What does a community manager do when not managing the community ?

Saltisol

I mean it as a sincere question. The title "community manager" leads me to beleive that the job involves a two way dialogue with the community. The community in this case are their playerbase, both active and inactive.

There is not an abundance of communication so what does the role of community manager involve aside from the obvious ?

shimm

Part of the job is deciding how to respond to personal attacks without inciting more personal attacks. I’m sure it’s not easy. I think it would be more productive to ask the question of ZOS; if they wanted the community managers to communicate more, they would.

andreasv

I'm sure there's more to the role than just dealing with customers / players. Community managers are also responsible for making decision about how the product / service is represented in any form of marketing, eg. making sure the right target audience is addressed. They also lay out how customer services have to reply to queries (I know I know, it's all canned replies anyway - but canned replies created by a human being).

I guess that most of the role's tasks are not immediately apparent and always visible to the customer.

Confirmation would be nice though

Edit: This job listing gives you a great idea of what you're expected to do as a Community Manager at ZOS

https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/community-manager-commander-keen-at-zenimax-online-studios-1402558442

MartiniDaniels

Ever worked IRL?

Saltisol

andreasv wrote: »

I'm sure there's more to the role than just dealing with customers / players. Community managers are also responsible for making decision about how the product / service is represented in any form of marketing, eg. making sure the right target audience is addressed. They also lay out how customer services have to reply to queries (I know I know, it's all canned replies anyway - but canned replies created by a human being).

I guess that most of the role's tasks are not immediately apparent and always visible to the customer.

Confirmation would be nice though

Edit: This job listing gives you a great idea of what you're expected to do as a Community Manager at ZOS

https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/community-manager-commander-keen-at-zenimax-online-studios-1402558442

Thanks for your reply. That link really gave some insight in what "Community manager" imvolves.

These two descriptions seems particullary interesting from a player perspective. It would be a really good thing if they could post parts of both the drafts and the result from these:

"Helps conduct private and public tests to gather community feedback that will help improve final product quality."

"Drafts and distributes community reports including community reactions, sentiment, and feedback, metrics, and research."

Saltisol

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Ever worked IRL?

Ahh how nice, another ambitous climber in the oh so exiciting forumladder, thrilling

Mariusghost84

Legitimately interesting question. What does a community manager actually do? I dont see them communicating with the players at all.

essi2

ZOS Support goes way beyond 'canned responses', some of them behave more like bots even when you've engaged them in a conversation.

MartiniDaniels

Saltisol wrote: »

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Ever worked IRL?

Ahh how nice, another ambitous climber in the oh so exiciting forumladder, thrilling

What? Man, I worked on very different kind of jobs in my life and I can easily say nobody is doing their main work 100% of the time. There are multiple menial and creative tasks other then those which is directly described in profession name. So such question I may expect only from person who didn't worked in regular full-time job. You will die of boredom and tiredness if you will do all the same 100% of work day without switching to other activities.

ChunkyCat

They find a comfortable sofa, sit down, stare at the wall, and wait....

Owondyah

this game has one?

I yet have to see it reply in any sense or form, without it being "i'm fkn closing this topic and merging it with other cuz you all spam same topics bla bla"

redlink1979

Owondyah wrote: »

this game has one?

I yet have to see it reply in any sense or form, without it being "i'm fkn closing this topic and merging it with other cuz you all spam same topics bla bla"

That only happens because enraged souls tend to derail off topic, bashing and insulting others who don't share the same opinion.

And yes, most users just creates threads even if there are already existing threads about the topic they what to discuss.

xxthir13enxx

Turelus

From what I know the ZOS ones also managed the community programs (Stream Team, Class Reps, Ambassadors), manage social media, attend and run events.

Mariusghost84 wrote: »

Legitimately interesting question. What does a community manager actually do? I dont see them communicating with the players at all.

Because they generally can't give answers until it's the correct answer. I know the CM's have the freedom to post anything, but they still need/like to get correct information from the teams or management before commenting on something big.

Saltisol

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Saltisol wrote: »

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Ever worked IRL?

Ahh how nice, another ambitous climber in the oh so exiciting forumladder, thrilling

What? Man, I worked on very different kind of jobs in my life and I can easily say nobody is doing their main work 100% of the time. There are multiple menial and creative tasks other then those which is directly described in profession name. So such question I may expect only from person who didn't worked in regular full-time job. You will die of boredom and tiredness if you will do all the same 100% of work day without switching to other activities.

Ok so and by doing that you know all you need to know and have stopped asking questions ?

I do work but that hasn't given me a knowledge of what all the other jobs involves so I ask, ok ?

vamp_emily

I'm sure they do many things that you are unaware of.

- make sure forum member obey the rules
- relay messages to other managers if people are posting they can't log in
- direct players to the correct department if they are having issues
- post company threads
- let players know issues are being worked on
- coordinating events

I'm sure it is a full time job. I don't think their job is to respond to every person that tags them in a post. I'm sure they try not to get involved in ESO drama.

VaranisArano

Presumably the parts of the job that don't involve directly interacting with the forum community. The Commander Keen job listing makes it pretty clear that forum interactions is the tip of the iceberg.

It looks a little like asking "What do you teachers do when you aren't teaching my kids?"
Seriously, teaching kids is the fun part of the job...and also in many ways, just the tip of the iceberg.

Jaraal

redlink1979 wrote: »

And yes, most users just creates threads even if there are already existing threads about the topic they what to discuss.

Maybe because bumping old threads about the topic you're interested in appears to be against the rules? Personally, I'm in favor of continuing and consolidating topic discussion, but everybody else (including community managers) seems to feel you need to start a new thread..... except when they close threads and link us to other threads and say to continue the discussion in the other thread, lol

Saltisol

vamp_emily wrote: »

I'm sure they do many things that you are unaware of.

- make sure forum member obey the rules
- relay messages to other managers if people are posting they can't log in
- direct players to the correct department if they are having issues
- post company threads
- let players know issues are being worked on
- coordinating events

I'm sure it is a full time job. I don't think their job is to respond to every person that tags them in a post. I'm sure they try not to get involved in ESO drama.

Yeah I'm sure it's a full time job, and thanks for your reply.
I do wish they did some more this though ( cut and pasted from the job description) and while doing that shared it with the Community.

"Helps conduct private and public tests to gather community feedback that will help improve final product quality."

"Drafts and distributes community reports including community reactions, sentiment, and feedback, metrics, and research."

Saltisol

Jaraal wrote: »

redlink1979 wrote: »

And yes, most users just creates threads even if there are already existing threads about the topic they what to discuss.

Maybe because bumping old threads about the topic you're interested in appears to be against the rules? Personally, I'm in favor of continuing and consolidating topic discussion, but everybody else (including community managers) seems to feel you need to start a new thread..... except when they close threads and link us to other threads and say to continue the discussion in the other thread, lol

LoL yeah causes some confusion.

Veinblood1965

Saltisol wrote: »

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Saltisol wrote: »

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Ever worked IRL?

Ahh how nice, another ambitous climber in the oh so exiciting forumladder, thrilling

What? Man, I worked on very different kind of jobs in my life and I can easily say nobody is doing their main work 100% of the time. There are multiple menial and creative tasks other then those which is directly described in profession name. So such question I may expect only from person who didn't worked in regular full-time job. You will die of boredom and tiredness if you will do all the same 100% of work day without switching to other activities.

Ok so and by doing that you know all you need to know and have stopped asking questions ?

I do work but that hasn't given me a knowledge of what all the other jobs involves so I ask, ok ?

Just stop replying Saltisol, you are feeding the trolls.

Saltisol

VaranisArano wrote: »

Presumably the parts of the job that don't involve directly interacting with the forum community. The Commander Keen job listing makes it pretty clear that forum interactions is the tip of the iceberg.

It looks a little like asking "What do you teachers do when you aren't teaching my kids?"
Seriously, teaching kids is the fun part of the job...and also in many ways, just the tip of the iceberg.

But you can ask if you want to know though, right ?

Sandman929

Reads a thousand questions and complaints a day and gets told no new information from developers 95% percent of the time when trying to follow up on those questions/complaints with them.
Most of the time, I suspect, they get answers from developers that are certain to *** people off even more. So rather than race to keyboard to throw gasoline on the fire of the day (and there's always at least one fire lately) they say nothing.
Not a great approach, since it leaves all of us to guess about what they do with their time.

FierceSam

Mariusghost84 wrote: »

Legitimately interesting question. What does a community manager actually do? I dont see them communicating with the players at all.

The various pinned posts above would serve to disabuse you of that misunderstanding.

ku5h

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Saltisol wrote: »

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Ever worked IRL?

Ahh how nice, another ambitous climber in the oh so exiciting forumladder, thrilling

What? Man, I worked on very different kind of jobs in my life and I can easily say nobody is doing their main work 100% of the time. There are multiple menial and creative tasks other then those which is directly described in profession name. So such question I may expect only from person who didn't worked in regular full-time job. You will die of boredom and tiredness if you will do all the same 100% of work day without switching to other activities.

Yea, this. Our community managers spend most of the time managing performance fixes, while performance guys manage community while not fixing stuff, which is 90% of the time.
This actually explains a lot.

Saltisol

Veinblood1965 wrote: »

Saltisol wrote: »

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Saltisol wrote: »

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Ever worked IRL?

Ahh how nice, another ambitous climber in the oh so exiciting forumladder, thrilling

What? Man, I worked on very different kind of jobs in my life and I can easily say nobody is doing their main work 100% of the time. There are multiple menial and creative tasks other then those which is directly described in profession name. So such question I may expect only from person who didn't worked in regular full-time job. You will die of boredom and tiredness if you will do all the same 100% of work day without switching to other activities.

Ok so and by doing that you know all you need to know and have stopped asking questions ?

I do work but that hasn't given me a knowledge of what all the other jobs involves so I ask, ok ?

Just stop replying Saltisol, you are feeding the trolls.

I really should listen to you but I can't help myself. The downside though is that the thread spirals out of Control and ends up being locked just because I never give up hope

Saltisol

Posts similar to this one "Activity Finder & Server Performance Update" is what I wish Community managers spent some more of their time on.

Reflections, underlying issues, concerns, adressing community topics, no need for a full blown discussion just post that they are aware of this and that and what's causing it etc.

Veinblood1965

Saltisol wrote: »

Veinblood1965 wrote: »

Saltisol wrote: »

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Saltisol wrote: »

MartiniDaniels wrote: »

Ever worked IRL?

Ahh how nice, another ambitous climber in the oh so exiciting forumladder, thrilling

What? Man, I worked on very different kind of jobs in my life and I can easily say nobody is doing their main work 100% of the time. There are multiple menial and creative tasks other then those which is directly described in profession name. So such question I may expect only from person who didn't worked in regular full-time job. You will die of boredom and tiredness if you will do all the same 100% of work day without switching to other activities.

Ok so and by doing that you know all you need to know and have stopped asking questions ?

I do work but that hasn't given me a knowledge of what all the other jobs involves so I ask, ok ?

Just stop replying Saltisol, you are feeding the trolls.

I really should listen to you but I can't help myself. The downside though is that the thread spirals out of Control and ends up being locked just because I never give up hope

Rofl it is true. My grandpa was like that always stirring up trouble, it was like he fed off of the discourse. I fell for the bait when younger a few times myself. He was really good at telling kids to stay out of his yard though. This is an interesting thread though better than the usual threads lately.

SidraWillowsky

Therapy?

SantieClaws

Sleep perhaps?

This one assumes though that it involves a lot of event management and the like. Big events take a huge amount of co-ordination and planning.

Not to mention all the articles, natch potes, writing the screenplay, script and direction instructions for each episode of ESO Live and making all of the costumes probably.

It is all a little like herding cats perhaps?

Yours with paws
Santie Claws

Saltisol

SantieClaws wrote: »

Sleep perhaps?

This one assumes though that it involves a lot of event management and the like. Big events take a huge amount of co-ordination and planning.

Not to mention all the articles, natch potes, writing the screenplay, script and direction instructions for each episode of ESO Live and making all of the costumes probably.

It is all a little like herding cats perhaps?

Yours with paws
Santie Claws

I Think i like you, can't be totally sure yet but I got a feeling I would. Which platform are you on ? EU/NA ?

Just one thing I got a hard time Reading and every time I read it it like echoes in my head, clawing scratching and driving me if not crazy so on the verge off geting there "natch potes" what the hell, I can't understand why a sane person would use it

No hard feelings, I just can't help it, it really gets to me.