Community Manager Appreciation Day

History

Yul Contenu community managers at PodCamp Montreal 2010

Community Manager Appreciation Day takes place every 4th Monday of January as a way to recognize and celebrate the efforts of community managers around the world using social media to improve customer experiences.

Jeremiah Owyang initiated this international event in 2010.^[1] People are encouraged to send sincere Thank You notes to their online community managers. People using Twitter include the #CMAD and #CMGR hashtag in their tweets about this event. Many online community managers and vendors in the social media marketplace post blogs in appreciation of their community managers. Cities with large concentrations of Social Media focused businesses, such as Boston, Austin, and San Francisco hold in-person meetup events to celebrate and honor those who represent and support their online communities.

In 2011 Africa's first Community Manager Appreciation Day took place in Nairobi, it was facilitated by iHub Nairobi, hosted by Mark Kaigwa and Soud Hyder. The Nairobi meetup was attended by leading community managers, digital media as well social media experts and practitioners. Present were representatives from Kenya ICT Board, Pamoja Media, Questek, Safaricom, Sandstorm, Social Light Media, Squad Digital, Skunkworks Nairobi. At the suggestion of Victor Ngeny the group agreed to have regular meetups to discuss matters pertaining to the digital media, internet and content industry in Kenya.

CA Technologies [1] participated in the 2011 Community Manager Appreciation Day by issuing a press release [2] and a video [3] to publicly celebrate the contributions of its community managers.

Notes

1. ^ Original blog post where the event originated (25/01/2010): "Community Manager Appreciation Day #CMAD (Every 4th Monday of Jan)"