What is Developer Relations and why should you care? Community Builder

The goal of this article is to provide an explainer sharing my thoughts on what Developer Relations is, what its core tenets are, and what important questions DevRel works to provide answers to. There is a blurring of the line between work and personal time. More than two-thirds of employees who work from home at least part of the time report they have trouble getting away from work at the end of the day. 17% of people working from home feel isolated or lonely all the time, and 66% feel like that at least some of the time.

has major developerrelations problem

Nearly half (48%) of people who work from a sofa or bedroom said they had developed musculoskeletal problems. If you are successful in that, then opportunities for progression will present themselves. Make sure you ask in your interview process what the onboarding experience is like for new hires, and how will you be trained in the specifics of the role.

Developer Marketing Core Philosophy

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  • I’m not saying that these conferences are a waste of money, good things can come from them.
  • Act as speakers and educators, taking part in tech conferences and organizing meetups?
  • Community refers to the current users and also potential users of a software or technology.
  • The hacker developer type is similar to the super technical one, but in my experience, more solution-driven – whatever it takes – than necessarily the format of the solution.
  • Build a project for each of the three most common use cases.

Teach core technologies and help them solve recurring problems with a blog post or a video. They can consume your content anywhere, not just in the office, but also in quarantine when they’re just bored. Often documentation can be the make or break factor when a developer chooses a service. Even if your product is best, if nobody understands it, then potential customers will go elsewhere.

Because we recognize that if we put the community first, above our company, and above the technology that we’re working with, we help the community to succeed. Being genuine and building trust are of tantamount importance at an ethical level. Companies that focus on this are going to be more successful. Developer Relations is the piece of the organization that most strongly embodies this, and cultivates relationships built on clarity and trust with the developer community. Our team hopes the developers we reach will choose to use our products. We hope they have a great experience with us and want tocontinueto be users of our products.

These quotes, and so many others, area prime example of people not understanding what Developer Relations is and the value that we provide to our company, sure, but more importantly… The value we bring to YOU — our technical community that we so desperately want to connect with, not so that we can sell you on our product, but so that we can empower you to do your jobs better. Developer Relations operates on the front line of this Developer Marketing philosophy.

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With UserVoice, people could suggest ideas, vote on them and comment. And the main criteria were that it was simple to use, no sign-up or log-in needed, just an e-mail address. It also had a built-in search so for people creating new suggestions, it was matching ideas to see if there already existed a similar suggestion. It also had a general search, paired with official replies from Mozilla, with a direct contact and where we could indicate if an idea was Under Consideration, Shipped, Being Worked on or Declined. And even if we declined something, developers were happy because they got a reply!

Developer relations, which some referred to as developer advocacy, is a dedicated department in some technology organizations. But DevRel is better thought of as a category of activities that share a strategic objective. The goal of DevRel is to connect with and inspire developers from outside of your organization. You also want to gain their trust and establish credibility with them. That way, they will use your products with confidence.

If any of their answers surprise you, go to the product and see for yourself. Then, you need to leave the happy path and experience what it’s like to really build with it. Right now is the only time you can genuinely empathize with a brand new user.

has major developerrelations problem

On the job learning has dropped 26% in the past year. Remote working sounds attractive and most DevRel job ads now lead with it as a key benefit — better work-life balance, flexibility, and reduced travel time and expense. This is why Glitch for Platforms is already being used by some of the most innovative developer platforms in the world, like Slack, Facebook, Trello, Botkit, and Algolia. The platform builder is very much behind-the-scenes and oftentimes the unsung hero. With that in mind, it is important for DevRel folks to be authentic. If members of the community feel like DevRel is merely sales in disguise, then they will flatly ignore DevRel.

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With this understanding you can craft initiatives that factor back into these goals. While no decision in DevRel is a sure thing, this will get you moving in the right direction. In Developer Relations, you act as the face of the company and product, so it helps to know what mission you’re representing. If your company doesn’t have one, ask people at your company what they feel the vision is. Recently, I heard of a number of DevRel professionals getting fired from a company, and their positions eliminated.

If you’ve got anything to suggest about this blog post, please send it my way. If you can follow and observe the workday of a senior DevRel, do it. It’s a great way to learn the job and get insights into their thought process. DevRel is inherently creative, so give yourself time to find your voice. Experiment with different types of content to find what works for you.

We develop a professional creativity software that has some fairly non-trivial Metal shaders. We have a user-base in the thousands – not massive, but decent. Our software is a vital tool for our users and we work on this for a living since many years. I’d be remiss if I didn’t thank all of the wonderful people who contributed to the conversations I’ve been having on Twitter and The Practical Dev as well as in the DevRel communities I’m a part of. This is an illustration of one reason why I love this community… everyone’s invested in helping each other and doesn’t think twice about offering advice, answering questions, or simply amplifying someone else’s work. Because we care about our communities and we put people first, knowing that when we do so, the community, as well as the company, will succeed.

More from CodeX

Stay friendly with the Developer Advocates at these companies. They’re not your rivals, just friendly devs like you working at a different place. Many of these questions would be good to ask your interviewers to learn more about the role. This will give you a robust understanding to help https://cryptonews.wiki/ you start strong. It can also help to create and manage your own communities, especially if there isn’t one in your space at the moment. In your own community, there may be more moderation work to do for your DevRel team, but you also get the opportunity to structure it to your wishes.

DevRel is critical for building bridges with developers. It helps them understand why your fancy new tech is worth their consideration, and it helps you as a company ReactNative vs Flutter GitHub understand what they need and what delights them. Advocacy is a powerful marketing technique that can help you turn the developers into developer advocates.

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