Guest Post: “How I Became a Community Manager” by David Peck

Jeremiah: Having been a community manager, I’ve real soft spot to those that are on the front lines, embracing customers using social media tools. Every so often, I hear of really excited folks that landed new jobs, and David thanked me for my blogging and tweeting, which helped him inch toward his goal.

The following is David’s submitted post:

How I got my job at Myminilife.com
Guest Post by Community Manager, David Peck

My name is David Peck and Jeremiah was nice enough to ask me to guest blog about how I got my new job as an Online Community Manager for Myminilife.com. If you have not heard of it, Myminilife.com is a virtual world company located near me in Palo Alto, California.

A question that I keep getting is how I got a job in social media. The simple answer is social networking. Yep that’s it. Okay, okay some more details.

I first started listening to podcasts back in 2005. This helped me learn about other social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn and such. It was not until I entered Second Life that things really began to change for me. In this virtual world I was able to meet and chat with the people I listened to on podcasts. I got to virtually hang with C.C. Chapman, Chris Pirillo, Jeff Pulver, and Adam Curry among many, many other new media mover and shakers. By doing this I was able to form relationships and get more involved in online projects.

One of the first projects I worked on was for crayon’s Steve Coulson and C.C. Chapman on Coca Cola’s VirtualThirst contest. My task was to help build an online community around the project. Yet, it was not until I discovered Twitter that things really kick in for me.

I went from networking and knowing 25-50 Social Media folk to knowing over 500. I discovered projects, people, places and events I had no idea about. I knew some people’s virtual Avatars but had no idea who they were in the real world. Twitter let me discover that and I got to know them much better. It really is a powerful tool. Everyone should be using it.

From this point I was able to locate freelance work that I had the skills to help on. If potential clients needed recommendations I would turn to my Twitter friends for recommendations from people like Ijustine, Eric Rice & Chris Brogan. In the past year I have worked on new media projects involving UC Berkeley, The Grammys, NPR, & PodShow. It was my being profiled on CNBC for my work in virtual worlds that allowed Myminilife.com to locate me. As their Online Community Manager I will lead incentives to increase membership, run the community blog, help generate quality content that stimulates quality activity and grow traffic on the site. The most important thing about this position though, I get to do something I love and get paid for it.

So yes the secret to getting a job in social media is to use the social networking tools out there to network yourself. Start with Twitter as its one of the best and easiest social networking tools. Where else can you talk to Robert Scoble, Jason Calacanis and Michael Arrington? Heck it was Twitter that let me find Jeremiah and allowed me to be a guest blogger on this site. 😉 Oh and don’t forget to add me on twitter!!

David Peck

Jeremiah: Thanks to David for sharing his story, hopefully what he learned on how to network with others will spur others to move forward. Also, David was featured in this recent video news clip covering his alter ego as Britney Mason, his blond bombshell avatar (female) in SecondLife.

If this blog has helped you with getting a new job (or getting promoted) in your career, I want to know, send me an email. Keep at it!