Research Exec Izzy provides an insight into our online communities we run here at Mustard…
Over the past few weeks, Mustard have been running some interesting pop-up communities across a range of topics – from the impacts of adverse credit, to the love of the great outdoors.
As community managers, it’s vital that we are all-hands-on-deck to make sure that our communities run smoothly. But what does that entail, exactly? Let me fill you in on a typical day in my life as a community manager on a pop-up community. (A pop-up community typically runs between 1-3 weeks, allowing for lots of data gathering over a short period).
9am – The first thing I do when I log on in the morning is check on engagement from the previous evening. How many topic responses do we have? How many participants left a comment? How many more responses do we need in the timeframe? It’s important to check that the community is on track and moving forward. I’ll also be checking my emails to make sure no participants have reached out for help.
9:30am – Next, I’ll typically chase any respondents that are behind on topics. Our brilliant community platform, Qualzy, sends automatic email reminders anyway – but it’s always good to check-in on any participants that have fallen behind, to make sure everything is okay and that they will continue posting.
10am – Then comes one of my favourite tasks – moderating. I’ll take my time going through and reading participant’s responses. I’ll be asking them questions on answers that need elaborating, or simply giving them a thank you and building rapport. I think this is a really important part of the community experience – it lets participants know that their responses are seen, heard, and meaningful. It also allows us to get that little extra juicy bit of insight that something like a survey might not potentially get.
It’s also important that whilst I’m reading responses, I’m gathering ideas for the future storyboarding meeting. What themes are jumping out? What are the key drivers or motivators? What’s causing happiness or upset or confusion? In relation to the project objectives, I’ll be noting down these ideas to bring forward, discuss with my team, and flesh out at a later point. Qualzy is great for this – the highlighting tool lets us put a spotlight on important ideas or hard-hitting quotes, and the tagging tool assists us in creating personas.
2pm – Cut forward a few hours to the afternoon, and it’s back to the community. I’ll be checking on the movement of the participants I chased earlier, and looking for new comments to moderate. I’ll also be troubleshooting any problems that might have arisen throughout the day. Sometimes participants can have trouble logging on or recording the videos that are asked of them during the community, so I’ll be working with them personally to help fix these issues.
5pm – Just before the end of the day, I’ll send my team a quick update on how the community is progressing, and note down any priorities for the next day (for example, ensuring any pending issues or follow-up questions are seen to).
Although, this isn’t just an end of day thing – periodically, I’ll be checking in with my project team throughout the day to let them know how it’s going, and to discuss interesting participant responses. Most of the team will be following a similar day as me, moderating and noting ideas, so it makes for super interesting (and important!) discussion throughout the project. Sharing the moderation really helps time-wise, too!
Of course, the days differ depending on what stage of the community you’re in – in the first few days you’re mostly welcoming participants, and in the last you’re thanking and administering incentives! It’s great that not every day of the project is the exact same.
Evidently, being a community manager is an incredibly important role. This day repeats for a week or two, typically. But it’s super fulfilling work; the reason I love communities is because you have the opportunity to really form a connection with the participants over time. When you hear from someone every day, and they hear back from you, it creates real connections that are likely to yield more genuine and authentic insights.