I agree with Daniel.  I don't think it should be a requirement to be an SME to run the community. And with a large enough community staff it should not be the community manager's job to be the expert.  The best case would be the comm manager is the expert on running the community, while each part of the community has its own SMEs.  For example, the forum moderator for individual forums is the expert on the forum topic.  If that is not possible, then the forum manager knows SMEs to contact to get forum questions answered. It is helpful to have SMEs somewhere to help the community along, definitely.

Firstly, I like your blue guitar---looks like the guitar that Jimmy Hendrix burned on stage at Woodstock in the 60's.

Secondly, I work for Intel and Josh works for Intel (full disclosure).

Thirdly, Josh taught me most of what I needed to know to start our first "channel (partner) community (private community called "Channel Voice") for about 200,000 partners.

Now that I got the admin duties out of the way...

I like the concept of, to steal the term from Peter Drucker, "information broker". Currently, I have about three different community managers and none of them are "deep" experts on almost any related topic (including me;)). Just to be clear, they are incredibly smart, but not "deep subject matter experts" regarding our customers needs. That said, they are incredible "brokers of information". Simply put, they find informational gaps and find experts to fill them. We have found with our channel customers that they are very patient and kind to "information brokering"...essentially "hey, that is a great question and i will help get a detailed answer...back soon".  This model presumes that the broker can identify and persuade the "expert" to participate wether directly (i.e. answering the question directly to the customer in the discussion area) or indirectly (providing the answer to the broker). Most of the time, we find that the expert is more than interested in directly participating (now they are hooked). There is something very, very compelling about asking a person for help to solve an "actual" customer problem. The directness and transparency of the relationship is incredibly compelling. In some cases I have had VP's participate in an answer--all too delighted to truly connect with a customer.

In summary, we have found that information brokers are a necessary and valuable part of our team solution and can generally "manage" a community, understanding that the "health" of the community is a huge team effort involving brokers and experts...and others.

S

Hi Scott,

I absolutely love the use of "information broker" in this discussion! It encompasses all of the right imagery for the role of the community manager's engagement with the community.

You summed it all up perfectly!

We too experience what you do at Intel when it comes to helping people. People just really enjoy and gain satisfaction from helping others, whether another employee at EMC, a customer or partner. It's a very neat thing to see.

Thanks for your thoughtful and thought-provoking response!

-Jamie

Hello Jamie,

Per your post, I have a couple of recommendations that may or may not be useful, and that you may or may not have already tried.

The first issue you mentioned (that comes to mind) is trying to "sell the community". I have lived the issue for 2 years now and I have found (probably after lots of wine and speaking with Josh Hilliker) that it is not about "selling the community". Yes, I am being dramatic for theatrical purposes...here is what I mean by that strong statement.

We human's (7,500 generations and 85 billion people later) are still quite simple emotional creatures;) Thus, we have a very hard time imagining/comprehending "abstract" ideas and "believing" in their usefulness (i.e. utility). Typical analogies are folks with horses and carriages trying to imagine a car. Or, in 1993 trying to explain that 65 million searches will be done each hour on a thing called Google, on a thing call the Internet. My point is, the idea or concept of community is simply too vague, abstract and utterly useless to most folks on the pilot (except for perhaps a quarter of a percent--you and I are in that category).

So, switching to tactical and practical methods, I don't even mention the word "community". Instead I use very, very simple techniques to "entice" Intel folks to participate in "community activities". As alluded to in a previous post, as an information broker (there are probably 5-7 on my team that fulfill this role), we identify questions and issues from customer and then the magic happens.

For example, just last week, I found a question about our new "services" for channel customers. It had been about 24 hours since the question was posted, so I stepped in and took action. Once I understood the question, I identified two folks at Intel that were experts (in some cases I have to find folks that know folks that are experts). Then, I email the question to the expert. It goes something like this...

"Hey Glen, it has been a long time since we have connected, but I have a customer with a really interesting question and I thought of you. I have also sent this same question to another team mate in case she has other perspectives to the customer question. I have attached a PDF of the discussion with the customers question, but to make it even easier, the URL link is right here [insert URL] (Clearspace does both of these rather easily). All you have to do is click on the link, read the question and provide an answer. I know this customer is anxious to better understand your "product services". Lastly, I have also asked your manager to post a blog as well. As a VP in the group, her views and opinions are really valuable to our customers."

Of course, with these subtle, but persuasive "sales techniques" I have yet to be ignored. How many folks are going to ignore a plea from a customer, particularly when I sincerely ask for their help and make it incredibly easy to participate...AND BY THE WAY, I never mention that this was a community and that they need to participate. The COMMUMITY IS A MEANS TO AN END. The real story is simple, Glen is a hero for helping a customer.

This is the short story of one way we gain support for our community (over 125 Intel folks participating in the private channel partner community--we can it Channel Voice).

In most cases, once the Intel person has answered a question for a customer, and the customer is grateful, they are hooked, and of course, begin to fully understand the richness and value of the other community features. I call this bottom up sales not top down. Sell the idea of participation one customer at a time, not "hey communities are important, you need to get involved (blah, blah, blah). Communities are not important they are just features, but the "benefit" is to help real customers with real problems, it just happens that the means to this end is "enterprise social media features" (ouch my head hurts just saying all those words together;)).

In summary my most successful method for getting support (after much trial and error and guidance from folks much smarter than me--not hard to do) is emailing one Intel "expert" at a time, with the URL (and couple other tricks) and simply stating that a customer needs help. Any of us that worked in retail (or any sales for that matter) instantly appreciate the value of helping a customer. We intuitively know that helping customers lead to sales. In a sense, the most compelling ROI model is that "business" social media is most importantly a sales activity--duh. Helping customer before, during and after sales is as basic as it gets. The fact that we can now (with social software features) help more customer more often with minimal effort...that is a heck of a deal.

So back to your main point, don't try to convince EMC folks to join a community, simply ask them to help with a customer issue. I hope this very simple concept help.

Oh, by the way, once that employee is hooked, they becomes loyal sales people for you as well and hence the "network effect" (aka geometric growth). One of my favorite dynamics, is that that new "born again" employee will tell their boss how cool and effective the experience was--to help a customer. Then the manager will begin to see value. So eventually VP's (for example) will also be involved and in this case (a true story), Glen (a team mate) was so excited, he asked his VP to get involved, then that VP (very smart women) evangelized to another director...pretty fun to watch.

Notice, i haven't mentioned anything about training large groups. I have found that to be nearly useless. The lowest common denominator generally kicks in. Specifically, paranoia and fear of a few start to invest the larger group and it moves to gossip of abuse issue and "what happened on Facebook last week". Total was of time.

cheers,

Scott