

Stakeholder Review Team networks, Communities of Productivity
peers/practices - Transparent decision-
making process
- Better sensing of potential
responses (crisis manage-
ment)
- Shared ownership of
decision

Communication of Functional communities, Communities Productivity
Information & of practice, Customer communities, - Alignment and shared
Decisions Partner communities, organization- situational awareness
wide networks - Better understanding of
reactions (crisis manage-
ment)


A major caveat to understanding how communities contribute to internal business goals
is that when communities are integrated into processes without good boundaries and
process management, it can be much more – not less – chaotic. As an example, many
organizations are intrigued by the idea of building an “idea exchange” community.
-

effort ineffective. When, however, the challenges promoted in the community align with
the plans of the organization, they can provide valuable feedback on how to prioritize
and execute, while creating early advocates and adopters.

Internal communities have the potential to transform organizations in a vast number

clear success can be documented before the initiative is broadened to a more complex
set of objectives.

It is No Longer About the Technology.
It is Always About the Technology.

Technology is the key enabler of online communities and yet it cannot alone ensure a
successful community. Once software is selected the focus shifts to ensuring produc-

programming, content, and support become much more pressing topics once the tech-
nology decision is made. Do not wait until the platform is launched to focus on these
issues.

We continue to see the rise of new technologies and with them the need for community
managers to experiment and explore to determine business applications. Communities
– even exclusive private communities – are spilling out and interacting across the social

-
cial business initiatives grow, they need to be integrated with existing platforms, mobile
delivery channels, and more powerful analytics tools.

Community leaders need to partner with internal and external experts to ensure that
focus remains on the business goal while continually evaluating the constantly shifting
technical landscape.


It is an exciting time to be a community leader. Articulating how communities are con-
tributing value to an organization and understanding the opportunities that open up for
the organization is rewarding and inspiring. We see community leaders as explorers,
builders, and translators – charting new paths for their organizations in a complex new
environment.

Explorer

The pace of change has become dramatically faster as networked communications on

and relish the role of explorer – not only discovering emerging environmental factors,
but also exploring the behaviors, interests, and goals of their community members. This
curiosity is critical to helping communities and the organizations that sponsor them.

Builder

Community leaders must be builders. Communities and relationships will rarely, if
ever, be perfect. Successful communities are built by those who have a predilection
for action and who will experiment instead of waiting for perfect timing. While planning

resources to support a community initiative, trying to predict what the community will
do and be before it exists is impossible.

Translator

Finally, a community leader must be a translator – ensuring that different constituencies
can understand each other and making sure stakeholders know how to evaluate the op-
portunities and risks in a community approach. This is particularly critical because new
technologies can often seem like fads to enterprise stakeholders. They need to have a
discussion of realistic opportunities and risks in their own language in order to effec-
tively understand and support investment in this space.

Those leaders that can evangelize and bring the value of communities into organiza-
tions are seeing their work rewarded with increased budgets, recognition, and new
opportunities.

This is the third annual State of Community Management and we’ve learned a lot in the

with TheCR Network members about the eight critical competencies in community
-
viduals can use to build, grow, and maintain communities.


This year we felt like we’d learned enough to provide a more prescriptive view of the
path organizations take and chose to structure the report by organizational maturity
stage. We lay out the artifacts, organizational patterns, and initiatives we see
organizations undertaking as they move from those wobbly early days to a structured

the organization.

Common patterns and approaches have emerged and we hope this report provides
you and your organization with a valuable guide in executing your own community and
social business initiatives.

Finally, we would like to thank TheCR Network members and advisory clients of The
Community Roundtable who have contributed to our collective understanding in a wide
range of ways. Without our clients, members and sponsors we could not offer you this
comprehensive insight that is so valuable to understand.


CMM1

Patterns in Community Maturity

-
atively un-touched by social technologies and methods to those with a chaotic jumble
of different teams using different technologies with an inconsistent understanding of the
opportunity, risks, challenges, needs or interests of the organization.

-
proaches might help them. Most individuals have no interest. Those that do attempt

the plethora of tools and streams of data. In this stage, social can become a short-term
productivity drain, as people learn and often reinvent the wheel using social approaches.

-

social initiative. The challenge is that they are often right – the use of social tools does
cause distractions, but without investment, a thoughtful and consistent approach is
hard to develop.


CMM1

Ironically, any companies that incorporate a well-designed social media marketing ap-
proach can internally still be in CMM1, especially if most of that work is outsourced and
does not impact or touch the majority of the business.

Artifacts

Likely

restrict access and use.

awareness of how social tools and methods are applied to business.

interaction with other teams in other functional groups.

opportunity.
-
hoarding, defensiveness when asked to share, and suspicion around the use of
information.

Possible

Organizational Patterns

Start simple with monitoring. Monitoring social channels for brand and key
market terms is a good place to start. Some analysis to aggregate and report on
the volume and make-up of the mentions is valuable to gain exposure and support.
Schedule “social media socials” or other types of informal get-togethers.
Face-to-face gatherings help social leaders advocate and build awareness of
social tools and approaches.
Evangelize to naysayers and skeptics. Break down barriers to social by


CMM1

with the individual’s pain points as to how social media can be of assistance;

stories and how mistakes were overcome.
Arrange peer-to-peer discussions when

ideas from those unfamiliar with their context.
Invest in understanding the audience.
engagement, technology, and content decisions.
Say it again.

Personal and business lives are blurring: The lines between personal and

to give employees boundaries for interacting on public social networks.
Let the outside in. Companies need to understand that if they are going to
go down this path of community, they need to be prepared to include external
people into matters that would normally be discussed behind the closed doors.
Self-awareness is critical.
help others understand the obstacles, self-imposed and organizational, that are
impeding them to utilizing social approaches.
Shift the mindset. When describing social media/social learning, make sure that
it is not described as being something extra that the person has to do. Instead,
let them know that by removing whatever obstacles were blocking its use

Be human. A community mindset is embedded in most people. It is more
human than the typical transactional philosophy found in business. People
love connecting and building relationships.
Promote ecosystem thinking. The more that you can think about your orga-
nization as a member of a larger network, the easier it is to connect with the
people you are trying to serve and those that either positively or negatively
impact the network.
It is still business. There still needs to be a value proposition with any business
initiative. Be intentional with whom the organization connects with, what the
ideal outcome is, and how that positively impacts the business.
Education is the key to success. Senior executives, legal and all potential par-
ticipants need a grassroots approach to understanding social media before they
can understand the bigger picture.
Mavericks matter. This journey often begins with leadership at a grassroots
level, by someone who sees the changing opportunities and risks and takes a
chance.


CMM1

Take stock. An internal audit often shows that there is already activity happen-
ing in the social arena. This helps to highlight to senior executives that all this
organic activity could continue with zero governance or it could be structured
in order to get the most value out of it. Audits can help get the ball rolling for
broader funding and attention.
Recruit leaders who can be pioneers. This is going to feel like pushing a

Establish a framework. It is very important to create a roadmap that outlines

this way.
Most experience lies outside of the organization. Recognize the importance
of networking with external colleagues, organizations, and experts. One organi-
zation cannot know all there is to know.
Don’t block the box. In order to make the adoption of social media more suc-
cessful, work to allow access to social media sites if they are currently blocked.
Broad adoption and understanding cannot happen without experimentation.
Legal is on your side. Legal teams are not necessarily a roadblock. Yes, they
-
ronments. Continuous education and information sharing is critical and helps to

The technology is the easiest piece: Finding the right technology for your

hardest piece because that skill set and experience does not reside within most
companies right now.
Translate. Explain social media in terms of the organization’s business objec-
tives. The critical outcome is to convince executives that you know how to trans-
late social media into business objectives.
Ask for the right things.

which tactics your business is particularly sensitive to and always make sure
your tactics comply.
To lead a social business initiative one needs to be a
-
zation takes a degree of personal and professional risk.
Ask the right questions.

Understand the value of lurking. Just about everything we do online markets
to the lurker. Even though they are not commenting, it does not mean that they


CMM1

are not reading. They are watching how you respond and what you write to other
people. People have different engagement tipping points and many need to lurk
for a long time.
Understand the two C’s. Consistency and cadence is critical to model the ex-
pectations you have for member engagement
Include others in your content. The best way to get your content shared is to
collaborate with others on it. They will likely share the content with their network.
Relevancy matters. If you are not sure about what content would be relevant
to your audience, or just do not have any content yet, simply ask your audience
outright via both conversations and surveys
Reduce and reuse work. Communicate the “what’s in it for me” element of

presence will reduce the amount of time that people with expertise are called
into meetings and/or asked to sit on projects because his/her expertise is much
more accessible.
Know your audience. When sharing social media successes, keep it focused
on the audience with whom you are speaking.

Initiatives

Recruit one or more executives sponsors
Identify cross-functional champions

technologies and dynamics
Create an operational framework and roadmap
Complete a social business audit or gap analysis
Start a listening program

do for the business and adopts the mission to bring that knowledge into the
organization.


CMM1

Reading & Resources

Books
Drive, Daniel Pink
Trust Agents
Sway
Groundswell
The Power of Pull: How Small Moves, Smartly Made, Can Set Big Things in
Motion
The Now Revolution

Reports

The 2010 State of Community Management Report
The 2011 State of Community Management Report

Other
Social Media is not a fad
Social Business Evidence is Mounting, Best Cases of 2011
Social Media Usage Statistics
The Community Roundtable’s Resources
How social technologies are extending the organization
List of Social Media Management Systems
Social Media Monitoring Solutions


CMM2

Stage 2 – Emergent Community

task of organizing, assessing opportunity, researching, learning, developing an opera-
tional approach, and marshaling resources. The investments early in this stage tend
to be limited; activity is happening in a relatively small group of individuals and costs
accrue around consulting, advisory work, research, and training to support the work of
that core team. Once critical decisions are made about the organizational approach,

Early in CMM2 is an exciting time for the individuals involved is social business ap-
proaches because they have a better understanding of the opportunities and they can

-
est of a variety of stakeholders so there is more interest and often, tangible support

organize a social strategy and having more structure helps reduce the chaos and as-
suage some of the fears.

By early CMM2 there is some level of executive awareness and support – even if it is
still limited to pilots and trials to determine the real opportunity at the enterprise level.


CMM2

Management is still, however, generally cautious or adverse to social and community
approaches. For those responsible for social initiatives, the goal for stakeholders in this
stage is education. This can take many different forms with the objective of enabling

further investments.

The purpose of early CMM2 is to get critical decisions made and to spread the under-

Once these decisions are made, planning and budgeting cycles are then aligned to
bring those decisions to life and social business initiatives move into a more operational

Infrastructure: Social applications, tools & integration services.
Resources: Community managers, social media managers, content specialists,
data analysts, business analysts and trainers.
Training: External and internal resources and programs to address formal and
informal learning across the enterprise.
Content & Programs: budget to support events, content development, and
content curation to support communities and encourage engagement.
Measurement: Tools and/or services to help determine whether you’re achiev-
ing your objectives in social environments.
External Resources: Consultants, trainers, research, and expertise from outside

The latter part of CMM2 is focused on deploying and optimizing approaches. This

This process can and does separate out the organizations that have effectively commit-
ted to a social business approach and those that may not have the culture or leadership
will-power to retain the focus needed to mature. Those organizations that better under-
stand their cultural limitations and opportunities are more likely to make it through this
Gartner reference
of the key challenges faced by social business teams is that organizations may not see
scaled outcomes that are convincing, due in part to the fact that it is not possible before
the approach is operationalized and optimized. This period can be very hard to
navigate, particularly if executive sponsors and advocates are not committed. It is

be protected during this period of fear, uncertainty, and doubt?


CMM2

The conclusion of CMM2 occurs when social business initiatives start producing
results at a meaningful scale to the organization. It is a time of great relief and much
rejoicing. Progress and success are obvious and the individuals that took the biggest
risks are often rewarded with acknowledgement and recognition.

Artifacts

Likely

existing marketing or support content.

form.

social media/community initiatives.

Possible

individuals and teams involved with communities.

website.


CMM2

networks.


Develop an integrated social strategy approach. This will insure you do not

them vet their idea in the context of evaluation, design/launch and manage/
monitor.
Develop a proactive approach.

within the business.
Understand the importance of education. Internal evangelism is the key ele-

resources than most organizations anticipate.
Make friends with legal, compliance, fraud, etc. Get the control functions of

executive team. This is important because if legal is on board then executives
are not able to hide behind legal risks as a reason for not moving forward.
Help early teams win. -

typically groups that are treated as the inhibitors of change organizationally, but
that is often misplaced. They want to support progress, but in a way that miti-
gates risk to the organization - collaborate with them on this.
Ensure scalability. Educate stakeholders within the company who want to use

sheet that outlines their plans and needs, including what they need from a cen-
tralized social business team
The best way to receive funding and approval for a
growing social initiatives is to get creative and “skinny down the ask”, to make
it small enough to do the initial experiment that proves the business case. Also,
-
ness case that people can rally around.


CMM2

Centralize the role of the social team. This approach will work with the internal
and external partners, as well as many internal functional departments and
business units.
Foster a community management mindset. Community management should
-
munity management mindset includes transparency, engaging the members
and/or volunteers, soliciting feedback, inclusion and the support and sharing of
other people’s ideas.
Develop strategies for overcoming objections from naysayers and skeptics.
- Meet with the skeptics in an informal setting vs. a business meeting.
- Acknowledge any concerns and show concrete examples that resonate
with the individual’s pain points as to how social media can be of assistance.
- Make videos and tell stories about social media.
Empower your community manager. The community manager needs to be

them the authority to go directly to a source for answers and set the expectation
that they need to receive straight answers.
Ask people frank questions about social media and community. There are a

-

feel that they are being heard within their organizations. The second statement
exposes trust issues in an organization’s culture.
Start early with the legal team. Discuss policies with your legal team months
ahead of the launch phase. Realize that this is a time-consuming task.
Invest in listening. It is vital that a company invest in monitoring software. Not
only will it give you a true picture of your brand perception, but it will also prove
invaluable in helping you determine your social strategy by exposing hidden op-
portunities and challenges.
It will not necessarily
be the market leader. Vendor intangibles are things like maintenance and sup-
port, etc. Accordingly, an organization should understand the vendor’s strategy
and roadmap and insure it maps to the organization’s goals.

needed to support the business goal and then align the software choices around

Start simple.

-
plicity to understand what is available to them.
Social comfort is critical to tool adoption.
of trust. The concept is right, but a term like “social comfort” might be a better


CMM2

software and comfort with the content.
To SaaS or not to SaaS? When considering whether to go with a hosted plat-
form or in-house, consider the issues of integration, managing entitlements and
data integration with community members and CRM. The other concern with

Know your ROI expectations. There are considerable differences between a
large organization and a small company in regards to the importance of short
-
ties and expectations before building ROI models and estimates.
Don’t track too often. ROI from community activity typically takes a while
because you are looking to change behaviors and that takes time. Tracking on a
daily or weekly basis may give you the wrong picture and it is often time wasted.
Consider your goals, if they are simple tracking on a weekly basis may be ap-

All members are not created equal. -
derstanding that difference and treating segments differently can help you reach

Executives have become numb to copious amounts of data. What gives

to tell a story is a powerful approach when sharing with executives.
Develop social stewards. When implementing an open culture create a social
stewardship program. The social steward role is the linchpin needed to help

also reducing the risk to the organization. These individuals work hands-on with
employees throughout the organization with a focus on promoting adoption and
coaching others.
Keep a global perspective. Build governance, stewardship programs, and cul-
tural initiatives to meet the needs of your entire enterprise. A narrow initial focus

Develop good judgment. A guidebook does not exist with all the appropriate
responses to follow for each and every interaction in social media. It takes train-
ing and experience. Ensure social and community teams have access to peers

Know your data sources. When setting up advanced listening initiatives it is criti-
cal to understand where data is coming from and what data is not being included.
Understand the purpose of social monitoring.
market to the masses, the social monitoring industry has created a bit of a mon-
ster by making it appear simple in their marketing. It is not simple. In fact, it has
evolved to a point where this is now a broader, consumer insights’ research type
of tool that has applications across the company. The depth of the monitoring
will depend on the needs of your organization and its goals. The main features


CMM2

and functionalities focus on engagement and response, text analysis, sentiment

Start managing at the outset. Without effective management of a community,

try and reign back control vs. facilitating it from the start.
Growing groups. Without effective community management, there is the risk of

because people join the group that is about everything. Time can be wasted try-

can silo information and conversations, also making it hard to locate. Finding the
right balance comes with experience.
Know your organization.
online communities could be authenticity-related challenges. In other words,
-
tion of how the company would really do this if it were being true to itself.
Build in hooks for engagement. It is important to have a hook within the com-
munity that keeps people coming back. This can vary by community and can

recognition.
Some critical lessons from participating in communities have helped com-
munity managers:
- Cultivate pride and identity
- Nurture the shared passion that brought this community together
- Build camaraderie
- Find altruism
- Generate excitement
- Build a sense of duty within the community
- Fun is critical ingredient
Use surveys to understand where to allocate budget. When deciding where

the effectiveness of this best practice, follow up with a phone call to the survey
respondents.
With regards to legal regulations, there’s no such thing as “The Wild West.”
The misconception is that this is all new, so therefore there are few rules. There

adapt existing rules/laws within social media until such time as new laws can
be enacted.
Don’t shoot the messenger. Lawyers do want to help their business clients
win, but they cannot change the rules. Their job is to help their clients and busi-


CMM2

that the risks are almost always external. Lawyers give advice based on those
external risks.
You get the legal advice you ask for. Lawyers worry about whether or not the
business client has been honest and forthcoming with all the facts or that some-
thing has changed without the lawyer being informed after s/he has imparted
his/her advice. That gap in information or change may have a material impact on
the advice that has been given.
If you want a better answer than “it depends”, do not play in the lawyer’s
world.
-
gest risk areas that I can do something about?” If you ask a lawyer for that kind
of guidance, then he/she can speak from experience based on what they have
seen, on emerging issues or actual cases. In turn, the lawyer will be able to give
you some steps to help you work with your business team to mitigate those
potential risks.

Initiatives

Build an operational framework and roadmap
Develop a comprehensive budget
Formalize an enterprise-wide governance structure
Deploy social software
Develop community management expertise and tools
Create metrics scorecards for various reporting levels
Document response and escalation processes

of experience with the new technologies, interest, and position in the organiza-
tion. These early leaders are sometimes replaced or supplemented with outside
hires.

-
ogy, community management, training, and governance.

make meaningful enterprise impact, but enough to show their potential to do so.


CMM2

Reading & Resources

Books
Online Community Management for Dummies
Digital Habitats – Stewarding Technology for Communities
The New Social Learning
Get Bold
Social Media ROI
Smart Business, Social Business

Reports

- How Corporations Should Prioritize Social Business Budgets
- Career Path of the Corporate Social Strategist: Be Proactive or Become
Social Media Help Desk
- A Strategy for Managing Social Media Proliferation

- The Shift Index - 2011

- 2011 Tech Trends Report

- Social Business Survey Results

- Community Health Index

Articles, Presentations & Posts
Differentiating Between Social Media and Community Management
How To Develop a Business-Aligned Social Media &
Social Networking Strategy

Enterprise Social Tools & The Knowledge Organization
Designing Metrics for Online Customer Communities
Metrics & Measuring Success in Online Communities
Measuring E2.0 Success & Business Value – Metrics & Analysis
Build a Content Plan & Successful Community Management
How to create an editorial calendar
New Media, New Metrics, New Lessons
Crisis Communications in Social Media: Are You Ready?


CMM2

Other Resources
Social Media Policies Database
Social Media Governance & Policy Database
Case Studies, Ideas, and Reports
Glassdoor
Troll Taxonomy


CMM3

Stage 3 – Community

milestone – they are seeing business returns from their community or communities at
a meaningful scale for the organization. While this allows the community management
team to take a collective sigh of relief because the pressure to prove the approach
dissipates, it creates new challenges in sustaining and managing growth. One of the
biggest risks is the perception that now that the community is successful, community
management can take a back seat or be de-prioritized because members have taken
on a lot of community management responsibilities themselves.

One of the biggest business decisions during CMM3 is whether a community approach
will remain something applied to discrete business goals or whether it will be incorpo-
rated into a broader business strategy and drive major changes to the organizational
business model. For many organizations, achieving and maintaining a CMM3 envi-
ronment will satisfy their needs and interests. A smaller percentage of organizations
will have the opportunity and interest in transforming their organizations through to a
networked approach to operations. Regardless of the long-term vision, organizations
-

CMM4.


CMM3

For individual employees, CMM3 can be a very unsettling period because no longer can
-
ronment. For the business processes the community supports, power is shared with the
-
ing this shifting power dynamic becomes something all employees who interact with the
community become responsible for. Community management is critical to help achieve
a healthy balance of power and to help navigate the myriad of hiccups that occur as
this ongoing negotiation happens.

While community management was primarily focused on organizing an approach and
selling a vision in CMM2, the responsibilities for community management shift in CMM3
-

community management is reprioritized, the community can often overwhelm the orga-
nization because of its emerging power. The tone and authenticity of engagement plays
a critical role in preventing either a reactionary stance from management or worse, a
community revolt. The risks associated with a CMM3 can come as a big shock to an
organization that, having made it up the mountain, now expects a relatively easy path to
future success.

CMM3 is where the bulk of the organizational culture and leadership change happens.
While a group of leaders likely made this leap during CMM2, the scale of the commu-
nity effort now touches a much larger percentage of the organization. Individuals who
were either not interested or skeptical during earlier periods now have to acknowledge
the community as a productive part of the organization and pay more attention. Many
people may do so unenthusiastically because it forces them to change how they oper-
ate. These changes can make people feel inept because the new approaches are so
unfamiliar. Education initiatives become vital to supporting and familiarizing all employ-

structures

CMM3 is usually where an organization stays for a long time, often for the foreseeable
-

-
tional approach and move toward CMM4.


CMM3

Artifacts

Likely

community activities across the organization.

individuals and teams involved with communities.

the most senior levels of the organization.

dynamics work.

expanded points of interaction to meet customers everywhere that they want to
interact across the web.

management use cases.

and customers.

or community are discussing business on external social channels.

measurement.


CMM3

Possible

emergent leaders.
-
plicable business functions.

website.
-

discussion and which consumed months of internal attention.

opportunities.

with corporate values in the hiring process.
Online communication skills are included in the employee development processes.


Actively listen for change. Watch for shifting narrative in the community and

change and update public statements according to what is being said in social
media channels.
Watch and adapt. Community members may not use the community as it was
designed or envisioned by the organization. Community members want what
they want, not what organizations want to give them. Be ready to reassess initial

too far away from your goals.

community.
Conduct war games. When working towards an open culture, reduce executive
anxiety and prepare the organization by getting fears out on the table, articulat-
ing worst-case scenarios, and planning hypothetical responses. Include a cross-
section of leaders from various functions.


2012 State of Community Management

2012 State of Community Management

2012 State of Community Management

2012 State of Community Management

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