I often compare the world of social media to a dinner party.
As a community manager, you are the host(ess). [It’s not a perfect analogy, but stay with me]
It’s your job to facilitate goodwill, a good vibe, and good energy.
Now, if you invite someone to your home and they make the effort to come, what is the first thing that you would do?
“THANK YOU for coming.”
When someone comments on your blog, your tweet, your post, your video, etc., they have come to your party and the first thing you should do: Thank them.
As my friend, Allister Frost, says “when you say thanks to someone, what’s not to like?”
And the power of that simple act of acknowledgement can have a profound impact on the relationship you have with your community.
Case in point: Mitch Joel’s blog.
Now, Mitch, is without a doubt, one of the leading thinkers when it comes to digital marketing, social media, and what I should be wearing today. I’m a Raving Fan of his blog.
A few months back, he put up a post called “You're Connected, But Are You Engaging?”
His conclusion, which is accurate, is that “with engagement comes loyalty and action.”
Now, for a bit of history.
In the past, Mitch said that his primary role was to “pump out a piece of content” and not necessarily respond on every comment.
I challenged him on this. He responded and it led to a new conversation with his community.
But, here’s where it gets interesting.
After that post, Mitch decided to “give it a try” (I can’t find the post) and respond to the comments.
Six months later, I pinged him:
Just curious…since the post/comments a few months back where you changed your attitude (and behavior) about participating in the comments on your blog, have you seen any shift in the metrics around comments/visits/readers?
Looks like you have more comments per post now, but that’s just a quick glance.
And Mitch’s response?
It's been amazing. On all points. It's hard to keep at it but it's worth the effort. 
He’s right, of course. It IS hard to keep at it, but it IS worth the effort.
If you’ve earned someone’s attention enough to the point where they invest the time to contact you in some way, you are faced with a decision tree.
Acknowledge it and begin the process of moving that person to Raving Fan status.
Just nod to yourself and forget for a moment that there is a REAL person on the other end who invested some emotional energy in reaching out to you.
And, that the lack of acknowledgement of that effort fails the “Maya Angelou Marketing” test…they will remember how you made them FEEL. 
And it won’t be good.
There are plenty of ways to acknowledge your fans.
Some elaborate (like JackBe’s comic series) or something small like a “tag” on your Facebook fan page.
The point is…if you are going to genuinely cultivate your community, it needs to begin with acknowleding their contributions, no matter how big or small.
For the introduction to this series, see here.