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In the interest of distilling the most popular takeaways and key data points from this year's State of Community Management: The Value of Community Management report (2013 SOCM), Ning partnered with The Community Roundtable to produce a three part infographic that includes a profile of the average community manager, information on the central role of community managers, and community engagement standards.
The 2013 SOCM builds on previous qualitative research, like 2012's Lessons from Community and Social Business Leaders, to offer a quantitative look at how community management functions within organizations and the value to expect from those efforts over time. Information was aggregated from over 100 survey participants, myself included, who answered questions relating to organizational demographics, community programs, funding, community management practices, and community demographics. The goal of the research was to characterize and describe the value of business communities and report on how community management impacts their success. It was a major undertaking with incredible results. And the response from the social business community has been overwhelming to boot. The 2013 SOCM has been written up by Social Fish, Dachis Group, Jeff Esposito, Maria Ogneva, and Rosemary O'Neill to name a few.
We had the pleasure of collaborating with Maggie Tunning, Rachel Happe, Leanne Chase, and TheCR Network's rockstar research innovation and management team who dug deep into the data so we didn't have to. Without their efforts, how would we know that 22% of organizations outsource at least some community management duties, or that when hiring a community manager, soft skills are valued over technical skills? We wouldn't. And these are important learnings in a fast-evolving social business landscape where more and more companies are investing in online communities.
Infographic: The central role, responsibilities and value of a community manager. <click to tweet>
Special thanks go out to Ning and Glam Media's very own Crystal Coleman, Jean Hsuehz, Vic Zaud, and Sheena Yang for the ideation, design and execution of this #2013SOCM infographic.