I hope that Community Manager Appreciation Day (CMAD) 2014 ringleaders Tim McDonald, Sherrie Rohde and Jonathan Brewer are sleeping in today, after pulling off 24-hours of interesting and informative community manager Google Hangouts.
2014 was the fourth year of this celebration of community managers, originally conceived by Jeremiah Owyang, and held annually on the fourth Monday of January. Kicking off at Midnight EST (05:00 GMT), the organizers brought together 24 moderated panels, featuring participants from around the world, and diving in on topics ranging from The Social Media Higher Education Landscape to Internal Communities with Yammer and Challenges for International Communities.
CMAD Award Winners
In addition to expanding the event to 24-hours of hangouts, up from 2013’s 12-hours of live events, the team also held the inaugural Community Manager Appreciation Day Awards, recognizing remarkable community managers nominated by their peers. Honorees, drawn from hundreds of nominations, included:
- Christie Fidura – @cfidurauk (#CMAD 2014′s Traffic Controller)
- Scott Bennett – @ScottB3nn3tt (#CMAD 2014′s Diplomat)
- Katrina Steffensen – @akatrinas (#CMAD 2014′s People’s Champion)
- Sherrie Rohde – @sherrierohde (#CMAD 2014′s Fastest Fingers)
- Amy Brown – @arb (#CMAD 2014′s Funniest Community Manager)
- Raj Patel – @Rajio (#CMAD 2014′s Best Community Community Manager Offline)
- Will Chau – @chaumaster (#CMAD 2014′s Best New Community Manager)
- Stephanie Wiriahardja – @stephawie (#CMAD 2014′s recipient of the CMGRs Choice Award)
Congratulations to the award winners!
Showing Community Managers Some Love
One of the highlights of the day was watching how companies across the globe celebrated their community managers. Tributes ranged from adorable graphics, to blog posts and infographics, to truly personal shout outs. Some of my favorites included:
A team shout out from Wisconsin’s Globe University, featuring photos of their community team members:
Moz staffers Jen, Erica, Keri & Megan gave a personal thank you to community managers:
Rebel Mouse created a portal showcasing the best and most engaging social #CMAD social content, while also giving Community Managers some love:
Get Satisfaction created a geeky cool infographic celebrating the Super Heroes of Customer Communities:
#smlondon got community managers to share their selfies on twitter and showcased them in a gallery:
DNN got in on the celebration as well, with Dennis Shiao participating in the Communities Around Content hangout, and sharing a SlideShare that shows how one passionate Community Manager can save an ailing company community.
Online Community Rx: Monitoring and Improving the Health of Your Online Community from DNN
Bringing Together an International Community of Community Managers
A highlight of the hangouts for many attendees was seeing the international scope of the role. Cities around the globe held CMAD meetups, with one of the largest—with over 200 people—held in Finland (#CMADFI).
Over the course of the day, more than 5,700 individuals contributed over 12,000 unique tweets using the #CMAD hashtag, and the Community Manager Appreciation Day website hosted over 14,000 visitors. If you missed out on some of the hangouts, you can view them on their Google + hangouts page or via YouTube, and catch up with the comments through My Community Manager’s storify recap.
Share Your Tribute
How did you show your community managers some love? Share your tribute to the hard work community managers do every day in the comments (below).