S4 · Episode 11

We’ve just got a lawyer to be our Community Manager!

with Julia Rozwens

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This week I’m joined by a familiar face: Julia Rozwens, Content Marketing Manager here at Feature Upvote, my own company and the team behind this very podcast.

Julia has around ten years of community management experience, including eight years at Gameloft for Asphalt 8 and Asphalt 9, where she rose to Global Social Portfolio Lead.

We chat about managing a community for a genre she’s not personally into (she still doesn’t have a driving license), her favourite CM memory from an esports tournament at Gamescom, and a funny story about a Discord ban wave that got a little out of hand.

We also discuss why community management too often gets treated as a dead-end entry-level role in gaming — and I’ll let you in on a secret: if you’ve ever wondered why the Feature Upvote social accounts have so much personality, that’s largely down to Julia.

Games mentioned in this episode:

Find Julia on:

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Transcription

Steve McLeod
Today I’m joined by Julia Rozwens, Julia has worked in community management for around ten years, making her one of the most experienced community managers I’ve had on the podcast. Welcome to the show, Julia.

Julia Rozwens
Hi Steve. So happy to be here.

Steve McLeod
I should add that we are currently working together. We are colleagues at Feature Upvote. We are you are our content marketing manager.

Julia Rozwens
Yeah, I joined Feature Upvote what was it? Four months ago, right? I think it that’s been it. So it’s a little bit different thing than community management itself. However, I think it’s very cool to work on a tool like this with the experience that comes from being a community manager for over ten years now.

Steve McLeod
Now if we get time, perhaps we can talk more about why and how that happened, but let’s start at the beginning. Tell us where your path into community management started.

Julia Rozwens
So that’s quite an interesting one I would say. I studied law and once I finished law, I did work in a tax advisory company for two years more or less. And yeah, it was great in some ways, but I figured out it really wasn’t for me.

It’s not the job but the whole culture of being part of a law company is something that you know, when you are twenty years old looks very, very serious and maybe you think this is not exactly where you wanna be in I don’t know, ten years or you think it’s the rest of my life I will be just going, you know, following the dress code and you’re getting fancy and things like that. And I didn’t think it really fit my personality and what I really like doing when I’m at the office. And I always liked games.

So my dream was to start doing something in gaming. However, like with the law background, I didn’t know what exactly it could be, and I managed to pivot into marketing, first starting with startups, UI, UX, things like that, which was a step better, but still not there. And eventually when I was doing marketing for one of the companies I worked in, I was super active on Twitter. I was already building kind of my persona on Twitter that I would be tweeting about games and things like that.

And eventually I stumbled upon a tweet from Omnidrone. It was a small company from Barcelona. They were searching for a community manager. And at the same time, I was actually going to Barcelona to visit a friend of mine. I dropped them a message. I came to the interview. And yeah, and a month later, I was hired. I remember later my marketing manager said: “when I hired you, I went back home and I told my wife we’ve just got a lawyer to be our community manager”.

Steve McLeod
Ha ha ha ha.

Julia Rozwens
I don’t know if I’m crazy or not, but you know that this is how it started. And yeah, so at Omnidrone I spent like three years and it was an amazing experience. It was very cool because since it was such a small company when I started with 15 people, I was doing a bit of everything. So community management, marketing, and I was given tools to really look into player data and do investigations when there were some exploits. It was a very, very interesting start to community management and gaming itself.

Steve McLeod
That’s fantastic. The I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a lawyer becoming a community manager before. I think that’s gotta be unique. you mentioned Omnidrone and I actually went there once for what was it, game testing, some early version of their game.

Julia Rozwens
Yeah, I think it was Titan Brawl. I had to wear many hats in this position and at one point I was recruiting players to play our games. Usually I was targeting younger players, but I also checked with friends I had on Facebook and I believe you were one of the people that responded to my Facebook post if I remember it correctly. It’s been a while now, hasn’t it? It feels like forever.

Steve McLeod
Yeah, I remember at the time doing that usability that playability testing or playtesting and thinking like it was my first insight to see how games are made. That was kinda it’s fascinating to see how a game is early on. So that was Omnidrone and then you were after Omnidrone you went on to GameLoft.

Julia Rozwens
Gameloft. So, straight to Gameloft, where I spent eight years. Basically there were some changes at Omnidrone. We moved more into production rather than publishing. So I started searching for something new, where I could continue developing my skills as a community manager. And Gameloft was searching for someone to join the Asphalt team.

It was a very interesting moment because at that point we were actually pivoting a little bit from just working on Asphalt 8 and developing Asphalt 9 at the same time. So I joined as a community manager for Asphalt 8. However, I was supporting Asphalt 9 from the beginning. So it was really cool because on one hand I could work with a very established community that was players of Asphalt 8 and and completely new one.

That was cool because first of all, I also didn’t know much about cars when I was joining. So it was really good to meet the community that was a bunch of experts in the end of the day. I was mostly working with the player mods. We had our Skype chat and really I wanted to give a shout-out to all the people that worked with me in those first months because I learned so much from them and they helped me to understand the game much better.

But at the same time we were just about to launch Asphalt 9: Legends. And that was also very interesting to actually have this new game with new mechanics, new physics, the new engine, and looking just amazing. And it was also cool because in the end we thought that maybe Asphalt 8 will kinda die slowly after Asphalt 9, but it didn’t happen this way. And I worked with these two communities that were a little bit similar, but not exactly the same.

Steve McLeod
So two questions, I wanna ask about that. If I understand correctly, car games are not your thing. You said you weren’t into cars.

Julia Rozwens
No

Steve McLeod
So how is it being a community manager for a game that’s not your type of game? Do you feel like you’re faking it or do you feel like you really got into it and you actually enjoyed it after all?

Julia Rozwens
I mean I did enjoy it, but I would like to say it became one of my favorite games. I think somehow I’m not the best at driving games. I just don’t feel them. I don’t even have a driving license. And I think once I went go-karting, but I was almost kicked out. I was such a bad driver.

Steve McLeod
Ha ha.

Julia Rozwens
So not really my thing, but I in the end, you know, you learn so much about cars, for example, new license, the licensor we were working with. you start actually recognizing cars, which I didn’t do before. For me, everything this one is blue and this is gray and then and then you know, I’m like, you know. I know these cars now and I know a little bit more, and you are also transparent with your community. I was never pretending to be the best driver ever.

So not really my thing, but in the end, you learn so much about cars, for example, through the licensors we were working with. You start actually recognizing cars, which I didn’t do before. For me, everything was, “This one is blue and this is gray,” and then I’m like, “I know these cars now, and I know a little bit more.” And you are also transparent with your community. I was never pretending to be the best driver ever.

Sometimes I would livestream and play the game, and people were laughing a little because I’m a noob. But that’s also fine, you know. You can be a good community manager without necessarily being the best at the game. Of course I would play, and I did improve over time because you have to play it to be able to help players, communicate with them and know what you’re talking about. But car games never became my top favourite games.

Steve McLeod
The second question I had based on that experience with Asphalt 8 and 9 is how did you manage to… How did you handle two communities that were similar but different? Like you had to you had to like keep changing hats or how did… how did you manage to balance that?

Julia Rozwens
We would work with them in quite a similar manner, but communication would be different depending on whether it was Asphalt 8 or Asphalt 9. The community and the game were a little bit different, but not enough to make it, “Oh, we completely need to change the tone of voice, we completely need to talk differently to our players.”

There were still mostly guys of a specific age playing the games. Some preferred the style of Asphalt 8, which was a little bit more grounded in reality, whereas Asphalt 9 had more tricks, more of an arcade feeling. But it wasn’t a completely different type of player that meant we needed to change so much.

Plus I had a lot of help. When I was working on Asphalt 9, we had other community managers. So I had time to learn on Asphalt 8, which was established. Then I could move to Asphalt 9 already knowing the basics and take care of the game.

Steve McLeod
So let’s go back to your law degree and your experience as a lawyer. How has that been helpful in your works in community?

Julia Rozwens
First of all, when you are in a big company like Gameloft, you work with many stakeholders, including the legal department. Whatever we do, we need to check it with them to make sure that everything is okay. When we work with player moderators or content creators, all those rules and guidelines have to be in place.

So I had a very good grasp of why we need to talk with the legal team. Again, shout-out to the legal team from Gameloft because I really love those guys. And because I knew the basics of law, it helped me communicate with the stakeholders from the legal department.

Steve McLeod
So do you have a story of a memorable positive moment as a community manager that you can share with us?

Julia Rozwens
To me, the best memory I have is going to Gamescom with Asphalt 9. We had a big tournament with Lamborghini (edit: Porsche!), I believe. It was the first time I went to such a big gaming event, and I was there to coordinate everything with our players, the ones playing in the esports tournament.

I knew some of them because they were also part of the content creator program I was running. All of them qualified through the events, but some were not part of that program. It was so great to meet the players in real life, hang out with them and see how passionate they are about the game.

And then just being part of this event. It was a full day of doing everything from talking with the video production crew, tweeting live, making sure the livestream was going well, hanging out with people and making sure everyone was happy. We also went for rides. Actually, it was Porsche. I think I said it wrong.

Steve McLeod
You already said you’re not a car person.

Julia Rozwens
Because now I remember driving in those cars. But in general, it was one of the most exciting days for me, being part of such a huge event, a big tournament connected with Asphalt, and seeing how happy and excited everyone was about it. You’re part of it too, helping to make the experience better for all the players. It was amazing. It was really my favorite part of working as a community manager.

Steve McLeod
Did you find feel like a bit of a celebrity with all those people thinking, Wow, she’s part of the people who make Asphalt. Ha ha ha.

Julia Rozwens
A little bit. I didn’t want to say that, but yes. I was using the nickname Mina when I was working at Gameloft. I had a friend laughing about it. Somebody would be like, “This is Mina,” and people would be like, “Wow.” I wouldn’t call it being a celebrity, but at least people recognize you and it’s a nice feeling.

Steve McLeod
One of the things I really enjoy about selling or creating a tool that’s used in the video games industry is at the events I do sometimes have meetings with people who have worked on games I’ve played and loved. And I actually get a little bit starstruck myself. And of course when I meet them I realise they’re just a regular person who happened to be working as part of that team. But I still you can’t help I think but be a little bit impressed when you’re talking to somebody who actually made something you play and love.

Julia Rozwens
Yeah, and it even works the other way around. You’re on a plane and you see a kid in front of you playing Asphalt, and you’re like, “This is so cool.” A few times I’ve felt like saying, “Hey, if you check the livestreams, you can find me there.” I’ve never done it, but it did cross my mind.

Steve McLeod
Ha ha ha. Moving on. How do you learn how to do your job better as a community manager? What resources or what processes or habits have you found that help you do your job better as a CM?

Julia Rozwens
As I mentioned, the first step was really my player moderators. They gave me all the knowledge I needed to understand the game better. They also helped me learn about the history of Asphalt. So I had context for a lot of things, even working with other players or knowing about the events.

It really helped me understand why the community was reacting a certain way to features and events we were developing. So that was the first thing. Second, the people I worked with. Fabian, my direct manager when I joined Gameloft, was so helpful, giving me feedback about content planning, copy and how to run content. So first, the mods and your peers.

Then of course you play games and are part of a community yourself. I would go to Discord, Reddit, Facebook and other social media for the games I love playing. You look for interesting posts, events and campaigns that you would like to copy, adapt or get inspired by. And then it’s just the work: the more you do it, the more you communicate.

I think every day you become better and better. I don’t think I read any specific book on community management. It was mostly materials I would find online, rather than bigger books or things like that.

Steve McLeod
Mm-hmm. You’ve been doing community management long enough that you started before the books existed with two books we’ve covered in previous episodes by Victoria Tran and by Carolin Wendt. But you had nothing, right? In terms of like yeah. yeah.

Julia Rozwens
No, not that I know of. It’s very different from law, you know. With law there are books about everything, and this is how you’re gonna learn your trade. With community management, I think it’s more about getting into the game, knowing your community, getting the best information from your peers, adapting as you go and using your personality.

I would say there’s no one way to do things correctly as a community manager. Depending on who you are, you should capitalize on that and use your personality, see what you can do and where you feel comfortable. Livestreams, for example, were not my favorite thing.

I wish I was better at that, and maybe I should train a little bit more. But at the end of the day, don’t force yourself to do things you are not comfortable with. Of course, train and do better, but find your niche, your way of working with the community and the game you’re working on.

Steve McLeod
Yeah. I think that’s really wise. Doing things that are not part of your personality, not right for you, I think it leads to burnout if you force yourself to keep doing them. Sometimes, but sometimes you try streaming and actually after a while you really develop a knack for it. So I guess it’s knowing. Yeah. Yeah.

Julia Rozwens
Yeah, I’m not saying not to try. That’s not my point here. But if you feel that you are struggling with something and it’s not a necessity, go and find something else that can still give you a great result, but will be a little different from what you’ve been trying until now.

Steve McLeod
So you mentioned when you started with Asphalt 8, there were moderators already. I assume there were volunteer moderators from the community. I guess at, after a while some of these no longer have the time or interest. How did how did you go about replacing moderators? What do you look for? How do you do it?

Julia Rozwens
Well, it depends on where my focus was. First of all, we started with forums, so my first moderators came from the Asphalt 8 forum. Then we moved to Discord. You find people on your Discord who are more active and helpful. You see people there every day helping others.

They’re answering questions when they don’t have to, so you’re already able to spot those champions, those people who will be helping you out later. And you approach them. Of course, then we had more structure and rules. I’m not gonna go into all the regulations, but you try to find people who like the game, are willing to share their knowledge and know Discord.

It’s not a must, but it helps if somebody already knows some bots, how to issue warnings, how to issue bans and things like this. And of course you want people who are liked by the community. It’s important not to pick people who will use the power of a moderator to go against people they don’t like.

You need to watch out for these kinds of behaviours because people can love the game but still abuse that power a little. Most of the mods I worked with were amazing. Really great people who loved the game and tried their best to help the other players.

Steve McLeod
Wonderful. Wonderful. I, as I’m listening to this, I actually recalled a situation in which I had been overly active in a forum, old school forum, maybe ten or more years ago. And at one point they just added me as a moderator and full, it gave me full admin rights. They didn’t even like give me any rules or any guidelines. They just like added me I remember the note was like, I’ve made you an admin, do what you like with it. It’s like, Wow, like the power I felt.

Julia Rozwens
Yeah, I think that’s why it’s important to give some guidelines. In the beginning I didn’t really know what I was doing. It was my first time working with mods, and they knew more than I did. But over the years the process changed. If somebody was becoming a moderator, I would have a little survey first. Then I would provide them with a PDF with guidelines on what was expected and the dos and don’ts.

Also, how to use Discord, to make sure people knew what they were supposed to do. It might seem easy or logical, but the devil’s in the detail. And now I’ve become a Reddit moderator myself for the first time.

Steve McLeod
How did that happen?

Julia Rozwens
I joined the community of one of the games I was working on. I introduced myself, they made me a mod, so now I’m getting all the Reddit moderator information. To be honest, I’ve not been very active as a Reddit moderator so far, but I think it can still be a useful thing to have.

Steve McLeod
Yeah. It’s also useful to go through that process from the moderator side at least once or twice so you see what the experience is like and also how you can do it better. Like from, like my own experience of finding myself suddenly not just a mod but full admin, but having no guidelines. So now I know that if I’m going to do that with any community I run, not that I run a community, I now know that you can’t just throw someone in there. Like it’s not fair on the community.

Julia Rozwens
No. Discord had a very cool thing. It’s not active now, but they had a moderator academy. There was a test, and once you completed it you would get a little badge on Discord saying you were a Discord moderator who had finished the course.

They’ve removed it now, which I find a little sad. Maybe people were cheating on the test or things like that — I don’t know what the reason was. But it was one of the indicators that showed me somebody was taking it seriously and had some knowledge about community management. A small thing, but it helped you recognise people who already knew something about it.

Steve McLeod
That is unfortunate the Discord took that away. When I asked you in advance if there was anything specific you’d like to talk about, you mentioned about the you’d like to talk about the options for community managers to be promoted. What are those options?

Julia Rozwens
Mm-hmm. I think it will depend on the company you’re in, but what I’ve noticed throughout those years is that, in many companies, it feels like a job with no options for promotion. I think lots of community managers feel that they go from moderating to community manager, then senior community manager.

Steve McLeod
Yeah.

Julia Rozwens
And then what else? Lots of them move to marketing, maybe become a product marketing manager. But I think it’s a little sad that there aren’t many positions that help you stay in community, where you pick this as your role and try to evolve there. I was lucky enough to get that opportunity at Gameloft.

So I became a Global Social Portfolio Lead, which means, to put it simply, I was managing teams of community managers, without getting too much into the details here. I think that was a great way to use my skills to help other community managers do a better job.

But I think it’s on companies to help community managers understand the possible path when they join the team. Right now, when we search for senior community managers, there aren’t many to find because lots of them pivot to something completely different. All this knowledge and all these professionals who could be getting better at their jobs — it’s disappearing. We often think about community management as just an entry-level position in gaming, which is a shame because it requires a lot of skills and knowledge. It’s not so easy to be good at it from the get-go.

I’ve worked with a lot of amazing junior community managers who usually came from being very involved in communities. But often I see passionate people who later get stuck and don’t know where to go from this position to evolve. So my message would be that it would be much better if companies provided better career paths for community managers.

Steve McLeod
You said that your first role in the gaming industry was Omnidrone, which was I think you said about fifteen people. I guess it’s really hard there to for there to be any path up from a community manager. A company that small, a studio that’s small, really doesn’t have anything to offer you after community manager unless perhaps you change your role completely inside the studio. Yeah.

Julia Rozwens
Yeah.

Steve McLeod
But in a bigger studio or a publisher where there is actually a need for a hierarchy of community managers or community roles. Perhaps that’s the difference.

Julia Rozwens
Yeah, that’s the difference, but then when you become a senior, what’s next, right? That’s the question some companies need to answer, or they need to make sure they’re valuing the community managers they have.

There should be ways to do that because there’s this image that a community manager is a twenty-year-old, right? And if you’re forty, you should already have pivoted to live ops, monetization or product itself. I think that’s a shame in the gaming industry. At least that’s how I’ve seen it in the places I’ve worked.

Steve McLeod
Yeah, especially if you’re in community because that’s your personality. You know, the one who really enjoys engaging with players and encouraging them and so on. Good point. Julia, I wonder if you have a story of a challenge you’ve faced as a community manager that stands out in your memory.

Julia Rozwens
Yeah.

Steve McLeod
Awh, too many.

Julia Rozwens
Yes, but I’m thinking about which one I can actually talk about. There are a few I can’t mention that much. Let me think. Okay, I can talk about this one, and it was a lesson for me as well. We had an update in Asphalt 9 and people were hating it. It was horrible. We were getting such a backlash all over socials. My Discord was on fire.

I think I got a little too engaged in that. I put slow mode on Discord, which means people can only post every now and then. And I started deleting messages, warning people and banning them from Discord.

And the ban wave went a bit too far. Even now, when I go to the Asphalt 9 Discord, which I do every now and then — I do some lurking, to be honest — I’ll see a comment about, “Remember when Mina banned about one hundred people in one day?” And I’m like, “Yes, I might have overreacted back then.”

Steve McLeod
Ha ha ha.

Julia Rozwens
But it’s funny how this one situation becomes something people remember for years, because it was a huge ban wave. Not the best example. I’m pretty sure I could have approached it a little better, but things also come with time. To be honest, it’s funny now to find memories of that situation still living on Discord.

Steve McLeod
So knowing now what you know if that situation was repeated, what would you do differently?

Julia Rozwens
Yeah, I would still put on slow mode most likely, but I would communicate much more clearly with the players about it. If they wanted to vent a little, let them vent, to be honest. Let them say those things. It also shows they are really engaged in our game, even if they’re saying mean things sometimes.

The warnings and bans would only be for the ones who were really going against the rules of Discord. And of course, making sure we resolve this and communicate with the players as soon as possible. That would be it. I would not have banned as many people as I did.

Steve McLeod
I really like the story. Julia, we are running out of time, but I do have one final question for you. It’s the most important question. What games have you been playing lately?

Julia Rozwens
So there are two games I’m playing a lot. One is Slay the Spire 2 and I think I have about two hundred hours, which is almost scary since the game is still in early access. I’m loving it. I haven’t played Slay the Spire 1, so that’s my introduction.

Steve McLeod
Oh you haven’t?

Julia Rozwens
No.

Steve McLeod
I wanted to ask you how similar was it to Slay the Spire One because I’ve heard that it’s more or less like it’s more like a content update than a real new version. But okay.

Julia Rozwens
Maybe. For me, I’m just starting with this one, so I don’t know. But it’s a great game, and finally I’ve started winning more because I was horrible at some point. I was getting my butt kicked in the boss fights. My win rate was just dramatic.

Steve McLeod
Uh-huh. You learn, you learn how to like build up the synergies in that game. I’ve played it way too much. And what’s your favorite character in it? Which one do you tend to play?

Julia Rozwens
The first one I finished with was… the Regent?

Steve McLeod
Regent, yeah.

Julia Rozwens
Regent, Regent, Sorry, let’s say Regent was my favorite character.

Steve McLeod
I think that’s how it’s said. Not having played number two, I actually don’t know but…

Julia Rozwens
Yeah, that’s my favorite. The mechanics just work the best for me. I find it super fun. I love using the sword, actually. My least favorite is the basic one, the Ironclad. With this one I still have just three ascensions, so I’ll have to push it a little more in the future.

Steve McLeod
Yeah, yeah.

Julia Rozwens
Another game I’ve been playing is Dave the Diver. They released the DLC this week, the jungle version. It makes me so happy because I love this game so much. I love diving, by the way, so it’s nice to play a game that has diving as the theme. And I find it very relaxing. It’s very different from playing super action games. Sometimes when there’s a big shark, I get a bit more stressed, but…

Apart from that, I find this game super cute, relaxing, and I love it. The third game I wanna mention is Orbital Blues. It’s tabletop. I’m playing with friends of mine through Discord. We’re not using Zoom or anything else. Discord is really the best platform to set it up. And it’s basically Cowboy Bebop meets Firefly. This kind of Wild West in space. It’s really nice to meet with friends every week or two and have a game like this. I highly recommend it.

Steve McLeod
Fantastic. Julia, we need to wrap things up. So thank you again for being on the show. The show that actually you help promote and plan.

Julia Rozwens
Thank you very much.

Steve McLeod
I think this is really great that people who use Feature Upvote or at least curious about it can actually here see the a bit of the story behind the name. And you are actually using managing our social media accounts quite actively. So when people are wondering why does this Feature Upvote Twitter account have so much to say about this and that, now they know why. So this has been wonderful.

Julia Rozwens
Yeah, I’m definitely using my personality and what I like when I talk about Feature Upvote. So some of the statements you hear from Feature Upvote are probably me, not Steve. But I’m hoping you like those things as well, or you would if you played them.

Steve McLeod
Now where can listens to get in touch if they’d like to know more about you or what we’ve discussed today?

Julia Rozwens
Yeah, so LinkedIn, Twitter. I’m not super active on Twitter, but you can find me under ‘julerr’ with double ‘R’ in the in the end. and I’m planning to reactivate it a little bit more because yes, I’ve been quite basically silent there. But I’m yes, on LinkedIn I’m now trying to be more and more active and I’ve been using this platform a lot.

Steve McLeod
Okay, and I’ll make sure that that’s in the show notes. Okay, bye, Julia.

Julia Rozwens
Bye bye, thank you so much.

Steve McLeod
Bye everyone.