Community Management
The practice of building, growing, and managing online communities around a brand or interest.
Definition
Community management encompasses building, growing, nurturing, and moderating online communities where customers, fans, and prospects interact with each other and your brand. This includes social media engagement, forum moderation, user group facilitation, and cultivating brand advocates.
Effective community management creates spaces where members find value beyond the product itself—peer support, exclusive content, networking, early access, and belonging to something larger. It transforms customers into community members and advocates.
Why It Matters
Strong communities create sustainable competitive advantages. Community members have higher retention rates, lifetime value, and advocacy behavior. They provide peer support that reduces service costs and generate authentic content and referrals.
In a world of declining organic reach and rising ad costs, owned communities provide direct access to engaged audiences without paying per impression.
Examples in Practice
A SaaS company's user community reduces support tickets by 40% as members help each other, while identifying power users for advocacy programs.
A fitness brand's Facebook group creates accountability partnerships among members, improving product results and retention.
A B2B company's Slack community becomes the industry's go-to networking space, generating constant qualified leads and thought leadership opportunities.