Kyle Harrison
report

The 2020 Community Industry Trends Report

2020 View original ↗

The 2020 Community Industry Trends Report

CMX’s survey of the community-management profession — with the caveat carried on the page itself: the responses were collected through 2019, so nothing in it reflects what COVID did to communities.

Notes

  • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZG2qlwc0uc&feature=youtu.be
  • Community is starting to command budget: 65% of organizations say they “will be increasing their budget for community over the next 12 months.”
  • Key metrics for community management: Customer engagement and retention are the key goals of community programs (replacing customer support in previous reports)
  • ** Increasing need for CRM-like functionality:** “Fewer than one-third of community professionals are using a CRM that connects community data back to customer data.”
  • Focus on scaling communities: 59% of community professionals are focused on scaling an existing community as opposed to revitalizing or building one from scratch
  • Target audience is customers and then developers: 43% of primary participants in a community are customers; 12% are developers. While lessons can be learned from open source community management the bulk of the focus is on customer communities
  • Report Notes::
    • “In this study, 88% of community professionals said that community is critical to their company’s mission and 85% said that their community has had a positive impact on their business.”
      • Feels like a biased sample size; only people who see Community as critical to their business would employ “community professionals.”
    • Fewer than 1 in 5 report they struggle with budget, and 65% say their organization will be increasing their budget for community over the next 12 months.
    • Even though organizations are investing in community, at least a third of respondents struggle to quantify the value of the communities.
      • Bigger question of “quantifying” that value; how do you track and calculate that ROI? Community CRM
    • The type of metrics community professionals track are often vanity measures instead of something that ties directly to business value — and the core objectives of their communities. The most common objective of branded communities is customer retention and loyalty. Yet, fewer than half of those who cite this as the primary goal for their communities, are tracking retention as a metric. Metrics
    • This makes sense, as fewer than one-third of community professionals are using a CRM that connects community data back to customer data. That means, for more than two thirds of the industry, it’s impossible to connect community data back to retention-driven revenue.
    • ==“Increasing engagement is the top frustration for both online and in-person communities.”==
    • Customer retention is the primary goal for most communities, both in-person and online. This is a shift from our last report in which customer support was the top goal.
    • “Community Manager” is the title for 45% of respondents and by far the most common title
    • In 2017, 28% of communities had existed for more than 5 years, and this number has since grown to 42%.
    • “The blending of offline programs with online programs can supercharge engagement and customer success.” Erica Kuhl, VP of Community at Salesforce
    • Local meetups are most common (82% of respondents) with conferences / summits close behind at 63%
    • Facebook and Slack are still the most common tools for hosting these communities but it’s quite fragmented:
    • Biggest difficulties for OFFLINE communities are getting members to attend, having largely manual processes, and difficulty quantifying the value of the community
    • Very similar frustrations with ONLINE communities. One key interesting difference: difficulty consistently engaging members vs. just getting them to attend, and then quantifying value and having largely manual processes
    • Often the value of community is measured more by vanity metrics (e.g. number of event attendees or even just the number of events held)
      • What should the key metrics be?
        • Retention?
        • NPS?
        • New pipeline created?
      • Metrics most commonly used?
    • Community CRM
      • 28% of respondents said they “have a CRM that connects community and customer data”
        • I really want to know what they’re using
  • Video Notes::
    • Bevy acquired CMX
    • Fear: Community Management is just a re-wrapping of Customer Success and the best outcome you can hope to have is Gainsight-sized outcomes
    • What is better?
      • Online scales, requires less budget, better for customer support, and easier to measure
      • In-person events has better customer retention and business business value
    • SPACE Model
      • Support
      • Product
      • Acquisition
      • Contribution
      • Engagement
    • Only 7% can measure impact of community on customer lifetime value
    • “The world is being re-shaped by the convergence of social, mobile, cloud, big data, community and other powerful forces.” Marc Benioff
    • Books about Community #books-to-read

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