Community Management Study Guide 200717c v03

SEPTEMBER 2020
Community
Management
Study Guide
Community Management Study Guide 1

Table of
contents
Overview 3
Define and Establish a Community 4
Develop Community Strategies and Processes 13
Make Strategic Content Decisions for a Community 34
Engage and Moderate a Community 43
Measure and Analyze Community Success 60
Glossary 74

Overview
Certification helps you stand out in your field.

Welcome to the Community Management Study Guide.
Throughout this document, you will have the opportunity to
explore community-building strategies, and learn about tools
to support the moderation and engagement of your online
community. The document is organized in chapters and sections
that cover topics that can be applied to non-profits and interest
communities, as well as brands and agencies. Reference this
guide as you build, scale and sustain your online communities.

1
Define and Establish

a Community

Community building is at the heart of Facebook’s mission, and it’s a community manager’s
key task. Learn the basic elements you need to define a community strategy and start building
your community online. This chapter will help you identify your mission, goals and success
criteria and create guiding principles to better support your community.
1.1. Build an online community

Facebook’s mission is to give people the help you learn how to build, scale and sustain
power to build community and bring the world a meaningful community more effectively and
closer together. People use Facebook to stay efficiently.
connected with local and global communities
through common interests, discover what’s Community-building on Facebook
going on in the world and share and express Online communities come in many shapes
what matters to them. and sizes. They can meet in Facebook Groups,
nonprofit Facebook Pages or brand Instagram
There are millions of communities that help
accounts. Many platforms support community-
people connect, which can give members a
building online, and community managers
feeling of belonging and access to a network
need to have a coherent strategy to oversee
of peers with shared interests. Overseeing
building, scaling and sustaining a meaningful
and running a community is called community
online community. However, these tasks require
management, and is done by a community
thoughtful planning and execution.
manager.
Community managers can use Facebook
Community managers are in charge of building,
products and technologies along with
growing and maintaining a meaningful
additional strategy frameworks to do their jobs.
community. Whether you’re managing a
community on behalf of an entrepreneur, Let’s start with the basics and review how
brand, agency or nonprofit—and whether it’s a various platforms support different types of
new or existing community—this section can online communities.

FA C E B O O K G R O U P S Facebook Groups enable people to come together around a common
interest to learn, share and discuss. Groups can be public or private and the
Groups themselves can be searchable or unsearchable.
Community managers can define rules to set group standards and ask
membership questions of prospective members to learn more about the
people who want to join your group.
Community managers can create content and communicate with group

members. Groups also allow member-to-member interactions and
member-curated content.
FA C E B O O K PA G E S A Facebook Page gives your community a public-facing presence on

Facebook. Pages are built around a product, business, cause or public
figure, and give you a place to share information. Think of your Page as your
storefront—it’s visible to everyone. Pages are public, and members can join
the community by liking or following your Page.
Community managers curate all the content on a Page, as opposed to

Groups, where community members can post, too.
I N S TAG R A M AC C O U N T S Instagram builds communities through visual experiences. The Instagram

community comes together to share their passions and to be inspired
through multimedia content. Instagram accounts can be public or private.
Community managers curate the content on an Instagram account and

broadcast it to the community, just like a Facebook Page.
In future sections, we will review strategies to help you decide which platforms are best suited to build and
scale your community online.

Community Strategy
There is a set of processes, known as a
community strategy, that every community
manager should follow. A community strategy
is a plan that a community manager uses
to build, scale and sustain a community
online. Usually, a community strategy covers
community goals and guidelines, as well
as strategies for engaging the community
through content and platforms, among other
key tactics.
We will learn more about how to build your

community strategy in the following chapter.
As you begin, be sure to:
• Give the community a name and identity.

Think of a title, description and image that
represents the community.
• Invite friends to join your community. Start

with people you trust who are interested in
what brings the community together.
• Post something. Welcome new members

and start the conversation.
Facebook products and technologies include

several different tools that can support
communities, such as WhatsApp and
Messenger, where you can create group chats
to connect with your community in real time,
and Facebook Events, which can bring your
community together for experiences both on Key takeaways
and offline. Explore all the options to engage
• Community managers are professional
and empower your community.
community builders who are in charge of
maintaining a community. They determine
a community strategy to build, scale and
sustain meaningful communities, and put
it into practice.
• A community strategy is the set of core
processes that community managers use
to run their communities.
• Use one or more platforms (like Facebook
and Instagram) to build community in
different ways.

1.2. Community goals
Communities need to set clear purposes and Community goals and parameters
strategies to thrive. Whether a community Let’s review key definitions and a question-
is new or established, community managers based strategy that will support you in defining
should pay close attention to its mission your community goals and parameters.
and goals, and determine metrics to build a
healthy community and assess its success.
These key elements will help to build the
other components of your strategy.

Definition Guiding questions
MISSION Why do I want to build a community?

The overall impact your community is
trying to make on your members and in What do I want to accomplish with this community?
the world.
What impact do I want this community to make
in the future?
GOALS What endeavors or activities do you need to accomplish

What you want to achieve through your to achieve your mission?
community to support your mission.
How does this goal support the community mission?
You can have one or many goals. They
are often broad and general statements.
OBJECTIVES Are your objectives specific, measurable, attainable,

What you want your community to relevant to a goal and time-bound?
achieve as you work toward obtaining
your goals. You can have one or many How can you evaluate if the objective has
been accomplished?
objectives associated with specific
goals. Objectives are usually precise,
measurable and time-bound and will
help you define what success looks like.
MEASUREMENT What data will help you determine whether you are
The data and key performance meeting your community goals and objectives?
indicators (KPIs) that you’ll track to
determine your community success at Do you have access to this data?
each of the objectives that lead toward
Is the data source reliable?
achieving your goals.
VA L U E S What kind of behavior do you expect from a valued

The behaviors and targets that are member of your community?
important to you and your community.
Values set the standard of how you What does it look like, feel like or sound like for a
want to achieve your objectives and member of your community to act on these values?
goals and fulfill your mission.

What are the values that you want your community to be
known for?

Think of these foundational elements of your
community strategy as taking you on a journey.
Your mission is your destination, and your goals Key takeaways
give you a map to get there. Your objectives are
• A successful community needs to have
the distinct milestones that you’ll reach along
a clear mission, well-defined goals and
the way. And your measurement will provide
measurable objectives for determining
you with information about how quickly you’re
progressing: Are you delayed, or are you on success. These elements are key
schedule? components of your community strategy.
• Community values define the important
behaviors that your community should
Once you define a baseline community follow to fulfill its mission.
strategy, share your mission and goals with
• Share your mission and goals with the
your community members. They will play a
community members and stakeholders.
fundamental role in making it successful.

1.3. Community guiding principles
Creating and communicating guidelines and • Make sure that your guiding principles are
rules is an important part of being a community aligned with your mission and values. Your
manager. As a community manager, you should guidelines should establish the kind of behavior
work to keep your community safe and enlist that will uphold your values.
your community members to connect with one
• Effective guidelines should include affirmative
another in meaningful and respectful ways.
statements that encourage a positive
Your mission and values will reflect the kind community culture. For instance, guidelines like
of community you want to build. Share a set “We believe in respectful conversations, so we
of guiding principles with your community do not allow profanity” instead of “Do not use
to ensure that members understand them. profanity” send a clearer message.
Guiding principles are statements that instruct
• Your guiding principles should be posted
your community on how you plan to uphold
publicly with your community. Share these
your mission and values. These can range from
guidelines when admitting new members.
stating what kind of content is appropriate to
For existing members, encourage behavior
encouraging respectful communication.
that reflects your guidelines. If you are using
Pages, make a pinned public post to share your
Defining guiding principles
guidelines. If you are using Groups, make an
Community managers use guiding principles to announcement, which you can refer to when
moderate content and interactions that don’t needed, or use the rules section. Consider using
align with their community values. Think of post approvals. This way, you can approve
rules as your tools to maintain the environment posts before they appear in your community or
you envision for your community. Follow these decline posts and provide feedback.
tips for writing your community principles:

• Great guidelines are more than just a
list of what’s not allowed. Experienced
community managers recommend
guidelines that encourage the kind of
member behavior they want to see in the
community, so members know how to
engage positively with other members.
• Guidelines can change over time. Introduce

changes gradually, not all at once, to give
the community time to adapt and react.
Your rules will change and grow as your
community does, and you can establish
these guidelines as a living document early
on to let your community know that you
will revisit them.
Writing great rules is a starting point for

maintaining a safe community. However,
guidelines need to be enforced through
moderation. In future sections, we will further
explore how to use guidelines to moderate your
community and help your community adhere
to them.
Key takeaways
• Your community guidelines reflect how
you can enact your mission and values.
• Creating clear guidelines helps build your
community culture and prevent member
conflict.
• Guidelines show what is expected and
what is not allowed from your members.
• As your community evolves, so can
your guidelines.

2
Develop Community
Strategies and Processes

Communities thrive when they have strategies in place to support their mission. In this
chapter, we’ll share key processes and strategies that community managers use to build and
scale their communities.
2.1. Audience strategy

To best represent their audience, community Imagine that someone asks you to describe the
managers should be able to answer questions average member of your community. You would
like: Who are the members of our community? probably start by describing some general
Where are they from? What do they like? What characteristics that your community members
kind of content do they engage with online? share, such as where they are from, their age
And who would you like the members of your range and their common traits and interests.
community to be? The answers will help you You can consolidate all this information into
to understand and define your community’s specific profiles that reflect your community
audience profile. members. These are known as persona profiles.
In this section, you will learn how to divide your A persona is a fictional character that
audience into segments, determine a strategy represents a segment of your community.
for the content you will share with your To create a persona profile, you will need
members and choose the platforms that will to do some research. Members’ locations,
best support your community online. demographics, interests, behaviors and
connections are crucial information for creating
Persona profiles a persona profile.
Without a clear idea of who your audience is,

scaling your community and engaging your
members can be challenging. You can define
your audience and their needs by creating
persona profiles.

Here’s how to start researching and define
your persona profiles:
0 1 I NT ERV I EW, PO L L O R O B S E RV E
A GROUP OF YO U R C O M M U N IT Y
M EM B E R S
Remember that you are looking for publicly

available information about their locations,
demographics, interests, behaviors and
connections. Be sure to collect enough data
in order to represent the community you are
studying, not just a small group of people who
happen to show up. Use polls or ask open-
ended questions to survey your community.
0 2 LOOK FOR OTH E R C O M M U N IT IE S T H AT

YOUR M E M B ER S M AY B E LO N G TO
This will help you understand your members’

interests and connections more deeply. For
instance, if you manage a Facebook Group,
you can investigate which other Groups your
members have joined and which Pages they
follow.
05 CREATE REPRES ENTATIV E MODELS
0 3 D EF I N E YOUR C O M M U N IT Y ’S VALU E OF THOS E GROU PS BAS ED ON THE
TO M EM B E R S PAT TERNS YOU FOU ND
Members will join your community with Representative models, which are also known
expectations of what they can do in it. as archetypes, are ideal models of types
Understanding what motivates members to or groups, such as a member type. These
join your community will help you to set clear archetype models will be your personas.
expectations for its value and address your You can create as many persona profiles
members’ needs. as necessary to represent your audience
segments.
0 4 FI N D PAT TER N S FRO M YO U R
RE SEA RCH A N D G RO U P S IM IL AR 06 MAK E PER S ONA PROFIL ES U NIQU E BY
M EM B E R S TOG E T H E R GIV ING THEM A NAME AND A S TORY TO
R EPR ES ENT THE S EGMENT YOU AR E
If you see that a group of members share a
DES CRIBING
common characteristic, you may have found
a member pattern within your community. The persona’s description should have
Patterns can include members sharing information on his or her location,
common interests and members in the same demographics, interests, behaviors and
age range. connections.

There is no right or wrong answer for how Insights can also help to answer questions
many persona profiles you should create for such as: What is the distribution between
your community, though you should avoid women and men in your community? What
getting too granular and creating dozens of age groups do your community members
them. The best approach is to assess how belong to? You can see the countries and
many segments you will need to reasonably cities your community members live in and
represent your audience. the languages they use. This information can
further inform your persona profiles and your
Defining an audience strategy using persona
audience strategy. For example, based on the
profiles will help to identify which content
demographic data in the example below, you
strategies you can use to engage your
could determine that one of your persona
community members better and select the
profiles should represent women ages 25 to
best platforms to build and scale your online
34, since almost one third of your member base
presence. The more insights you have on your
falls within that segment.
audience, the better equipped you’ll be to
deliver meaningful messages to them. Insights access and capabilities will vary
depending on which product you are using
Also, as your community evolves, your
to build your online community. You can only
audience may change too. Revisit your
access Insights once your community has
audience strategy frequently to see if your
grown to a specific size. In Pages, for example,
persona profiles need to be updated or your
demographic data, such as members’ age,
audience segments need to be reviewed.
gender and location, is only available once
the community has 100 or more members. In
Using Insights to understand your audience Groups, you can only see certain information,
One way to research your audience like top countries, cities, age or gender, when
characteristics is using your community you surpass 250 members.
Insights tool. Insights provide information
about your community’s performance,
including demographic data about your
audience and how your community members
are responding to your content.

Key takeaways
• Community managers should be able to define audience
segments within a community.
• Creating persona profiles is a strategy to define audience
segments using insights from your community members,
researching members’ information and creating models of
representative groups.
• You can use Insights to help define persona profiles and
understand your members’ demographics.

2.2. Platform strategy
You can build and grow your community across Community managers should consider the following
several different platforms; choosing the right questions when researching which platforms to use
tool is critical for setting your community for building an online presence:
up for success. Each platform has different
strengths and opportunities, and some will be • Are the potential platforms aligned with my
better suited to pursue your goals. community’s needs?
• What are the products and features that each
As a community manager, you will decide
platform offers to create, share and manage
which platforms are appropriate for building
engaging content for my community?
and scaling your community. Research and
understand what platforms can and cannot do • How does each platform support user
for you and your community. This might lead management and moderation?
you to choose one or many platforms, but you • What community member insights does each
should keep your choice consistent with your platform provide?
community strategy, mission, values, goals and • How will success and relevance look on each
audience. platform, and how can you gauge these on an
ongoing basis?
A multi-platform strategy may result in having
more ways to deliver and share content, and
more significant reach. Or, it could require more
work and resources to manage. Find a balance
that suits the resources that you have and the
goals that you have set for your community.

Build a platform strategy
Let’s work on an example of how to build a platform strategy. We will use Facebook apps and
technologies here, but you can use this strategy with other products based on your needs.
MISSION State your community’s mission, as it should always be your guide. Your platform
selection should be aligned with your overall community strategy.
AUDIENCE Briefly describe your audience segments. You can reference your persona profiles here.
P L AT FO R M Facebook Instagram WhatsApp Messenger
OPPORTUNITIES Foster Broadcast Focus on Synchronous Make

member- information visually- messaging connections
to-member and updates oriented for small through
interactions audiences communities conversation
PRODUCT Groups Pages Accounts Groups Chat
Groups are You can like Use an Keep in touch Messenger is

a place for or follow a Instagram with the people a messaging
people to Page to get account to who matter service. Use
communicate updates from share photos, the most. With Messenger
about shared businesses, videos and group chats, to make
interests organizations stories. Here, you can share connections
and facilitate and public you can view messages, and build
peer-to-peer figures. what you’ve photos and relationships
connection. Anyone with shared, the videos with through
You can create a Facebook people you’re up to 256 conversation.
a group for account following people at once. Messenger
anything—your can create a and who’s You can also can make
family reunion, Page or help following you. name your your
your after-work manage one, group, mute community
sports team or as long as or customize more
your book club. they have an notifications, accessible to
assigned role and more. members.
on the Page.
SAMPLE Membership Pinned posts Photo and Instant Send direct

F E AT U R E S approval video posts messaging or group
Fundraising messages
Groups Insights tools Stories Secure
encryption Make voice
Membership Page Insights Instagram and video
questions Insights Invitation only calls
Ads
Fundraising Automated
Ads messages for
your Page
SAMPLE Number of Number of Number of Number of Number of

METRICS members reactions followers group chat messages per
participants day
Comments per Reach of a Likes per
post post photo or Number of Number of
video messages per connections
Number of day
user-generated
content

Once you finish the comparative table, assess
which platform or platforms would be best for
cultivating your community’s online presence.
Remember that some platforms will be better
at achieving specific community objectives
than others. For instance, if you need to foster
member-to-member connections, a Facebook
Group would work well, while an Instagram
account would be better suited to building a
visual experience.
As you choose a platform, think about how to

tailor content and engagement strategies to
accommodate its capabilities and constraints.
We will review tactics to make your content
more engaging in future sections, but these
strategies will depend on the platform that you
have chosen to build your online presence, as
each one offers different ways to share content
and unique features for connecting with your
audience.
Key takeaways
• Community managers should be able to determine the
platforms that will best support community-building and
creating an online presence for their audience.
• A platform strategy can help you align your community’s
needs with a platform’s products and features. Each
platform has its own unique strengths.
• Community managers should tailor their content and
engagement strategies to accommodate a platform’s
specific capabilities.

2.3. Branding strategy
It is important for a community manager to What are the elements of your community’s brand?
define and understand your audience and There are three main components that will define your
determine your community experience. As community’s brand:
a community manager, you represent your
01 YOU R ES S ENCE AND CORE VALU ES
community’s brand, mission and voice.
These are the same values that are part of your
A community’s brand is the collection of
community strategy and should be aligned with
characteristics that distinguish and define
your community mission. For instance, if you
how members feel as part of that specific
want your community to be a respectful place for
community, and the way your community
conversation, you should include “respect” among
is perceived by others. Community brand
your brand’s core values, and all your messaging
attributes can include your name and logo,
and content should be aligned to that principle.
the colors and styles of graphics and the tone
of voice you use when posting content and 02 YOU R MES S AGING S TYL E
engaging members. Communities can thrive
when you keep your brand consistent with your This demonstrates your brand’s personality.
overall community strategy across platforms. Will you address your members formally or in a
colloquial manner? Is your community a funny
place or a more serious environment?

0 3 YOUR V I S UA L ID E N T IT Y For instance, if you use a Facebook Page and an
Instagram account, make sure that your logo is the
This incorporates elements such as your logo, same on both.
imagery, typography, colors and creative
design, and defines how your brand looks and Your branding strategy is not set in stone. You can
feels. always update it to reflect how you want your brand
to be perceived by your members, but don’t change
How can you put a community branding it so often that people won’t know how to pick you
strategy in place? out of a crowd.
Once you define your brand’s core elements,

ensure brand consistency in your strategy and
your community with the following tactics:
0 1 M A K E YOUR CO M M U N IT Y E ASY TO
I D E NTI F Y
Pick a recognizable name and use a profile or

cover photo that represents your community
clearly. In Groups, you can create a custom
URL for easy access, and in Pages, you can set
up a username in your custom URL.
0 2 D EF I N E A ND D O C U M E N T B R AN D
GU I D ELI NES
Write down your brand rules: Logos, colors,

layouts, styles and tone of voice. Annotate
everything that makes your community unique,
and specify how you are going to use those
features. Check out Facebook brand guidelines
to review an example.
0 3 EN S UR E B R A N D C O N S IS T E N CY IN YO U R
CON TEN T Key takeaways
Maintain your brand’s core elements • A community manager represents a
throughout your content. For instance, if community’s brand and voice.
you create an Instagram account dedicated • A community’s brand is how it is
to black and white photography, don’t post perceived by others. Your brand
color photos, as they would go against your
consists of your core values, your
guidelines. Also, if you engage with your
messaging style and your visual
members in a friendly way, keep that tone
identity.
consistent in all interactions.
• Document your brand strategy
0 4 BE CONS I STEN T W IT H B R AN D
and identity, and adhere to it in all
GU I D ELI NES AC RO S S P L AT FO R M S
your content and across different
If your community has an online presence platforms.
on multiple platforms, make sure that you
follow your brand guidelines on all of them.

2.4 Launch Strategy
Ready? Set? Launch! You have prepared How to build your launch strategy?
by determining a strategy and guidelines, First, think about how you are going to
figuring out how to define your audience, pair the components of your community
deciding on appropriate platforms and strategy with specific tactics that will
writing down brand guidelines for your help you meet your goals. For instance,
community. This is all just the beginning for if you want to reach a specific number of
your community, and keeping your strategy members by the end of the month: What
in place will be key to your success. practices are you going to follow to achieve
that objective? How will you consider
Community managers can use a launch
audience segments to determine the most
strategy to define milestones, determine
engaging tactics? What will those tactics
tactics and actions to get to their goals, use
look like on the specific platform you are
metrics to gauge early success and establish
using to grow your community? And how
a process for redefining their targets on an
will you implement your brand guidelines
ongoing basis.
when using these tactics?

For example, imagine that you want to grow a Facebook Page follower base.
Here’s how to implement a tactic for achieving this goal:
• Define your community parameters keep enhancing your community. If you

and community strategies. There are didn’t meet your goal, think of ways you
foundational and fundamental parameters could improve your tactics. It may also be
you need to establish in order to define necessary to redefine your objectives.
your community, such as its mission, goals,
• List your tactics, as they will create an
objectives and values. In this case, our goal
action plan for your launch strategy.
is to grow Facebook Page followers.
Compile your tactics and use them as
• An objective is precise, measurable and part of a roadmap for managing your
time-bound, meaning that it needs to be community. Facebook Ads is one of
accomplished in a certain time period. many tactics that you can use to grow
Plan tactics that will work within the your followers. You could also invite your
timeframe of your objective. For example, friends to join the community, or rely on
to grow Facebook Page followers, be organic growth and let people find you
specific about how many new members through word of mouth. All these tactics
you are expecting and when you should can contribute to an action plan that builds
expect them by. Be realistic about your toward your goal during the launch period.
objectives and set specific numbers and
• Feel free to make changes anytime
due dates.
you redefine your goals and objectives
• Choose a tactic for how you are going through this process. Things can and will
to reach each objective. Consider change over time, so it’s important to
your audience research, your platform revisit your parameters and strategies to
capabilities and your brand guidelines. make sure that they still reflect the reality
An appropriate tactic should detail how, of your community and the sentiment
when and with what you are going to behind your mission.
achieve your objective. To grow a Page, for
Other launch goals may include creating a
example, you could use Facebook ads to
certain amount of content to post, getting
reach potential new followers.
a specific number of reactions per post or
• When you reach your deadline, use your launching a set number of campaigns in
measurement data to assess whether a period of time. Think about your launch
you have accomplished your objective. objectives and determine specific tactics to
If you reach your objective, think about help you reach them.
how you can set a higher bar next time to
Growing your community

As you launch your community, you will set in motion a strategy to start building your community’s
presence. But you can’t build and scale a community without members to engage with.
One of the first objectives to pursue in your launch strategy is growing your member base. There
are two main ways to do it: Organic and paid growth.

Organic growth Paid growth
Growing your community organically means Paid marketing campaigns can help
bringing in new members through unpaid your community grow by leveraging the
tactics and strategies. Some examples of reach of social media channels, including
tactics that can lead to organic growth: Facebook apps and technologies, and using
merchandising.
• Invite people you know. If you are starting
a community about a topic you are • Create ad campaigns. Facebook apps
passionate about, you probably know and services provide a wide variety of ad
some people who share that passion options to grow your community. If you
already. Get them involved early and manage a Facebook Group, you can create
encourage them to be active in the and link a Facebook Page to it, from which
community. you can run ads. With ads, you can create
campaigns to increase overall awareness
• Ask members to invite their friends.
of your community, grow the number of
If your members are having a positive
people who are visiting your community
experience in your community, they might
and get more people to engage with your
consider inviting their friends to join them.
posts through comments, shares and likes.
Encourage your members to help promote
your community and expand your reach. • Use merchandise to advertise. Give
souvenirs or merchandise with your
• Optimize your community for online
community name and URL to members
search tools. There are several ways to
or potential new members. You can
help people find your community online.
also make flyers or business cards as
For example, use keywords that represent
offline advertisements to promote your
what your community is in its name,
community.
since potential group members might be
searching for those common terms. You When growing your community, you can
can also use hashtags in your content to combine organic and paid strategies to
make it easier to find. achieve your goals. Use the combination of
tactics that best fits your goals and budget.
Key takeaways
• Successful communities set launch strategies that align an overall community strategy
with an audience, platform and brand strategy.
• A launch strategy considers several tactics to achieve your objectives. Community
managers can compile a list of tactics in an action plan for success.
• Use organic or paid growth options to expand your membership base and reach
potential new members.

2.5 Team Strategy
Running a community by yourself is complex, other roles to distribute their workload and run
and requires posting relevant content, a community effectively and efficiently.
welcoming new members, moderating
If you are at a point where you need community
discussions and maintaining engagement.
management support, you may be asking,
As the number of community members
Where and how can I find a team? And how can
grows, this will take lots of time, effort and
we work together to grow our community?
resources. Community managers can work
in teams of administrators, moderators and

Team-building strategy 05 ONBOAR D NEW MEMB ERS AND HAVE
Overall, your team strategy should consider FR EQU ENT TRAINING FOR YOU R TE A M
a process to assess your community’s needs Explain your management approach and
and define ideal team candidates, strategies community goals upfront so your team
to onboard and train new team members, is on the same page. Be clear about each
and tactics to empower your peers and individual’s responsibilities and your
delegate responsibilities. To start building an expectations for their performance. Every
all-star community team, you’ll need to: team member is critical to maintaining
your community’s culture and should
01 D ETE R M I N E T H E TAS KS YO U
be well versed in understanding and
NE ED H E L P W IT H
implementing the community strategy.
Do you have a backlog of content to Find ways to develop the team’s skills
review? Then you need someone to through mentorship, coaching, training
moderate content. Are conversations and feedback.
going off-topic? Then you need
someone to moderate discussions. 06 COMMU NICATE W ITH YOU R TEAM
Identifying your needs will help you Establish a private communication
figure out the profile and skills to look channel to discuss community issues. Use
for in a potential team member. meetings to coordinate with your team
and collaborate on moderation decisions
02 D EF I N E TH E P RO FIL E O F YO U R
before taking action. You can set up a
TARG ET TE A MM AT E S
WhatsApp or Messenger group chat to
Build a list of characteristics that stay connected.
are most likely to make your team
successful. In Groups, you can use 07 R ELY ON YOU R TEAM FOR HEL P
the suggested moderator feature to
Share and divide responsibilities among
determine candidates who may be a
team members to avoid overwhelming any
good fit for your moderation team.
individual. Be sure that team members
know what they are responsible for, so
03 TRY TO BUI LD YO U R T E AM W IT H
no single person takes on too much and
M EM B E R S F RO M YO U R C O M M U N IT Y
there are no redundancies. As you build
Active members who frequently engage
your team, trust that they will share
with others, support your cause and know
responsibilities.
your brand might be interested in joining
the team. These members are usually 08 K EEP YOU R TEAM MOTIVATED
well established in the community and
Some communities will have paid
are familiar with its culture. If possible,
community managers, but others may
consider these people when building
enlist volunteers. Find ways to incentivize
your team, as their knowledge of the
and reward your team to encourage
community will be a valuable asset.
them and keep them engaged. Show how
0 4 FIN D PEOPL E W IT H D IV E R S E S K IL LS thankful you and your community are
A N D PE R S PEC T IV E S for your team’s work. For example, some
communities acknowledge outstanding
While you are passionate about your
admin work by dedicating posts to them.
community, there will be things that you
know less about. Try to find people who
believe in your mission and can bring a
different point of view to the team.

Key takeaways
• Scaling your community provides an opportunity for growing your
team. Assess your needs and invite the right people to collaborate in
running a growing community efficiently and effectively.
• Communicate with your team members on an ongoing basis. Set
expectations for your team so they can manage the community and
stay aligned with the community strategy and mission.

2.6 Operational Workflows
Your community runs through a combined Defining and documenting workflows will
effort from people who are following help you organize how things get done
processes and defining strategies. To run in your community. For instance, you can
a community efficiently, be sure to clearly establish protocols to categorize responses
define, document and share strategies and by priority or sensitivity, design documents
procedures with your team. Community that include key resources to better onboard
managers define operational workflows to new team members and determine a service-
manage their community in an efficient and level agreement (SLA) commitment to set a
effective way. response time to community needs.

How can you build operational workflows?
Not all workflows need to be defined in one master document. You can use a group of supporting
frameworks together to form your operational workflow protocol. Here are some examples of
documents that your workflow might consider:
• Flowcharts that define a sequence • A community management playbook.

of activities. A flowchart is a visual In a playbook, you can write down your
representation of the steps in a procedure mission, goals, values and guidelines.
and the decisions needed to perform a Also, you can use this document to share
process. You should establish a flow for tips and best practices. For instance, your
each critical process required to run your playbook can list expert advice on how
community, such as a protocol to escalate to create engaging content and how to
crises, accept and welcome new members measure content performance. Ask your
into the community and a sequence of team what topics they would like to see
steps to approve content. covered in the playbook to take advantage
of it as a training tool.
• A Responsible, Accountable, Consulted
and Informed (RACI) chart, or similar, can • A list of frequently asked questions
define roles and responsibilities. RACI (FAQs). Your team and your community
charts are usually displayed as a matrix members will have many questions that
with a list of processes alongside the team will come up often. Gather the ones that
members who are responsible for them. It are most frequently repeated and write
is a good practice to map your flowcharts down the answers to them. You can refer
to a RACI chart. For instance, you can use members to the list to save yourself some
a RACI chart to determine who is the point time.
of contact when you need to escalate
Operational workflows will support you in
conflicts and who will be in charge of
managing your day-to-day tasks. Revisit
onboarding new members.
your workflows over time to see what
• A Gantt chart illustrates mid- and needs to be updated based on how your
long-term milestones. This project community evolves. Share your documents
management tool is used for high-level and workflows with your team and train
planning and can help you schedule, them on how to use the documents to run
coordinate and track specific tasks in your your community efficiently and effectively.
community. For instance, use it to keep
track of the target dates for milestones
and the weekly activities that you are
implementing to achieve your community
objectives.
• A content calendar. While a Gantt chart Key takeaways

illustrates long-term tasks, a content
• Community managers should define the
calendar can be broken down by days,
most important operational workflows to
weeks and months. Content calendars
run the community.
specify what content you are going to
share with your community and when. • Operational workflows can consist of varied
tools and documents, including flowcharts,
project schedules and playbooks.

2.7 Partnerships Strategy
As your community grows, you may be In this section, you will learn more about
thinking of ways to expand your community’s what strategic partnerships are, how they
impact. Some communities have found that work and how your community could benefit
connecting with different strategic partners, from this type of collaboration.
like other communities, brands, nonprofits
and organizations, helps to strengthen their
community’s efforts.
Community managers can define strategic

partnership criteria and classify potential
partners, steward mutually beneficial
partner relationships and determine terms of
collaboration between parties.

What is a strategic partnership?
A partnership works by connecting two or more communities or organizations who offer unique and
exclusive benefits to support each other’s causes and help each other achieve their objectives. Your
community could partner with other groups, nonprofits, brands or organizations.
What are the benefits of partnerships?

Strategic partnerships represent an important opportunity for communities to connect with other
organizations that can help support their goals and further their impact. Partnerships offer a simple
and effective way to increase your community’s presence without financial strain. For instance,
you can partner with an elearning organization that helps you provide training courses to your
community members while you raise traffic to the organization’s website by sharing a link to it in
your community.
What kind of partnerships are there?

From brand and business partnerships to nonprofit and fundraising options, there are a wide variety
of opportunities. Some partnerships are purely motivated by cost-saving, but there are a variety of
other benefits to partnerships that can strengthen your community. Here are some examples:
• Content partnerships Co-create content, • Cost-sharing Communities can partner

like a blog post, video or podcast, with a with brands or nonprofits to share costs
partner. This content can be shared, cross- for mutual causes. For instance, you can
posted or featured from a Page to a Group. co-host an event and divide the cost
Be aware that certain restrictions may apply accordingly.
to branded content in your community when
• Sponsorships Brands can partner with
using Facebook products.
communities for sponsored events and
• Link-sharing opportunities Work with a provide products, funds and venues for
partner to share news about a specific event the event.
or program. For instance, you can direct your
• Discounts and promotions Brands can
community members to an event invite that
offer communities discount codes and
your partner is hosting.
promotions that are unique for members.
• Charitable opportunities Partner with Make these opportunities relevant and
other organizations that relate to your beneficial to your community members,
community’s mission and provide your not just the brand.
members with volunteer opportunities or
become key partners in fundraising efforts.
• Market research Plan learning opportunities

to help partners create better and more
relevant products. This is particularly helpful
for community managers who run brands for
market insights.

How can I establish a partnership?
Knowing the benefits that strategic partnerships can bring to your community is the first step. Let’s
review the strategy that a community manager should follow to establish and nurture partnerships:
01 D EF I N E PA R TN E R S H IP C R IT E R IA AN D CL AS S IFY POTENTIAL PAR TNER S .
A potential partner should share common ground with your community, such as values or
mutually beneficial goals. Ask yourself questions such as: Do our values align with those of the
prospective partner? Are our community members interested in the partnership outcome? Is
the potential partnership aligned with our overall community strategy?
02 PRE PA R E A PI TC H TO L AN D YO U R S T RATEGIC PARTNERS HIP

A N D R EACH O U T TO YO U R PAR T N E R C ANDIDATES .
Think of something concise that answers who your community is, what you expect both
parties to gain from the partnership and how you envision success for both partners and
their communities.
03 CULTI VATE A N D N U R T U R E A M U T UAL LY BENEFICIAL PARTNER REL ATIONS HIP.

Make sure that the partnership will be beneficial to everyone involved. For instance, ask your
members if the outcomes of the partnership are beneficial to them, and check your content
performance to assess if there has been a change in engagement with content related to
the partnership.
0 4 D EF I N E TH E T E R M S O F E N GAG E M E N T FOL LOW ING LOCAL RU L ES AND REGU L ATIONS.

Be open and share with your community the news of the partnership and the reasons for it.
Adhere to rules or policies that the partnership may be subject to.
05 M EA S UR E TH E S U C C E S S O F A PAR T N ER S HIP AND DEV ELOP YOU R R EL ATIONS HIP.

Assess the collaboration on an ongoing basis, asking questions such as: Is the partnership
working? Are both parties benefitting from the partnership? How can the partnership be
amplified or extended in the future?
Key takeaways
• Community managers can establish partnerships with other communities or organizations
to amplify their impact.
• There are various partnership types. Community managers should assess when and if
partnerships are necessary and who are possible partner candidates to collaborate with.
• To establish partnerships, you need to define the criteria, cultivate mutual benefits and
measure the success of your collaboration.

3
Make strategic content

decisions for a community

Part of the role of a community manager is to create and curate engaging content. In this
chapter, you’ll learn the practices and tools you need to build an engaging content strategy
for your community.
3.1 Relevant Content

Everything you share with your community To know what content to share, first, learn
online—like posts, photos, videos and what’s relevant to your audience and how to
stories—is content. In order to build, scale create or curate content that will be meaningful
and grow your community, engaging content to them. Community managers create and
is key. Creating and curating content that curate content that is reflective of their
is relevant to your community is a complex community members’ interests.
task that requires planning, strategizing
Creating your content strategy
and understanding your audience. As a
A content strategy connects your everyday
community manager, you should set a
efforts to your overall community strategy and
content strategy that outlines when and
the needs of your community. You can build a
what to post. A good content strategy
content strategy in three steps:
will lead members to check in often to see
what’s new. 01 DEFINE W HAT TO POS T
02 DETERMINE W HEN TO POS T

To know when to post, observe your
audience’s habits and behaviors, including 03 AS S ES S THE PER FORMANCE OF
the time they are most active online. You YOU R CONTENT
can create and use a content calendar to

plan when your content will go online.

Let’s review each of the three elements of a content strategy:
0 1 WH AT S H OULD YO U C O N S ID E R W H E N POS TING CONTENT ?
• Consider your community mission. • Use tools that support your creative
The content that you share with your process. You don’t need to use
community should contribute to your advanced graphic design software to
overarching mission. It should also create beautiful multimedia content.
adhere to your community strategy, Instagram filters, Boomerang,
rules and branding principles. Layout and other tools can help you
streamline graphic design work.
• Think about your platform strategy.
Content works differently across • Amplify someone else’s content.
different platforms. For instance, if In addition to original content,
you manage an Instagram community, you can also share high-quality
your members will most likely see your material from other sources with
content on their phones. Plan ahead, your community. Always ask for
and use the strengths of the platform permission and give credit to the
to your advantage. source. Tailor it to your community
by saying why you think the content
• Get to know what your members like.
you’re sharing is good for them.
Your content should be relevant to
the people in your community. To best • Encourage members to share
understand what your community content when the platform
members like, use tools like Page allows. Members are at the heart
Insights, Group Insights and polls. of meaningful communities, and
their interest is what moves the
• Use eye-catching multimedia. Don’t
community forward and keeps
limit yourself to plain text. Engaging
other people engaged. Harness your
content often consists of multimedia
members’ interests and experiences
assets such as pictures, animations or
by encouraging them to create
GIFs, video, infographics and links to
content for the community. You
other sites.
can moderate and curate member
• Decide what action you want people content in your Facebook group
to take. Ask your community to using post approvals. Promote
do something with a clear call to challenges or topics of the week,
action in the content you share. It engage with the content your
could be to answer open-ended community members post and
questions, reply with a GIF, provide acknowledge and thank your top
feedback or comments, tag a contributors.
friend or ask your community to
share content to their feed.

02 WH EN S H OUL D YO U P O S T C O N T E N T ?
• Research your community’s online • Post regularly. Your community needs

behavior. Use Page Insights or to stay active and engaged. Commit to
Group Insights to figure out the a periodic release of content to keep
times your community is most things interesting.
active. Your audience has a greater
• Use a content calendar. Determine
chance of seeing your content at
the days and hours when you will
those times, and the more people
post. Prepare your content calendar
who see your content, the greater
in advance by scheduling posts in your
the likelihood of engagement.
group or on your Page.
03 HOW CA N YOU M O N ITO R AN D AS S E S S YOU R CONTENT ?
• Keep track of performance metrics. • Use Facebook tools to manage your

You can track the reach, engagement content and measure its performance.
and conversion metrics of each post. If you’re running a community on a
Reach is defined as how many people Facebook Page or Instagram, Creator
see your content. Engagement is Studio brings together tools you need to
how many interactions community effectively post, manage and measure
members have with the content, content across all your Facebook Pages
such as Likes, comments and shares. and Instagram accounts. Creator Studio
Conversion relates to how many also helps you take advantage of new
member interactions turned into features and opportunities for your
new actions, such as website visits, community when they become available.
sign-ups or event attendance. Track
your content performance using
Page Insights or Group Insights.
We will learn more about content
performance and further explore how
to track it in a future chapter.
Key takeaways
• Test your content and optimize it
• Community managers can use a content
for performance. If a particular post
calendar and community insights to post
isn’t performing as well as others,
compare it to past posts that were
content that is relevant to their audience
more successful. Experiment with the at times their audience is most active.
variables that may have contributed • Track and measure the reach, engagement
to past performance. Some variables and conversion from your content to
that you can optimize are the time understand which pieces perform best in
of a post, the type of media you
your community.
share and the call to action you
use. Change one variable at a time
• Your content strategy should always
until you determine which ones be in sync with and contribute to your
perform better with your audience. community’s mission and values.

3.2 Valuable Trends
Your community is not isolated from global • Holidays and festivities. Refresh your
and local events, trends and issues. This can content with seasonal elements, whether
include global issues such as climate change, it’s to celebrate the beginning of spring or to
a health crisis, or local news and events. commemorate an upcoming festivity.
Pop culture trends will also affect the social
• Viral memes and Internet challenges.
media platforms that your community uses,
Have you seen what is trending on Facebook
and most of your members will engage with
and Instagram? Chances are that your
trending topics in some way.
community members have. Make use of
In this section, we will share examples of memes, GIFs and Internet challenges to
trends and issues that can help community engage your community, but make sure that
managers create relevant and valuable the content that you are sharing adheres to
content to increase engagement with your community guidelines and aligns with
their communities. your community mission.
Common trends These trends are valuable for connecting your

Community managers can research trending community to the wider world but are best
topics and incorporate them into content to used sparingly, as they could shift attention
increase its relevance to their audience. Here away from your mission.
are a few examples of trends and issues that
you may consider:
• Global and local news. Events that occur at

a global or local scale may affect members
of your community. Include these issues
in your content to acknowledge how a
particular event may be affecting your
audience. Make sure to cite reliable
sources and avoid misinformation.

Find valuable trends
The key to finding valuable trends is to
monitor traditional and social media. What’s
happening in the world? What’s happening
outside your community? What other social
media are your members consuming? Here
are some ways to find valuable trends to
engage your community:
• Insights. Facebook IQ can lead you

to powerful, actionable insights and
measurement about the behavior of your
community. Use Insights To Go to look at
insights aggregated by region, industry
and more. Page Insights and Group
Insights can show you which posts are
trending in your community.
• News. News outlets can provide valuable

information about what’s happening
globally and locally. If you want to share
news with your community, make sure to
post news from reliable sources. Facebook
News offers a collection of headlines and
stories from trustworthy publishers.
• Social listening. Social listening is

the act of monitoring social media to
determine what people are saying about
a particular topic. You can use hashtags
and keyword alerts to start social
listening in your community. Hashtags
turn topics and phrases into links in your
posts and can help you find more related
posts about topics you’re interested in. Key takeaways
Keyword alerts enable you to receive
• Community managers can include relevant
notifications when specific words and
trends in their content strategy to improve
phrases appear in your community.
community engagement.
Your community members will often provide
• Trends may include global and local news,
valuable trends and give you ideas of what
holidays and festivities, viral memes and
content they would like to see. Engage your
Internet challenges, among others.
community in conversation and explore what
valuable trends you can include.

3.3 Goal-driven Activities
Creating engaging content for your As a community manager, you can create
community is one of the core tasks of different types of posts using Facebook
a community manager. But traditional products and services to engage your
text-based media may not be enough to audience and mobilize your community in
accomplish your strategic goals, such as different ways. In the next section, we will
improving your reach and engagement, or review examples of the tools you can use to
kicking off conversation. Facebook apps and reach your goals.
services provide product-specific tools to
help you enhance your content engagement
and support your overall community strategy.

Products and features
Certain types of posts can help you achieve your particular strategic community goals. Community
managers should be familiar with the tools available and how each one can engage and mobilize
their audience.
Here are some product-specific tools that you can use to enhance your content and reach your
overall community strategy goals:
TOOLS FOR H I G H L IG H T IN G C O N T E N T IN T HE LONG- AND S HORT-TER M
Announcements and pinned posts Stories

Available in Facebook Groups and on Pages Available on Facebook and Instagram
• Group announcements are posts that • Stories are collections of images or short
appear at the top of your group and in the videos that you can create from your
announcements section. Facebook Page or Instagram account. You
• Similarly, you can pin a post to the top can add overlays, stickers and effects to
of your Facebook Page. While you can your stories, and they are visible to your
only pin one post at a time, you can community for 24 hours.
feature multiple announcements. • Get creative with stories to achieve
• Use announcements or pinned posts to share broader reach and engagement. For
important information with your community, example, create a narrative with a
such as your guidelines, or news that you collection of short clips or survey your
want members to see clearly at the top of audience using poll stickers.
your community News Feed.
TOOLS FOR H E L PI N G YO U R C O M M U N IT Y GET TOGETHER ON AND OFFL INE
Events and get-togethers Live and Watch Party

Available through Facebook Pages Available through Instagram and Facebook
and Groups Pages and Groups
• You can host in-person and online meetups • You can use Facebook Live to broadcast
using the Events tool on your Facebook events, performances and gatherings in
Page or in your group. real time. Your community can watch from
• In your group, you can create get- a smartphone, computer or connected
togethers, which enable you to set a date, TV. Start a live video on Instagram, or on
time and location for a meeting. You can Facebook from a Page or a Group.
also choose to “decide later” if you don’t • You can host a watch party to bring your
have those details worked out yet. community together for a shared video
• With events and get-togethers, your experience. Choose videos relevant to your
community members can make more community and invite members to join
robust connections by meeting in and discuss them. This feature is available
person or online. These relationships through your Facebook Page or Group.
can contribute to an increased sense of
community and belonging.

TOOLS TO G ET TO K N OW YO U R TOOLS TO S U PPORT
COM M UNI TY ’S OP IN IO N S COMMU NITY L EARNING
Polls Units
Available on Facebook Pages, Groups and Available through Facebook Groups
Stories and Instagram Stories. • Units enable group admins to organize
• Create a poll on Facebook or Instagram content and share educational resources
to ask a question. Customize the answers with their community. You can use units
and let your community members vote for to create a series of sequential or themed
their favorite option. Facebook posts (for example, a member
• Polls can help you engage your community training guide or learning path) and track
and start conversations around topics that who has completed it.
are of interest to them. For instance, you
can ask your community for feedback, or
ask what types of content they would like
to see more of in the future.
TOOLS TO M OB I LI ZE YO U R C O M M U N IT Y TO TAK E AC TION
Fundraise Ads
Available on Facebook and Instagram Available on Facebook and Instagram
• Use fundraising tools on Facebook and • Facebook ads can help you reach new
Instagram to donate and raise money for people on Facebook or Instagram who may
both nonprofits and personal causes. You be interested in your community. Use ads
can create fundraisers as a community to to increase overall awareness, expand your
support your overall cause or mission. reach, get more people to engage with
your content, and grow your member base.
Think of creative ways that you could use

these tools to pursue your community
goals. You can also create campaigns that
achieve your goals through a mix of tools.
For example, if you want to grow your
community, you can use stories and ads, and Key takeaways
plan an in-person event to invite new people • Facebook apps and services include
to join your community. If you want to assess
many tools that can help you create
your community guidelines, post them in
content and activities that support your
an announcement, use a poll to survey your
community goals.
community and host a live event to chat
with your audience about your mission and • Community managers should determine
how your values should be reflected in the which tools can best enable them to
community rules. engage and mobilize their community.
Note: Some of these tools are not yet

available worldwide.

4
Engage and moderate

a community

Community managers have the ability to cultivate a welcoming culture. Learn how to engage
and moderate your community by onboarding new members, encouraging member-to-member
connections and using Facebook Community Standards to keep your community safe.
4.1 Onboard New Members

A community is a group of people who Community managers should help new
connect around a common topic to learn, members get oriented. The first step in
share and discuss. Each community the onboarding process is to make new
has its own mission, values and culture. members feel welcome and comfortable
Community managers work to create in the community. In this section, we will
spaces that support the community review different ways to onboard new
strategy and culture. members of your community.

How can you make new members feel welcome?
New members may have a hard time engaging with your community at first.
Help them to feel more comfortable with these strategies:
• Post a welcome message. A greeting Be explicit with your new members about
makes new members feel appreciated and your values and rules. Include a link to your
accepted. Each platform your community community guidelines in your welcome
uses offers a unique opportunity to post in order to set clear expectations,
welcome new people. For instance, in encourage positive behaviors and help
Facebook Groups, you can tag new new members understand more about
members in a welcome message. In Pages your culture. As an added bonus, sharing
and on Instagram, you can post a photo the community guidelines in frequent
that invites new members to introduce welcome posts will help to reiterate the
themselves in the comments. Across rules for everyone.
platforms, you can create a welcome post
• Create a safe environment for your
that invites new members to say hello and
community. Building a welcoming
prompts current members to greet them.
community culture is an ongoing effort.
• Encourage members to welcome each Encourage members to engage with your
other. Empower your community members community content and each other in
to support one another and contribute a friendly manner. Cultivate respectful
to the community culture. For instance, conversations so everyone feels invited
your members can organize a welcome to participate.
committee that greets new members.
• Use membership questions. In Groups,
Members can also tag each other to make
membership questions can help you
connections and start conversations.
screen new members. Learn more about
Reach out to members who help you make
potential members before introducing
your community a welcoming space, and
them to your community—for instance,
thank them for their support.
you can ask them why they want to join
• Involve everyone on your team in the the community, and ask them to adhere to
onboarding process. Encourage your your guidelines.
teammates to welcome new members
Your onboarding strategy will depend on
and to introduce themselves and share
the platform you are using. For instance,
their roles in the community. This helps
membership questions and rules sections
new members get to know the different
are available in Groups, while in Pages
community management team members
you can post a welcome message with
and feel acknowledged.
your guidelines and pin it to the top. With
• Refer new members to your community Pages, you can also create a group in which
guidelines. If you are using Pages, your Page is the admin, and move your
make a pinned public post to share your community-building strategies from your
community code of conduct. If you are Page to a group. Adjust and revise your
using Groups, make an announcement, strategies to make them suitable for your
which you can refer to whenever you need platform and community.
it, or create rules for your group.

Key takeaways
• Community managers should help new members to feel welcome
and comfortable within the community. Try tagging new members
individually or share a collective welcome post.
• Make sure that new members understand your community
guidelines when they join.
• Encourage other community members to participate in the
onboarding process.

4.2 Member-to-Member
Connections
Fostering meaningful conversations and In this section, we will review a series of
connections among your community strategies to help you boost community
members can lead to a strong sense engagement by strengthening members’
of belonging. Experienced community connections with each other and creating
managers encourage participation from opportunities for participation.
everyone, recognize members on an
individual level and enable meaningful
connections among peers.

Tactics to encourage meaningful connections
Here are some great ways for community managers to promote participation
among community members:
• Acknowledge contributing members. • Curate member-generated content. Your

Recognize and reward people who members are a great resource for content.
exemplify your community culture and Encourage them to share their favorite
values. You can encourage members to stories, images, memes and opinions
give shout-outs to other helpful members, to start discussions. This can also help
identify your most active members in lighten your workload when creating
Group Insights and use top fan badges content for the community. In Groups,
in Pages to identify the most active you can pre-approve members to post, or
members in your community. There are you can use the post-approval function to
several ways you can acknowledge your curate individual member contributions.
top contributors: You can post picture
• Ask for feedback and questions. Use
collages of them with a thank-you
polls and open-ended questions to
message, interview them and share it with
make it easy for your members to
the community or pre-approve their posts
participate. Polls are great for members
in your Facebook group.
who are reluctant to post, while open-
• Encourage member-to-member ended questions enable you to engage
communication. As you get to know your with people who are eager to share
community members, think about ways their thoughts. You can create polls in
to connect them, such as asking them Facebook and Instagram communities.
to share the region or city where they
• Be aware of the differences in your
live or similar interests they may have.
audience. Some members will be very
Tag members and invite them to start a
active and comment on everything,
conversation. Motivating members to get
while others will prefer to engage with
to know one another on a deeper level can
content but not start or participate in
help your community form stronger bonds.
conversations. Acknowledge both active
• Coordinate in-person events. Face-to- members and members who don’t often
face meetings can increase a sense of engage publicly, and invite them to
community and belonging. Consider participate in the ways that make them
hosting real-life events or get-togethers to feel comfortable.
gather with your community offline.
• Lead by example. Reply and engage
• Host special online meetups. Online in meaningful conversation on your
events are a great way to connect with members’ posts, demonstrating the
your community both locally and globally. kind of tone that you want others to use.
Use Watch Party or host a live video As you set the standard on community
with your group or Page to kick off a participation, other members will follow.
virtual gathering. You can also encourage
conversations and plan events using
Messenger Rooms.

Key takeaways
• Build a welcoming community by
fostering member connections. Thriving
As with most engagement tactics, try new
strategies one at a time, and assess which
communities encourage member-to-
ones work best for your unique community. member conversations for people to make
meaningful bonds.
Stay up-to-date with the latest community
• Recognize the members who contribute
management resources in the Facebook
Newsroom and on the Community Leaders
to the community and exemplify your
website. Learn about new tools and trends ideal participatory culture.
that you can use to manage your community. • Encourage member participation through
tactics such as sharing member-created
content, asking open-ended questions
and collecting feedback through polls.
• Stay up-to-date with the latest tools
and products to foster engagement and
member connections.

4.3 Community Standards and
Terms of Service
Previously, we learned strategies for In this section, we will review Facebook
developing the guiding principles of your Terms of Service and Community
community. These were specific guidelines Standards. We will also review how to
based on your plan to uphold your community’s identify when someone goes against these
mission and values. And, if your community guidelines in your community and what you
expands across Facebook apps, you need to should do if it happens.
adhere to the Terms of Service in addition to
your specific community principles.

What are the Terms of Service and Community Standards?
The Terms of Service outline the legal These Terms, Community Standards and
agreement between a service provider (in Policies evolve over time to keep pace with
this case, Facebook) and a person who changes happening online and in the world.
wants to use that service. When you build a They are written and updated based on
community using Facebook apps and services, feedback from the Facebook community
Facebook is the service provider and you are and the advice of experts in fields such as
the service user. These Terms govern your technology, public safety and human rights.
use of Facebook apps, including Instagram,
In particular, Community Standards apply
and the other products, features, services,
to the content you post on Facebook
technologies and software on these platforms.
platforms. So, to review, Facebook Terms of
Every person who uses Facebook must Service govern your use of Facebook apps
follow these Terms. Community managers and technologies, and Facebook Community
in particular should be familiar with and Standards detail what is and isn’t allowed
follow Facebook Community Standards, on Facebook.
Pages, Groups and Events Policies, and
Commerce Policies.
What values are Community Standards based on?

Facebook Community Standards address what is and isn’t allowed on Facebook.
They are built to support the following values:
• Authenticity. We want to make sure that • Privacy. We are committed to protecting

the content people are seeing on Facebook personal privacy and information.
is genuine. We believe that authenticity Privacy gives people the freedom to be
creates a better environment for sharing, themselves, and to choose how and when
and we don’t want people using Facebook to to share on Facebook and to connect
misrepresent who they are or what they’re more easily. Some examples of prohibited
doing. Content that doesn’t adhere to the behavior include content that identifies
authenticity principle might include, but is individuals by name and conveys their
not limited to, inauthentic behavior, using personal information or facilitates identity
multiple accounts, sharing false news and theft by posting or soliciting personally
misinformation. identifiable information.
• Safety. We are committed to making • Dignity. We believe that all people are
Facebook a safe place. Any expression equal in dignity and rights. We expect that
that threatens people has the potential to people will not harass or degrade others
intimidate, exclude or silence others and and respect their dignity. Content that
isn’t allowed on Facebook. Examples of violates the dignity value might include,
content that violates the safety value may but is not limited to, hate speech as a
include, but is not limited to, messages that direct attack on people based on what we
promote bullying, harassment or self-injury. call protected characteristics.

What are the Community Standards?
Here is an overview of the Community Standards and how they treat each of the following categories:
• V
iolence and criminal behavior. We aim to • I ntegrity and authenticity. These policies
prevent potential online and offline harm are intended to create a safe environment
that may be related to content on Facebook. where people can trust and hold one
Our violence and criminal behavior standards another accountable. This policy
prohibit content about violence and prohibits misrepresentation, spam,
incitement, content by dangerous individuals inauthentic behavior, false news and
and organizations, content that coordinates manipulated media.
harm or publicizing crime, content about the
sale of regulated goods, and content about • R
especting intellectual property.
fraud and deception. Facebook takes intellectual property rights
seriously and believes they are important
• Safety. We are dedicated to promoting a safe for promoting expression, creativity and
environment for everyone on Facebook, and innovation in our community. People own
will remove content that encourages harm all of the content and information that
or jeopardizes safety. Our safety standards they post on Facebook. However, this
prohibit content about suicide and self-injury, standard prohibits people from posting
child nudity and the sexual exploitation of content that violates someone else’s
children or adults, bullying and harassment, intellectual property rights, including
human exploitation, and content that violates copyright and trademark.
privacy or image privacy rights.
• Objectionable content. Hate speech,

cruel and insensitive remarks, and violent
and graphic content are all prohibited on
Facebook. So, too, is content about adult
nudity, sexual activity and sexual solicitation.
What should you do if the Community Standards are being violated in your community?
As a community manager, you should be You can report profiles, individual content
aware of the core values that support and comments as well as other Pages and
Facebook Terms, Policies and Community groups. You can use moderation tools in
Standards so you know what kind of Groups or Pages, or the Group Quality and
content is and isn’t allowed. You can also Page Quality tools, to identify possible
use Facebook Community Standards as violations and the steps you should take
a guide when you create rules for your to keep your community safe.
own communities.
If you think that your community might have

content or members that are not adhering
to Facebook guidelines, you should report it.

How can I use Facebook Community
Standards in my community?
You can use Facebook Community
Standards as a reference for what is Key takeaways
expected from your members. For example,
• T
he Terms of Service and Community
you can design your community guidelines
Standards detail what is and isn’t allowed
to complement the four values that
support Facebook Community Standards: on Facebook platforms.
Authenticity, safety, privacy and dignity. • F
acebook Community Standards are
frequently updated policies that change
We will further explore moderation tactics
over time and are built around the values
that can help your members adhere to
your community guidelines and Facebook of authenticity, safety, privacy and dignity.
Community Standards in the next section. • C
ommunity managers should ensure that
their communities are safe spaces for
people to connect through moderating
and reporting content that may go against
Facebook Community Standards.

4.4. Crises and Conflicts
At some point, it is inevitable that a In this section, we will review what
conflict will come up in your community. conflict moderation looks like in an online
A conflict is a clash of interests between community, how you can prevent it from
two or more people that could range from a happening, and which strategies can address
difference of opinion to an argument or more and resolve crises and disputes.
harmful communication. It’s not unusual
for community members to engage in a
conversation where differences of opinions
may arise. However, when those differences
become serious, negative or turn into a
significant conflict, community managers
should intervene.

What does conflict look like in an online community?
People can engage in debates or conversations This can happen because of differing
online that are controversial. That is part of values, opinions or perspectives, and often
normal community interaction. However, when occurs when someone’s feelings are hurt in
a discussion escalates and participants become response to a conflicting view.
deliberately aggressive or insulting, this is a
In online communities, conflict can range
conflict and it’s important to take action.
from negative posts, rude comments
Conflicts usually arise when two or more people and inappropriate language to bullying
disagree, and, despite their best attempts, or harassment.
aren’t able to achieve a mutual understanding.
How can you minimize conflicts in your community?

As a community manager, you want to make your community a safe place for open and respectful
debate. You may not be able to eradicate conflict completely, but you can follow these strategies
to keep debates civil:
• Write clear community guidelines. Community • Encourage your members to report

guidelines reflect how you plan to uphold conflict. Members should be able to report
your mission and values and show the kind posts or tag admins in the comments of
of behavior you want to encourage in your heated conversations. When a member
community. Your guidelines should state the reports a post, community managers will
consequences of not following the rules. receive a notification. This enables you
or someone on your team to address the
• Share your community guidelines regularly.
situation. Members can report content to
Repost your community guidelines often to
the community manager or to Facebook.
remind your members about them. You can
share your guidelines to your whole community • Use keyword alerts to track potential
with a post, comment on specific discussions negative comments. Turn on keyword
where you think conversation is becoming alerts to stay ahead of disagreements. If
negative or send private messages to members you know that certain language is banned
who are engaging in heated conversation. If or indicative of conflict, you can flag those
you are using Pages, make a pinned public keywords and receive an alert when they
post to share your guidelines. If you are using are used in your community.
Groups, make an announcement, which you can
• Curate all published content. In
refer to when needed, or use the rules section.
communities like groups where members
• Train your team to spot early signs of conflict. can post their own content, consider
You will not always be available to track using post approvals. This way, you can
content and conversations in your community. approve posts before they appear in
Empower your team to recognize early signs your community.
in heated conversations about controversial
These strategies may not prevent conflict
topics. Delegate the responsibility to moderate
in your community completely, but they
discussions and take action to enforce your
can help you to take action before negative
community guidelines.
conversations escalate.

How to manage conflict in your community?
Act quickly in a conflict to minimize its impact and keep your community safe.
Here are some actions you can take:
• Always step in. Leave no conflict • Mute, remove or ban members from your
unmanaged. Moderate or comment community. If intervening or closing the
on a conversation that you think may conversation doesn’t work, you will have
escalate to a conflict and is moving to consider other approaches. The options
away from your community guidelines. you have to moderate your community will
Show members that you care about the look different based on the product you
way they speak to one another and that are using. In Groups, you can temporarily
your community doesn’t tolerate rude mute or block members, and in Pages, you
behavior. If needed, you can reach out can hide or delete member comments or
to members privately to understand the ban people from your community. When
source of conflict and remind them of you take actions like these, it’s important
the rules. to be upfront and open about why you
took them.
• Close conversations. If intervening
and moderating the discussion doesn’t • Report content that violates Community
solve the conflict, consider turning off Standards. Use the Find Support or Report
comments or removing the posts. Before link to report Pages, Groups, Events,
closing a post or a post’s comments, it’s members or content that goes against
important to be transparent and state Facebook Community Standards.
why you decided to do so, providing
• Resolve any issues and keep track of
feedback for the involved members.
conflict. Keep a record of conflicts
For instance, you can say that the
and crises that have occurred in your
conversation was not productive to the
community. Count how many conflicts
community anymore and it was moving
have been solved and how many are active.
too far away from an appropriate context,
Try to bring this latter number to zero.
or refer to the community rule the post
Your record will help you measure your
was not adhering to.
community health.
Key takeaways
• C
onflicts happen when two or more people have a disagreement that escalates. In an
online community, conflict is unavoidable and it will happen eventually.
• B
e proactive in taking actions to prevent conflict, such as writing and sharing clear
community guidelines to maintain respectful conversation that you, your team and your
community members can enforce.
• W
hen conflicts arise, act quickly. Join the conversation to moderate it, and mute,
remove, ban or report members if necessary.
4.5. Community Operations
Community operations are the set of tasks, Community tasks
based on your community strategies, that As a community manager, you will take
keep your community running on a daily actions to maintain your community
basis. In previous sections, we reviewed: operations on a daily basis. Each of these
actions should align with your overall
• Operational documents and workflows
community strategy. Community operation
that can help you manage your
tasks will vary from one community to
community.
another. Overall, community operation tasks
• How to create and implement a content
will revolve around four elements:
strategy.
01 CREATING AND
• Tactics to engage members.
MONITORING CONTENT
• Strategies to build a team.
02 ENGAGING AND
Community managers combine all these MODER ATING MEMB ERS
elements and strategies to manage their
03 COL L AB ORATING W ITH YOU R TEAM
communities effectively and efficiently on a
04 TR ACK ING YOU R LONG-TERM
daily basis.
COMMU NITY S TRATEGY
In this section, we will look in depth at
how community operations tasks can
help you manage and run your day-to-day
community tasks.

Compare this list with your community core tasks and define your community
operations strategy based on what’s important to achieve in your day-to-day work.
Let’s break down each of these processes:
01 CR E ATI N G A N D 03 COL L AB ORATING W ITH YOU R TEAM

M ONI TOR I NG C O N T E N T
• Onboard new team members. If you
• Create or curate relevant content and run a group, you can use units to
use valuable trends to update your develop an onboarding program.
community content library.
• Use your operational workflow
• Schedule posts for publication using documents to delegate tasks to your
a content calendar. You can use the team members.
scheduling tool in Groups or Pages to
implement a content calendar. • Commit time to training and
communicating with your team
• Track content engagement and members. You can use this time
performance, measuring reach, to organize work and develop a
engagement and conversion metrics community playbook with tips and
using Group or Page Insights. best practices.
02 EN GAG I N G A N D • Empower your teammates and share

M OD ER ATI NG M E M B E R S responsibilities. Use a RACI chart to
• Onboard and welcome new members. clarify your expectations and team
You don’t have to commit time to members’ unique roles.
welcome new members every day,
04 TR ACK ING YOU R LONG-TERM
but it’s a good practice to check your
COMMU NITY S TRATEGY
member base regularly using Group or
Page Insights. • Assess how you are doing at
achieving the community objectives
• Participate in conversations with your defined in your community strategy
members, foster member-to-member and determine whether you have
connections and make moderating accomplished them or not. If needed,
crises and conflicts a priority if they evaluate your community’s long-term
occur. Follow your established flow milestones using your gantt chart.
charts protocols on how to escalate
conflict. • Schedule your daily activities to cover
all the elements of your community
• Answer member questions or direct operations protocol. Remember that
them to your community FAQs not all communities are the same.
(frequently asked questions). Adjust this protocol to suit your
community’s needs.

Key takeaways
• C
ommunity operations are a set of tasks that keep your community
running on a daily basis.
• As you manage your online community each day, you will create and
monitor content, engage and moderate members, work together with
your team and keep an eye on your long-term community strategy.

5
Measure and Analyze

Community Success

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Community managers review data and analyze insights on an ongoing basis to determine the
success of their community strategy. In this chapter, you will learn how to assess the performance
of your content, collect insights from your community and evaluate your monetization options.
5.1. Content Performance

Community managers measure the 02 ENGAGEMENT
performance of the content they create and is defined as how many interactions the
curate to understand how it performs, how content receives, such as Likes, comments
people are engaging, and how they may need and shares. Measure the engagement
to revise or adjust their strategy. of a piece of content when you want to
gauge how many people interacted with
In this section, you will learn about how to
it. For instance, if you post a photo to a
measure content performance with Facebook
Page, engagement refers to the number
apps and services.
of interactions on the photo. Interactions
include things like reactions (Like, Love, Care,
Understanding content performance
Haha, Wow, Sad or Angry ), comments and
In content metrics, there are three key the clicks on the photo to open it in gallery
elements to define performance: reach, view.
engagement and conversion.
03 CONV ERS ION
0 1 RE ACH
is defined as member interactions that turn
is defined as how many people see your into valuable actions, such as website visits,
content. For instance, if you post something sign-ups and purchases. For instance, if you
in a Facebook Group, the reach will refer to create an ad campaign for a Page in hopes of
how many members saw your post. Members increasing sales, conversion will be measured
may not interact with the post, but as long as the number of people who were exposed
they have seen it, their view will count to the ad and bought something. A high
toward its reach. conversion rate means that an ad campaign
was successful in making the audience take a
desired action.

How can you track content performance?
The simplest way to track the performance
of content in your community is to use a
content engagement tracker. Let’s build a
simple content tracker with an example post.
• The example post has a reach of 122,

because that is the number of people who
saw the post.
• The example post engagement includes

how many people reacted to the post and
how many people commented on the post.
The example post has 4 reactions and 9
comments.
• The example post contains a poll, so

conversion here refers to how many people
answered the poll question. The poll
received 108 answers.
Apply this counting method to all your posts and build a table to track content performance and historical
data. You can also build your analytics tracker within your content calendar template so you can keep track
of how scheduled content performs. Your tracker might look similar to this:
Day of
Date Time Campaign Description Reach Engagement Conversion
Week
Poll: How are you Reactions: 4

5/4 12pm Mon Feelings 122 108 answers
feeling today? Comments: 9
Post:
Reactions: 4
4/29 10am Wed Feelings Understanding 160 ...
Comments: 4
our feelings
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...

A content engagement tracker provides your audience sees and engages with the most.The
a useful overview of how your content is example post has a reach of 122, because that is the
performing. However, it can be challenging number of people who saw the post.
to keep a manual tracker up-to-date with all
• T
o track content performance in Groups, go to
the real-time interactions that may happen
Insights and click on the Engagement tab. In this
in your community. Facebook apps and
section, you will see a graph of your engagement
services have specific tools that enable you
metrics for a specific date range. In Group Insights,
to review and keep track of your content
under the Engagement tab, you can also track the
performance with data that is always
posts with the most comments and reactions.
up-to-date.
Download details to see a comprehensive table
Track content performance using Insights that specifies the performance metrics for each
post in your group.
Insights provide information about your
community, including demographic data • To track content performance in Pages, go to
about your audience and how your members Insights and click on the Post tab. Here, you will
are responding to your content. Your access see a list of all your published posts with the reach
to and capabilities within Insights will vary and engagement numbers for each one. In the
depending on the product you are using to Overview tab, you can download details to see a
build your online community. For example, comprehensive table with the performance metrics
Pages provides data through the last two for each post on your Page. You can also track the
years, and you need 100 or more members performance of your ad campaigns from your Page.
to see aggregated demographic data, like Go to the Page’s Ad Center to find a summary of
age, gender and location. In Groups, you your latest campaigns.
need 250 members to see aggregated data,
Tracking the metrics of your posts and analyzing their
like top countries, cities, age and gender. In
performance will help you understand what kinds
Instagram Insights, you can find aggregated
of content work best to engage your community
data about your followers and the people
members. For example, you may notice that posts
interacting with your organization, including
published at certain times receive more attention
gender, age range and location. You can
and positively affect your reach numbers, or that
also determine the posts and stories that
content with photos and animations receives more

reactions than text-only posts. Explore
different approaches and optimize your
posts for reach, engagement and conversion
as needed. Eventually, you will see
performance trends that may help you set
goals for your metrics, determine specific
content objectives and redefine your
engagement tactics.
ALT PHOTO LAYOUT --
ADD PHOTO HERE
Key takeaways
• Community managers measure the
performance of the content they
create to understand what resonates
most with their community.
• Content performance is measured
by tracking reach, engagement and
conversion.
• You can use Insights to analyze the
performance of your content.

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5.2. Feedback Collection

Your community strategy acts as a foundation 02 INFORMATION
for building, scaling and sustaining a The context that data needs in order to be
meaningful community. But your strategy categorized or organized in specific ways. For
will change over time to meet the evolving example, post reaction data can be organized
needs of your community. You can learn what by type of post (text only, photos, videos)
needs to be updated and when by collecting and you can look at the number of members
data and feedback. in your community by gender or age range.
In this section, you will learn how to implement

03 INS IGHTS
feedback channels and collect data that can help
Findings based on data and information
you make changes to your strategy as needed.
that can help you plan and improve your
community strategies. For example,
Data, information and insights
historical data and information from your
Any strategy changes you make should be based community posts can help you determine
on evidence: data, information and insights. To that video content usually gets higher
collect this evidence, assess what works, focus levels of engagement, or that most of the
on the goals and outcomes that matter to your community members who engage with your
community and use the insights you learn to posts are women between the ages of 25
inform any changes to your strategy. Let’s break and 34. You can use these insights to plan
down these different kinds of evidence: future content that may include video and is
designed to appeal to your audience.
01 DATA
Raw numbers, facts and figures. Some

examples of data are the number of
reactions that each post has or the
number of members in your community
desired action.

Collect evidence to implement
strategy changes
You can collect and analyze feedback in

many different ways. For example, you can:
Ask your community. This may seem

obvious, but it’s often overlooked.
Ask community members what things
are working and what things could be
improved. You can ask questions about
what kind of content they would like to
see more often and what opinions people
have of your community guidelines. Use
open-ended questions to engage people
in conversation or post polls to gather
specific feedback. Give members the ability
to add poll options and vote for more than
one option.
• Use Group and Page Insights. Insights

provide information about your
community, including aggregated
demographic data about your audience
and how your community members
respond to your content. Use this data
and information to understand what
works well with your community and
what doesn’t.
• Explore, implement and assess. Try
new things. When you face a challenge,
make small changes to start, and use
other feedback collection methods to
understand how that change is working.
If your community responds well to a
small change, expand it.
As with most tactics, you can combine all

these feedback channels to make decisions
about your strategy. Ultimately, you should
try to collect evidence that can help you
understand what strategies you should
maintain or review.

Key takeaways
• C
ollect data, information and insights
to support changes to your community
strategy.
• Track and measure the reach,
engagement and conversion from your
content to understand which pieces
perform best in your community.
• Ask your community members
and community manager peers for
additional feedback.

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5.3. Data Reporting

As your community grows, the increasing Download spreadsheets with raw data in
number of members, interactions, table format from the Facebook Group or
content and insights will generate more Page Insights tabs.
data. As we reviewed in the previous
• Graphics
section, contextualizing and organizing
Graphics are visual representations of
this data can help you make valuable
numeric values. Facebook Group and Page
discoveries and decisions.
Insights use graphics to show engagement
Reporting and understanding this data is levels and member attributes. Some kinds of
an essential skill, especially if you want graphics are better suited to reporting data
to share your community insights with and explaining certain concepts.
others. In this section, we will review
• Histograms represent how data has
data-reporting tactics.
varied over time. For example, use
histograms to track how your member
Reporting quantitative data base has grown in the last month.
Quantitative information, or data, is • Bar charts represent categorical data
obtained using a numerical measurement with heights or lengths proportional
process. The number of reactions to to the values that they represent. For
a post and the number of members in example, you can compare the reach
your community are two examples of and engagement values of your last five
quantitative information. You can report posts to see how they performed.
this data with:
• Pie charts represent how data sets
• Tables relate to one another. For example, you
Tables are a fantastic way to present can display the proportion of women to
raw data that you need to analyze in men in your member base.
detail or use to make other calculations.
For instance, you can use tables to
build a post performance tracker.

Reporting qualitative data
Qualitative data records things that are

descriptive, subjective, not quantifiable
or difficult to measure, like a community
member’s opinion on your last post or a
written review of a service your community
offers. As this data is not numeric, it can’t be
represented with tables or graphics. However,
it can be represented through other methods.
For example:
• Quotations
Select key quotes that sum up the opinions
of the group. Use quotes to support claims,
illustrate ideas, evoke emotion or provoke a
response. For instance, if you ask an open-
ended question in your community, pick
a selection of responses that summarize
how your community responded to
your question.
• Word clouds
Give greater prominence to words that
appear more frequently in your community.
Use word clouds to identify broad topics
that are discussed often.
• Categorization.
If your qualitative data can be organized by
topic, classify responses into categories.
Categorizing enables you to transform
qualitative responses into quantitative
data. For instance, you can classify
responses to a change of your community
guidelines into positives and negatives,
and graph your results to report what the
general community response was to the
new rules.
You can combine qualitative and

quantitative reporting in creative ways.
Make a presentation featuring graphics and
word clouds, or use infographics to show
your results.

Key takeaways
• T
o illustrate key insights from their
communities, community managers
need to understand data and how to
collect it.
• Report quantitative data using tables
or graphics. Download the graphics
and raw data that are provided in
Insights.
• Report qualitative data using
meaningful quotations or word clouds.
Categorize member responses to
questions when possible to transform
qualitative data into quantitative data.
• Create presentations that combine
quantitative and qualitative data
or make a presentation stronger by
using infographics.

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5.4. Sustainability
Some communities sell products and services • Revenue sources are the different ways
that can provide a source of income. These you can earn income. Examples of revenue
communities can use Facebook apps and sources can include donations, fundraisers,
services to connect with their audience and subscriptions and sales of products
grow their business. and services.
• Community resources are things that you can
Other communities, like groups and nonprofits,
monetize, like community content, products
are built around a common interest or cause
and services.
and may not have a revenue model with a direct
source of income. As these communities grow, • A revenue-generating approach is the
so will the amount of work that community combination of one or many revenue sources
managers need to do to moderate and engage and your community resources, like offering
their members. They may also need to build a subscriptions to up-to-date community
team to maintain community operations. These content or selling community merchandise.
efforts can be costly, and communities may
Understanding revenue options
need to explore revenue streams to keep their
A revenue source represents a single kind of
community flourishing.
income for your community. You can combine
In this section, we’ll review ways to generate many different revenue sources based on the
revenue to help make your community resources and capabilities of your community.
financially sustainable. But you must also consider the impact that
your choices might have on your community,
Building a sustainable community as a bad choice could mean losing the respect
A revenue model is a plan for generating and trust of your members. The more income
income, and you can develop one to make your options you have, the stronger your revenue
community financially sustainable over time. A model becomes. Here are some examples of
community revenue model will often combine revenue options:
a revenue source, resources and a revenue-
generating approach.

01 D ONATI ON S
Money that is given to your community
to support its cause. You can receive
donations from individuals and
institutions or even collect them during
events. For example, a local band can
organize a fundraiser concert and
donate some of their ticket sales to your
community because they support your
cause.
02 RECUR R I N G R E V E N U E S
A consistent and stable source of income.
Usually, recurring revenues come in the
form of subscriptions or time-based
membership fees. For instance, you
can offer a monthly subscription to
premium content that is only available to
subscribers.
03 SAL ES
Communities can offer products or
services that address the needs of your
members. For example, you could sell
access to online courses that you host.
ALT PHOTO LAYOUT --
04 BRA ND PA R TN E R S H IP S
Companies can use your community ADD PHOTO HERE
to bring awareness to the activities,
products and services that their brand
offers. You can use partnerships to
promote brand content or sponsor
company events in your community.
05 PU B LI CATI ON S
Books, magazines and blogs can be great
ways to tell the story of your community.
You can opt to publish yourself or aim
for a partnership with a publisher. For
example, you can combine the top
learnings on a topic into a blog article to
be shared with a wider audience.
You can mix and match many different options

to diversify the revenue that your community
generates and may need to use off-platform
solutions to implement them.

Adhering to Facebook • Follow Facebook Content
Community Standards Monetization Policies
Monetized content must adhere to an
When communities use Facebook apps additional level of standards above and
and services to build their online presence, beyond our Community Standards, called
they must adhere to Facebook Community Content Monetization Policies. These
Standards and other policies. Communities include deeper restrictions on content
that use Facebook platforms to generate itself and the formats in which it
revenue must also comply with a set of rules is presented.
called Partner Monetization Policies. For
a comprehensive list of rules please visit • Share authentic content
Facebook Partner Monetization Policies. Communities that post content flagged
These rules apply to all content, Pages and as misinformation and false news or share
groups on Facebook: clickbait or sensationalism may lose their
eligibility to monetize.
• Follow Facebook Community Standards • Share original content

These rules apply to all posts and Communities can only monetize content
interactions on Facebook, and include rules that they created, were involved in the
against hate speech, calls for violence and creation of or directly features their
sexualized content. Communities may creator or publisher. Content that is
lose their eligibility to use Facebook’s unoriginal or reproduced without any
features to monetize if any of their content meaningful enhancements (such as
violates Facebook’s Community Standards, commentary, parody and creative editing)
including policies regarding intellectual cannot be monetized.
property, authenticity and user safety.
• Avoid systematic violations
Monetized creators and publishers
and those who have not been using a
monetization product may lose the ability
to monetize if an entity connected to them
has repeatedly violated these policies.

How can I monetize my Facebook community?
While all monetization policies apply for Pages and Groups, the way you
can monetize your community varies depending on which platform you
use. Here are some examples based on specific platforms:
Monetization through Pages
• Fan Subscription • Monetizing video through Facebook Stars

A service that communities can use to Viewers can buy Stars and send them to
connect with their members to offer exclusive you while you’re live or on past live videos
content, discounts and perks through a that had Stars enabled.
monthly paid subscription service. It enables
• Donate button
the audience to pay monthly to support the
Eligible Pages can raise money for a cause
community’s work and get access to special
by adding a donate button to their live
features.
videos by using the Facebook app on
• Video ad break mobile or Live Producer on a desktop.
Videos posted to Facebook can earn money This allows you to raise money during a
by featuring in-stream ads. Note that videos live video for a nonprofit or charitable
with in-stream ads must follow certain rules. organization.
Monetization through Groups
• Branded Content • Selling Merchandise

For group admins, branded content provides Communities must turn on the buy and
an opportunity to earn money to support sell feature to sell things in groups. Only
their work to manage engaged communities, group admins can turn on the buy and
and for brands to reach engaged, authentic sell feature.
group spaces. The branded content tag is a
• Tickets to Paid Events
tool that allows admins to publish content
Communities can create paid and
in partnership with brand advertisers. Posts
sponsored events that are held outside
that are published with the branded content
of their group. Events must provide clear
tag will include a Paid Partnership label. This
and up-front disclosures for any actions or
provides group members with transparency
additional costs associated with an event
by clearly labeling content funded or
ticket purchase. Asking members to pay
produced by a brand advertiser. The tool
for exclusive access to a group will result
also provides brand advertisers with more
in a violation of this policy.
understanding into how the post performs
on Facebook. The branded content tag tool
is currently only available to a limited number Note: Some of these tools are not yet
of public Facebook groups and it ensures available worldwide.
that branded content occurring within public
groups is policy compliant.

Key takeaways
• Find ways to be financially sustainable through revenue sources
that can keep your community flourishing.
• Donations, memberships, sales and partnerships are some revenue

sources that communities can use to generate income.
• Make sure that all your sustainability efforts comply with Facebook
Community Guidelines and Partner Monetization Policies.

Glossary

Term Definition
Brand strategy The collection of characteristics that distinguish and define how
members feel as part of a specific community, and the way that
community is perceived by others. Community brand attributes
can include name and logo, the color and style of graphics, and the
tone of voice used when posting content and engaging members.
Community rules or Statements that instruct a community on how the community

guidelines manager plans to uphold the community mission and values.
These can range from stating what kind of content is appropriate
to encouraging respectful communication.
Community The act of building, growing and maintaining a community.

management
Community manager The person or people in charge of building, growing and

maintaining a community.
Community operations The set of tasks, based on a community strategy, that keep a
community running on a daily basis.
Community playbook A document that includes the mission, goals, values and
guidelines of a community. This document can also be used to
share tips and best practices for community management.
Community Standards Policies that explain what content is and isn’t allowed on
Facebook platforms.
Community strategy A plan that a community manager uses to build, scale and
sustain a community online. Usually, a community strategy
covers community goals and guidelines, as well as strategies for
engaging the community through content and platforms.
Content calendar A schedule that specifies what content a community manager

plans to share with their community and when.
Content strategy A strategy that connects everyday efforts to the overall

community strategy and the needs of a community. Content
strategies can include decisions about what to post and when to
post. They also take into consideration the performance of
posted content.

Term Definition
Conversion A metric that includes member interactions that turn into

valuable actions, such as website visits, sign-ups or purchases.
For instance, if the objective of an ad campaign is increased sales,
conversion will be measured as the number of people who were
exposed to the ad and bought something.
Engagement A metric that measures how many interactions a piece of content

receives, such as Likes, comments and shares.
Facebook Groups Virtual communities where members can post and comment
about a dedicated topic or shared interest. Groups can be created
for anything. For example, a family reunion, an after-work sports
team or a book club.
Facebook Pages A place for people, public figures, businesses, brands,

organizations and nonprofits to create an online presence and
connect with their community. Anyone with a Facebook account
can create a Page or help manage one, as long as they have an
assigned role on the Page.
FAQs Frequently asked questions. A list of answers to common

questions about a specific product or service.
Flow chart A visual representation of the steps in a process and the decisions
needed to complete it.
Gantt chart A project management tool used for high-level planning that can
help with the scheduling, coordination and tracking of specific
tasks in a community.
Goals What the community manager wants to achieve through the

creation of a community. There can be one or many goals, and
they are often broad statements.
Insights Information about a community, including aggregated

demographic data about its audience and how members respond
to posted content. Access to and capabilities within Insights will
vary depending on the product being used to build the
online community.
KPIs Key performance indicators that help community managers

determine whether or not they are achieving the stated goals of
the community.

Term Definition
Launch strategy A strategy that determines the milestones, tactics and actions to
achieve community goals The launch strategy also uses metrics
to gauge early success and establishes processes for redefining
goals on an ongoing basis.
Mission The overall impact your community is trying to have on its

members and in the world.
Objectives What the community manager hopes the community will achieve.
There can be one or many objectives associated with specific
goals. Objectives are usually precise, measurable and time-bound
and help define what success looks like.
Partnerships strategy When two or more communities or organizations connect to offer

unique and exclusive benefits to support each other’s causes and
help each other achieve their objectives.
Persona profile A fictional character that represents a segment of a

given community.
Platform strategy A strategy that helps a community manager decide which

platforms are appropriate for building and scaling a community.
RACI chart Responsible, Accountable, Consulted and Informed (RACI) charts.

They are usually displayed as a matrix with a list of processes
alongside the team members who are responsible for them.
Reach A metric that measures how many people see content. For
instance, the reach of a post in a Facebook group refers to how
many members saw the post.
SLA Service Level Agreement. A documented and specific expectation

that describes one or more of the minimum or maximum
performance measures, such as the maximum response time for a
community.
Social listening The act of monitoring social media to determine what people are
saying about a particular topic.
Team strategy The processes put in place to assess a community’s needs and
define ideal team candidates, strategies to onboard and train new
team members, and tactics to empower peers and
delegate responsibilities.

Term Definition
Terms of Service The legal agreement between Facebook and the people who use
it. When community managers build a community using Facebook
apps and services, Facebook is the service provider and they are
the service user. These Terms govern their use of Facebook apps,
including Instagram, and the other products, features, services,
technologies and software on these platforms.
Values The behaviors that are important to a community. Values set the
standard of how a community manager will achieve a community’s
objectives, goals and mission.


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SEPTEMBER 2020

Community Management Study Guide 1

Define and Establish a Community 4

Develop Community Strategies and Processes 13

Make Strategic Content Decisions for a Community 34

Engage and Moderate a Community 43

Measure and Analyze Community Success 60

Community Management Study Guide 2

Certification helps you stand out in your field.

Community Management Study Guide 3

Define and Establish

Community Management Study Guide 4

1.1. Build an online community

Community Management Study Guide 5

Community managers can create content and communicate with group

FA C E B O O K PA G E S A Facebook Page gives your community a public-facing presence on

Community managers curate all the content on a Page, as opposed to

I N S TAG R A M AC C O U N T S Instagram builds communities through visual experiences. The Instagram

Community managers curate the content on an Instagram account and

Community Management Study Guide 6

We will learn more about how to build your

• Give the community a name and identity.

• Invite friends to join your community. Start

• Post something. Welcome new members

Facebook products and technologies include

Community Management Study Guide 7

Community Management Study Guide 8

MISSION Why do I want to build a community?

GOALS What endeavors or activities do you need to accomplish

OBJECTIVES Are your objectives specific, measurable, attainable,

VA L U E S What kind of behavior do you expect from a valued

goals and fulfill your mission.

Community Management Study Guide 9

Community Management Study Guide 10

Community Management Study Guide 11

• Guidelines can change over time. Introduce

Writing great rules is a starting point for

Community Management Study Guide 12

Community Management Study Guide 13

2.1. Audience strategy

Without a clear idea of who your audience is,

Community Management Study Guide 14

Remember that you are looking for publicly

0 2 LOOK FOR OTH E R C O M M U N IT IE S T H AT

This will help you understand your members’

Community Management Study Guide 15

Community Management Study Guide 16

Community Management Study Guide 17

Community Management Study Guide 18

P L AT FO R M Facebook Instagram WhatsApp Messenger

OPPORTUNITIES Foster Broadcast Focus on Synchronous Make

PRODUCT Groups Pages Accounts Groups Chat

Groups are You can like Use an Keep in touch Messenger is

SAMPLE Membership Pinned posts Photo and Instant Send direct

SAMPLE Number of Number of Number of Number of Number of

Community Management Study Guide 19

As you choose a platform, think about how to

Community Management Study Guide 20

Community Management Study Guide 21

Once you define your brand’s core elements,

Pick a recognizable name and use a profile or

Write down your brand rules: Logos, colors,

Community Management Study Guide 22