This report is a summary follow up to our coveted State of Community Management Report 2021. Here, you will find data on how the community industry is evolving and insights based on the observations of some of the forerunners of the Indian community industry.
If reading this report gets you curious about how to launch your custom in-app community in a single day, click here to learn how we can help you do just that.
Matching the pace
While community managers are refining their approach to reporting, more and more businesses are hoping on the community wagon.
Businesses are starting to rely more on community than risky and expensive paths such as performance marketing. This trend is emerging stronger in B2B and SaaS companies.
Pawan Rochwani, inFeedo
Bling or Business
Communities are evolving from being perceived as yet another fad to a key in enabling larger business goals. Active and new members, along with event attendees, are at the forefront of tracking the impact of community. However, many businesses are still grappling with how to effectively evaluate this impact.
Clear understanding of the mission and objective is going to be a must for community teams. Depending on the current focus of the organisation, the objective might be upselling, increasing reach, retention, etc. Clearly communicating the objective of your community to stakeholders and aligning efforts with the objectives is how communities will become a major component of the business flywheel.
Nipun Goyal, Founder LikeMinds
Wings of fire
Community builders in India, are rather bullish on the future of CAC (community as a career). Excuse the bad pun, but believe us when we say that the future of “CAC” is bright. Majority of our respondents (64% to be precise) do not worry about losing their jobs despite the widespread downsizing. The global comparative of 41% reflects a stronger confidence in state of community management in India.
The focus of community managers is shifting from just operations to strategy formulation, team leadership, and the fostering member relationships.
Co-create with the users. Communities help businesses have a testing and feedback loop with the early adopters and frequent users resulting in faster and efficient iterations rooted in user feedback.
Neha Agarwal, Community Simplified
Community managers have also started contributing towards marketing, social media and content creation. As such, not only are these people evolving to be all rounders, they are becoming indispensable.
One major change from current state of community management is that communities are also seeing increased participation from founders. They are starting to see it as a bridge to users.
What lies ahead
Community building is a nuanced field having overlap with various functions. Over time communities will see segmentation not only in the tasks and responsibilities of internal teams. Communities can offer customised experience that current social platforms can not offer while creating a domain of it’s own.
Every community needs to have a mission. Focus on adding value to each cohort of your community, and identify the factors that are creating the stickiness to your community
Shruti Agarwal, Founding Member, D2C Insider Foundation
AI will play a crucial role as we develop tools to reduce time and effort for repetitive tasks like moderation. Embracing AI’s capabilities will enhance user satisfaction and efficiency for our community platform. Leveraging AI to create an intuitive user experience based on engagement can be a game changer.
The trends suggest users will become more invested over time but be part of fewer communities. This points to the rise of micro communities or sub communities in the future.
Summary
Community building is a dynamic segment. First movers will gain an advantage by evolving alongside user interests and expectations.
In a world of lower attention spans and mechanical content generation, connections and customization become the biggest USP for businesses to outpace their competitors. How businesses will address this remains to be seen, but communities will undoubtedly be a crucial component of the strategy.
Note: We have shared the poll results from this community management report on our LinkedIn page. Check it out here, and follow us for more content and conversations around community building.
