What kind of community do you manage/facilitate as a Community Manager?
I manage communities for Lonely Planet, the largest travel publisher in the world. The principal community I facilitate is the Thorn Tree travel forum, on lonelyplanet.com, a knowledge and exchange hub for travellers around the world. I also run our communities within social networking platforms, like Facebook and Twitter.

Is this community independent (on its own) or subsidized by a brand/company/organization?
The Thorn Tree is hosted and supported as a core part of the Lonely Planet brand. Other sub-communities are shared within third party containers (like Twitter or Facebook). I’d argue that they’re all independent, especially Thorn Tree, whose members have a strong sense of ownership and responsibility within the community.

How many members does your community count?
Our community hub, the Thorn Tree, has just under a million members. Our Facebook community is currently around 85,000 members and our Twitter follower community around 120,000. We also consider the hundreds of thousands of travellers who write to us one on one an indispensible part of our community, whether they’re part of our online communities or not.

What is the ratio between active (the creators) and passive (the lurkers) members?
We have about 5% of our community that are creators, with that varying across sub-communities of expertise. We also have a high ratio of occasional posters, who pass through in accordance with their travel cycle each year, and a strong contingent of active lurkers, who contribute in different ways and help fuel our community engine.

What is the main goal of the community?
To facilitate discussion, debate and exchange between travellers and people who are curious about the world. We help connect like minded people who’ve been there and done that, empowering travel mentors to share their wisdom (including our founders and authors) and first timers to take the plunge. We gather stories and insights about places and experiences over time, and have been a really great resource when people need to learn about events on the ground and reach out to each other, like natural disasters. It’s during times like that that the Lonely Planet community and Thorn Tree truly rise to the occasion. We’ve been recognised by newsmakers for this effort. And last but not least, we want the Thorn Tree (and all of our communities, to an extent) to be a welcoming place for members to shoot the breeze. It should feel like home, especially when people are on the road.

How did the community start?
Thorn Tree is the oldest travel community on the web. Tony and Maureen Wheeler, who founded Lonely Planet, started the Thorn Tree in 1996, wanting to give travellers a way to help each other out with peer to peer advice. They realised early on they would never have all the answers and that local knowledge and the support of like-minded travellers is indispensible. The Thorn Tree has enjoyed an epic, almost Homerian odyssey across those 14 years, worth a guidebook of its own!

When do you consider the community you’re responsible for successful?
There are a number of factors that we look at when performing a community health check: are the majority of our members and users getting what they want and expect from the community; are we continuing to attract new members; are we retaining our valuable contributors and influencers; how is our traffic; what are people saying about us and to us directly (on and offline). I know things are going well when my team and I can stand back and let the community run on its own steam, which is most of the time!

Does the rest of the organization feel the same way about that?
Yes, although it hasn’t always been that way, Lonely Planet holds community at the heart of who we are and what we do.

Though different parts of the business have different goals and expectations wrapped up under the umbrella of ‘community’, we all share a bottom line of community health and happiness – without which, nobody wins!

How would you describe the culture/atmosphere of the community?
Lonely Planet prides itself on telling it like it is, without fear or favour, and the Thorn Tree is the same. Our travelers have a reputation for giving authentic, first hand advice and insights that are inspiring and illuminating, but never sugar coated. Thorn Tree members are some of the most generous, fascinating people on the web, and they can rarely be accused of being boring. Thorn Tree is reminiscent of a local pub, with different groups of fans, happy to shout you a beer and tell you about their latest exploits, what scams to avoid on the road and run over an itinerary with you. It’s a tight knit community, definitely not afraid of being vocal, and you won’t find better travel buddies or mates anywhere.

Which techniques do you use to create a ‘feeling of community’ between the members
We’ve taken a deliberately hands off approach with things like voting and karma systems. The community eco-system has developed its own codes and reward systems, and we look for ways to support the best of these. Our members have explicitly rejected reputation systems that they feel are artificial and easy to game, but we are still always looking for new ways to showcase the best of who they are and what they do. My team are in the community every day– helping people find their way, connecting people with the information they need, enforcing guidelines where needed, and, perhaps most importantly, taking part in discussions as members ourselves.

Do you organize off line community meetings?
Thorn Tree members organise their own offline meet ups around the world. Called ‘piss ups’, in the grand Aussie tradition, they put out the word on Thorn Tree and invite members or travelers to meet up in various destinations throughout the year. Sometimes these are open events; sometimes they are more private affairs between Thorn Tree friends. We’ve deliberately taken a back seat and let the members own these events, managing them as they wish. They know we’re here to support if they need anything, but we don’t want to hijack them. We are looking to hold more formal events, including traveler tweet ups and community parties.

What would you like to see different or improve about your community?
There’s certain technical functionality I’d like to see in place to support community needs and dynamics – there’s always a wish list! I’d like to see even more of the Lonely Planet staff and authors engage with the community. There’s an interesting tension here – Lonely Planet has treated Thorn Tree as its own beast for so long, that some people are reluctant to dive in and become a member themselves. There’s respect there, but also fear. Many authors and staff members do engage, which enriches the experience for them and our members alike. I’m working on deepening those connections

To what department does the community belong?
My role sits in editorial, as does the community, strictly speaking. However I also manage customer service and feedback, so there is a cross over there. We value the editorial voice of our community and treat it primarily as an editorial entity. But it also straddles innovation, marketing, production (of both our print and digital products), IT and operations. Accountability and strategy is centralised with myself and my team within editorial, but there is distributed ownership of various community aspects.

How are department such as marketing, PR and customer service involved with the community?
My team and I all perform duties that sometimes fall into these categories, particularly customer service. At Lonely Planet we actively encourage all our staff to get involved in our online community, and many do, including representatives from all of those areas. They understand that staying in touch with members is an important part of their work. Generally though, my team and I “own” our member relationships, and people know to come to us, or via us, if they want to tap the community for something – particularly if they haven’t had experience with it before. Our goal is to empower the Lonely Planet network to feel comfortable engaging the community on their own terms for their own needs, but we insist they do so fairly, transparently and with integrity.

What does the future of the community look like?
The Lonely Planet community – and Thorn Tree especially – have a future as rich as their past. I believe you’ll see strong growth in the size of the community in coming years, a deepening of expertise, and some innovative connections being forged across people, platforms and products. Members will help shape Lonely Planet products and services in some new ways, and we’re exploring ways to reward and showcase community members with compelling stories and amazing advice. Our Blog Sherpa community is the first of many stepping stones in this direction.

Which are your responsibilities as a CM?
Too many to list! Like most community managers, I have a wide range of responsibilities. They include, setting and implementing governance and best practice; managing a team of moderators; developing and executing community and social media strategy for the business; writing and curating community editorial for our website and social media channels; relationship management and customer service; product development and testing; social media evangelism and training across the business.

What do you like the best about being a CM?
It’s one of the most fascinating, exhilarating jobs in the world. I get to work at the threshold of new media and social technology, and meet interesting, inspiring people all over the world. It’s a constantly evolving, never stale role.

What is the hardest aspect about being a CM?
It’s exhausting and can feel relentless, because, as many of your colleagues and readers would understand, it’s the type of role that never switches off. My team and I are responsible for a global community that never sleeps, and leading the community charge for Lonely Planet and our travellers.

Do you have colleagues that help you managing the community?
I have an amazing team of colleagues that sit around the globe. I have full time moderators and community liaisons who work with me managing our online communities and a terrific product team who make sure we’re creating tools and services to support community needs. I also manage our Talk2Us team, who receive and respond to every single piece of feedback and correspondence that Lonely Planet receives. They’re extraordinary.  I’m incredibly lucky to work with such talented folks, all deeply committed to the importance of community and conversation with travellers.

How do you see the role of CM in the future?
In general, I think it’s already emerging as one of the most important roles in 21st century commerce. Social intelligence within organizations of all kinds is a critical literacy and community managers will carve out the vocabulary for success. Community has always been part of the Lonely Planet DNA, and I don’t see that changing. If anything, we’re looking to invest even more in our community and our relationship to travellers.

What are your personal ambitions considering the role of CM?
I am very interested in virtual ethnography and online community research. There are some amazing thinkers and researchers out there in this field, and some amazing practitioners, but I feel there’s insufficient intersection between the two. I’d really like to work in that intersection and explore how theory and practice can better support one another. I also have secret ambitions to write a television show about community managers, but I’m not entirely sure TV is ready for us! Perhaps a comic book…

Venessa Paech works as a Community Manager for Loney Planet. She also is the founder of the Australian Community Manager Roundtable. See her LinkedIn profile for more information or to get in touch.