Community Manager Hangout: Building a Community from Scratch

This week’s Community Manager Hangout will explore building a community from scratch. So many times, whether if it’s a startup, a new product/service or an existing organization recognizing the value of having a community manager, new community managers are put in a position where they must build the community from scratch. It can be a daunting challenge, but also an amazing experience that provides a feeling of amazing reward. Are you ready to find out how to build a community from scratch? Have you seen how others have built a successful community? Or better yet, have you been part of building a successful community? We’d love to have you join us on air for the Community Manager Hangout.

My Community Manager has been hosting the Community Manager Hangout on Google+ since January 24, 2012. While many people said “good luck with that” we’ve never been afraid to push the envelope and try new things. We did it with the Community Manager UNconfernce, we did it with embracing all types of community managers, and we are do it every Friday by combining a Google Hangout with a Twitter Chat!

Our Community Manager Hangout on Friday will field questions and foster a conversation on Twitter while our panel of community managers on Google+ will answer and respond. It’s our core mission to include as many people as we can while being a resource for community managers, those wanting to become community managers and companies needing community managers.

How will it work? Tim McDonald, founder of My Community Manager, will moderate the panel of community managers on the Google+ Hangout and Brandie McCallum will host the Twitter chat using the hashtag #cmgrhangout. If you have a question, you can post it on Twitter starting 30 minutes before the hangout begins at 2pm EDT on Friday and continue the conversation until it ends at 3pm EDT.

Questions to be discussed

1. Where do you start when building a community? Why?
2. What effective ways have you found to do outreach and build relationships?
3. How do you get user generated content when you don’t have users?
4. Share some successful campaigns you’ve seen building communities. What made them successful?
5. How do you maintain personal relationships as you scale?
6. Open forum. What advice do you have on building community?

This week, we are looking for community managers that have built communities from the ground up or are interested in how to do it. Have you seen other community managers successfully build a community from scratch? Leave us a comment below or find us on G+ and tell us. We’ll invite you on air for the hangout. You must have a Google+ account and be able to use a webcam.

Interested in being part of the panel?

Join us on G+, Watch right here (starting at 2pm ET) or follow #cmgrhangout on Twitter.

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