What Is Social Media Community Management?

You post something.

Someone comments.

What happens next?

For a surprising number of brands, the answer is not very much.

Which feels like a missed opportunity.

Community management is what happens around the content: the comments, questions, DMs, conversations, feedback and opportunities created when people interact with your brand.

Because social media isn't supposed to be a one-way broadcast channel.

Community management is more than answering questions

Customer service can be part of it, but the role is much broader.

A good community manager understands the brand well enough to have conversations in its voice.

They know when to answer a question seriously, when there's an opportunity for humour and when something needs escalating internally.

They also listen.

What questions keep appearing?

What are people excited about?

What are they getting wrong?

What are they asking the brand to do next?

Your audience is giving you research for free every day.

Should you respond to every comment?

Not necessarily.

A fire emoji probably doesn't require a five-paragraph response.

The objective isn't achieving a 100% response rate for the sake of a spreadsheet.

It's knowing where the brand can genuinely add something.

Sometimes that's answering a question.

Sometimes it's acknowledging somebody.

Sometimes it's turning one funny comment into an entire conversation.

Good community management requires judgement.

The opportunity extends beyond your own posts

Some of the best community opportunities happen elsewhere.

People are discussing your category, competitors and interests all over social.

Proactive community management means understanding when your brand has a credible reason to join those conversations.

The important word there is credible.

Not every viral post needs your brand underneath it making a joke.

Shaka in practice

Our example of how we create community interaction is with our clients James Porter & Sons. 

Their boutiques have garnered a loyal community over years as experts in watches and jewellery, and we use socials as a way to interact, share opinions, stories and expertise with loyal customers and new faces. 

Realising that the comment section was a goldmine for content, we built those comments and interactions into the content strategy as we moved forward in our relationship with the client.

From a 3-part series answering questions from the comments, to sending in pictures of their watches for staff to react to, and even bringing a watch collector and top client of theirs to do a series with the owner to show off his favourite watches and tell the stories behind them. 

Community building now shapes the content itself.

Having this platform for community management creates another touchpoint for James Porter & Sons to emphasise their skills and knowledge in product, as well as give customers a chance to interact with other watch and jewellery enthusiasts and the experts. 

Your community can influence the content

This is one of the biggest opportunities.

Community shouldn't sit in isolation.

The person reading hundreds of comments every week has an incredibly useful view of what the audience actually cares about.

That information should make its way back into content and strategy.

The best community management doesn't just respond to the conversation.

It helps decide what the brand says next.