Community management is one of the hardest roles to hire for in tech right now. Yes, you read that right — community managers, not developers.
You see, it’s not about scarcity of talent; it’s about the quality of talent. Most folks assume that they can hire just any college grad who was “born social” and, voila, you’ve got a community manager! Unfortunately, this assumption often leads to mismatched expectations and skills, non-quite-fulfilled roles, and poor performance. Finding someone who has the right blend of strategic and tactical experience for your product can be quite a challenge.
Before even finding the right candidate for the job, however, there a few questions that you can ask yourself that will exponentially increase your new hire’s chance of success.
1. Is it actually a community manager that you need?
While the goals of community are clear, many startups remain unsure about what their community manager should be accountable for. The big question is: Does this role align with what you hope for your future hire to accomplish? If you’re looking for a dramatic and quick increase in new users, you’d be better off hiring an acquisition marketer. If you want a million fans on Facebook, hire a social media specialist. Likewise, if you’re looking for someone to take support off your plate, hire a support manager.
Certainly, all of these roles touch community, but are not community roles in and of themselves. Hire a community manager if you want someone who will own the relationships with users, advocate on users behalf, connect users with each other, increase engagement and increase retention.
2. What kind of community manager does my community need?
A community manager at any given company can touch any part of the business, ranging from operations to marketing to product. So ask yourself: in what manner is it appropriate for your users to engage with each other? Is it through the product, on social platforms, or is it in real life at events? Maybe all three! Or, it’s possible that it’s not at all appropriate for your users to connect with each other.
Just like developers and designers, community managers tend to specialize in specific areas of the community “stack” such as event planning, scaling, content, support, product, or program management. Answering this question will help you better target the specific skills that you need in your community manager and recruit accordingly.
3. What kind of person will be able to authentically represent my community?
It’s very common practice these days for startups to hire their later-stage community managers from the ranks of their own community, and for good reason. No matter how excellent your community manager is at his/her job, if they’re unable to relate to their users in an authentic way, they will never be able to fully empathize with the community, and this impacts day-to-day decisions. So, if you’re a food startup, find someone who is obsessed with food. If you’re a product for busy moms, hire a former nanny, and so on.
At the end of the day, it’s important that your community manager embody the community. While many of the tactical skills of community management can be taught, and the strategies can be learned with experience, nothing can replace authenticity.