Research, Type, Edit, Repeat
Khoros Community Strategist Kelly Stocker shares her Slack discovery. Building trust through coherent storytelling. And a roundup of must-read content.
Howdy!
Several years ago, I observed a sea change that changed the course of my career: brands were becoming their own media companies. As technology began transforming the way people received information, companies recognized the value of brand journalism. Consumers wanted smart content and I wanted to create that for them as a multimedia journalist. After cutting my teeth as a writer and a content strategist for a variety of B2B and B2C brands, I’m eager to bring my ability to write clear, concise and human copy to Slack.
Kickin’ It With Community Queen Kelly Stocker
Kelly Stocker is woman-about-town. Many Austinites know her as the former Community Manager who helped write the playbook for creating purposeful communities at Yelp. Others know her from her popular Friday Five newsletter, her Thrillist bylines, and her booming voice as an Alamo Drafthouse emcee for special events. I chatted with Kelly about her work as a Community Strategist at Khoros, discovering Vaxxie via Slack, and her philosophy on working smarter.
Clarisa: Kelly, tell me about how you got into community strategy?
Kelly: I feel like it was a complete accident. I started working at Dell because that was the adult, responsible thing to do with a degree in Management Information Sciences. That was what the world was telling me at the time: get a corporate job, make money, get insurance. So, I did that. Then, I realized there are more fun opportunities out there. The opportunity with Yelp came up and I loved the idea of what they were doing. My brain is always trying to share information and optimize things, and it just came in the form of Yelp. That community is the engine that drives all of their success.
We know that community is an extension of how people form friend groups—so basically what businesses are trying to do is take advantage of this natural thing that humans do, and then give them a platform to do it, typically with an end in mind. Sometimes that end is to create brand affinity or it’s to be a part of a conversation.
Clarisa: What do you specifically do at Khoros?
Kelly: A big part of my job is saying, “You’ve never had a community before. This is how you need to think about it.” The trap that businesses get into is they only think of their business goals. This is why user-centered design has been such a thing over the past five years. Businesses are like, “We want businesses to do this in our community.” And the first thing I always say to them is, “It’s not about what you want. This is a completely different beast. This isn’t like you’re designing. You’re creating a platform for people to do their thing, and you’re setting up parameters.”
Clarisa: I know Khoros uses Slack and that you’ve used it outside of work to get vaccine updates. What do you get out of the platform?
Kelly: The major value proposition for me is that’s it’s basically a searchable group conversation. If somebody emails you then you have to go dig yourself out of email. Then you answer that question, you answer that question, you answer that question. You’ve answered it 42 times. But with Slack, you just have to answer it once and someone can find it and it’s done. That’s the ideal, right?
I think the value proposition of Slack, in a non-work scenario—like the Texas Vaccine Updates—is two-fold. It connects people outside of group texts and, again, it’s searchable. The second thing is a lot of people are developing on Slack. For example, there are a number of channels that basically crawl H-E-B’s website, crawl Walmart’s website, CVS, Walgreens. And within those channels, they’re like, “This HEB has vaccines. This Walgreens has vaccines.” It’s constantly updating. It’s awesome! The sub-point of that, too, is somebody developed a tool called Vaxxie. So, I put in that I was looking for vaccines. It was like, “In what area?” And I’m like, “78704.” And it’s like, “Okay, within how many miles?” And when a vaccine comes up in one of the channels that’s within 30 miles of 78704, it sends me a Slack notification. That’s amazing. The value of Slack lies not only in the original idea of Slack but also in what people are building on top of that right now.
Clarisa: You were once a productivity trainer. What is your philosophy on working efficiently?
Kelly: While I think there is value and a benefit in fixing the things you see are wrong, I also have to sit back and consider if the job clearly tracks back to my role. I think that the question is not, “What’s the key to productivity?” I think the question is, “What is the key to creating value in the position that you’re in, or in the business that you’re in?" Because productivity is different than value.
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Hot Type
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Sometimes I wonder if some creative professionals are wired to be naturally prolific or if they just have better workflows in place. A Zapier blog I stumbled across sheds some light on how sociologist Niklas Luhmann’s analog productivity system helped him manage his creative output, and now I’m researching which app can best help me apply the Zettelkasten method to my writing process.
Did anyone else notice that KFC has been in slogan purgatory? The brand tried on some other catchphrases recently, and I think it’s brilliant. Gold star for creativity!
The Last Word
In addition to being an interactive storyteller who deeply understands account-based marketing, I’m also an avid networker who cares about building community. I’m a proud Returned Peace Corps Volunteer and I’m finishing my term as Chair of the Girls Empowerment Network. A lot of people don’t know that I’m a third-culture kid who grew up living in Indonesia, Japan and Qatar. When I’m not flipping through my AP Stylebook, I’m spending my free time cycling around Austin and nerding out with my husband (who moonlights as a novelist) and dog.