Marshall Kirkpatrick is a Lead Author for the very popular web apps, web technology trends, social networking and social media website, ReadWriteWeb.  He posed an interesting question on Twitter;

marshallk “Thinking of writing a story about whether startups need community managers. Thoughts?”

In his own blog, Marshall said that he got twenty people to reply.  There were some great responses.  Look for his article on ReadWriteWeb.  Here is what I had to say:

If by “community managers” you mean someone that keeps track of what is happening in a certain community, then yes, startups need a community manager. Especially if that company pays attention to social media. Social media is so important for many companies these days, but the sheer volume of information that is shared can be a problem for them. I think it takes at least one person in a startup to “keep an ear to the ground”. That person should be reading feeds all day and paying attention for appropriate information and content. That person should be writing a blog and listening to their other networks. A social network community manager should learn about what is happening in that company’s field every day and report it to their team.

Doug Coleman

If anyone out there is looking for a community manager, I am looking for a job.  Feel free to contact me at: dougcoleman1@gmail.com