We Support NYC

The sharing economy has been on everyone's minds lately. From Airbnb host conferences to Uber PR meltdowns (and the question of whether Uber is even part of the sharing economy), it's a hot topic. …"

My email is a monster

Mike Krieger, co-founder of Instagram

This might explain how Serial has become the fastest growing podcast ever.

Jobs Round Up 

Looking for your next position? The upcoming holiday is the great time to polish your resume and draft those cover letters. To help point you in the right direction, here’s a round up of some of the latest community jobs in New York:

Community Support Specialist at Skillshare

Social Media Manager at WeWork

Community Manager at MongoDB

Customer Experience Specialist at Canary

Community Manager at Carrot Creative

Welcome to We Support Spotlight, where we feature some of the fine folks we admire who work in the realm of community & support.

Who are you and what do you do?

My name is Andrea Murphy and I'm the Community Team Manager at Meetup. I manage the folks who provide support, encouragement and coaching to new and existing Meetup Organizers. They are 25 of the warmest, smartest and most dedicated folks I've ever met, and I'm incredibly lucky to be working with them. I'm also responsible for developing and improving tools, resources and policies for the team, so they are well supported in providing equitable and top-shelf service to the community.

What does your typical day look like?

A typical day involves checking in with each of my leads to make sure all of our bases are covered and that no plates are left spinning unattended. Then I review our progress towards the goals we've set that quarter. I make sure things are moving along and provide help, insight and direction wherever I'm needed. We're always recruiting, and I'm heavily involved with staffing and team development, as well as the evolution of our team structure as we take on new responsibilities and initiatives.

It's like gardening. I check the weather, I look at the forecast and I help the team prepare for seasonal changes.

If we're on pace to hit goals with current projects, I set new goals. Sometimes those goals involve dealing with low-hanging fruit and sometimes we have the bandwidth to start planning larger initiatives. We're currently trying to crack the code for how to ensure every single Meetup Group gets to a certain number of members within the first 7 days. I would tell you what the metric is, but then you would have to buy me a drink. Here's a clue: I like a good 7 and 7.

Do you have any pro tips to share with us?

There are so many lessons I've learned over the years. I think one of the most important things every community manager should do at least once during their tenure is assess who you serve. [pullquote position="right"]Know your people. Know what they value about your platform and be mindful of what they need to be successful.[/pullquote] Tools, encouragement, support, resources. Be an ambassador for their needs within your organization but don't ever preach; not to your community, nor to the company about your community. Be an advocate and a representative instead.

I've also learned that your community will respect you more as their leader if you are a member and avid user. Be that too.

What are your predictions for the future of community and support?

I think product development and support are going to merge. We need each other to build a meaningful experience and retain users. Sometimes you can solve a problem by looking at metrics from behind the digital divide between community and product, but it's just one side of the story.

In the future we'll build better feedback mechanisms into our app and product experiences so support can be proactive rather than reactive. We'll be monitoring for success all the time. We'll contact you when we know things aren't going well or when we know you could use a tip.

Members, followers and fans expect a certain level of intuition from their apps and online services now too. We expect you to know when our streaming was broken or when our photos aren't uploading properly. We expect you to give us some kind of credit or reimbursement, without being asked.

The only way we're going to get there is by making sure our products are designed to measure user experience instantly, with user friendly feedback loops and mechanisms that catch when things go wrong...and more importantly, that our support teams evolve with a product management mindset to monitor things carefully in the present so we can provide agile, timely support resolutions.

Thanks for your insightful responses, Andrea! We're sending you so many virtual hugs right now.

Meetup is currently looking for Associate Community Specialists, Community Interns, and a Director of Community Operations.

Welcome to our first installment of We Support Spotlight, where we feature some of the fine folks we admire who work in the realm of community & support. 

Who are you and what do you do? I'm Dan Hayek, a big video dork and fan of great craftsmanship when it comes to practically anything made, or rather tangible. My work focuses on helping online services teach their members about their offerings and the underlying craft or skill that their service provides a platform for. I spent several years at Vimeo as Director of Education & Community where I focused on making both written & video content for their educational platform, Vimeo Video School. More recently I've been freelance consulting for various tech companies who want to educate their members in an engaging and friendly manner.

 Dan Hayek hard at work

What does your typical day look like? Generally a combination of tasks. Sometimes I'm researching the service I'm making content for by learning more about their features, members, and general communications strategy. Other times I'm drafting content plans or brainstorming creative ways to convey the potential of a website for its members. Depending on production plans I can also find my days working on video shoots, scouting locations, and/or working with editors to polish video content.

Do you have any pro tips to share with us? Don't be afraid to ask yourself questions from the customer/member's perspective. I think this provides some of the freshest perspective, especially if you're overly immersed in a website. Go back to square one, open a new account, notice what the welcome process is like, see what sticks out as great and not so great. Ask yourself what would help you as someone new to your service. Trust your gut and stand up for the things you believe are essential to the site, use metrics and testimonials to back up these feelings. Also take internet breaks. "For the love of all that is holy and mentally stable, give your mind occasional breaks from the internet."

What are your predictions for the future of community and support? I think the people working in community & support are setting themselves up to understand services far better than many CEOs and there's tremendous opportunity in that. I look forward to seeing community & support centered people move into greater positions of authority and influence, which I believe is gradually happening. I'm a big fan of website decisions being made by people who know the actual service intimately, in my experience those tend to be community & support people.

What is your spirit gif? It changes frequently but lately it's this sweet dog trying to catch a ball and failing.

It's a combination of graceful intent and earnest failure that I find pretty adorable. It's also a healthy reminder to try hard even though you'll fail sometimes. :)