Hi, I'm Jill Ross πŸ‘‹

I help companies build, launch, and manage customer communities.

I’m a community leader and practitioner with over 15 years of experience building customer communities. I specialize in the B2B SaaS industry, from startups to large global enterprises, and I’ve worked within a variety of teams including Marketing, Customer Experience, Customer Success, and Global Learning.
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πŸ‘©πŸ»β€πŸ’» What I Do

🧩 Community Strategy

  • Business Goal Alignment
  • Stakeholder Interviews
  • Customer Persona Research
  • Community Mission, Vision, & Values
  • Roadmap Development

βœ”οΈ Vendor Selection

  • Use Case Mapping
  • Requirements Gathering
  • Contract Negotiation
  • Implementation Project Management
  • Platform Migrations

πŸ”§ Community Design & Build

  • Branding, Naming, & Creative Theme
  • User Experience Design
  • Information Architecture
  • Integrations (Salesforce, Marketo, etc.)

πŸš€ Launch Plans

  • Founding Member Programs
  • Communications & Training Plans
  • Integrated Marketing Campaigns
  • Direct Mail / Swag Design & Distribution

πŸ“… Content & Events

  • Content & Programming Calendars
  • Virtual & F2F Event Planning
  • Product Knowledge Management
  • SME Recruitment & Enablement
  • Go-to-Market Support

πŸ† Member Engagement Programs

  • New Member Onboarding
  • Top Contributor / Super User Programs
  • Gamification
  • User Groups
  • Customer Advisory Boards

πŸ’‘ Product Innovation

  • Beta Testing / Early Access Programs
  • Product Ideation
  • Product Advisory Boards
  • Product + Community Integration
  • Developer Programs

πŸ“ˆ Business Value Measurement

  • Support Case Deflection
  • NPS / CSAT Score Impact
  • Product Adoption
  • Customer Retention, Upsell & Cross-sell
  • Sourced & Influenced Opportunities

πŸ“… Community Office Hours

Looking for some help with your community program? Need to validate an idea?

Book a 30 minute call with me at no cost.

Available Tuesdays 1-4pm & Fridays 9am-12pm (Pacific)

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πŸ‘©πŸ»β€πŸ’» Work Experience

Director of Community

Fivetran, Remote | January 2022 - Present

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Building Fivetran’s customer community... stay tuned!

Head of Community & Customer Enablement

RollWorks, Remote | July 2019 - October 2020

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Built, launched, and managed the Accountable Marketing Collective, a community for marketers to learn about account-based marketing, share strategies and best practices, and ask & answer questions about the RollWorks account-based platform. Also built, launched, and managed the RollWorks Help Center on Zendesk.

Enterprise Community Manager

Hitachi Vantara, Remote | October 2014 - July 2019

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Led the Hitachi Vantara Community, a global community Hitachi customers, partners and employees. Defined community strategy and roadmap and led community programs and operations.

Head of Marketing & Community Strategist

JCS Consulting Group, San Diego, CA | November 2012 - May 2014

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Led corporate marketing strategy and executed all marketing activities. Provided client services including strategic consulting, Jive training, and any other areas where community, marketing, and Jive expertise could be leveraged. Clients included DIRECTV, TaylorMade-adidas, and Qualcomm.

Marketing & Community Manager

BlueHornet, a Digital River company, San Diego, CA | September 2009 - November 2012

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Developed content marketing and demand generation programs for three Digital River business units: BlueHornet, Digital River World Payments, and Direct Response Technologies. Proposed, launched, and managed internal and external communities powered by Jive Software.

Director, Sales & Marketing

Harbor Yacht Clubs, San Diego, CA | November 2004 - September 2009

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Built and managed a home-grown membership forum for yacht club members to connect online to find sailing partners to share and share boat rental and sailing class fees. Designed and implemented new corporate branding across all marketing channels, built a new website, and launched several digital marketing programs including SEO, PPC, display ads, social media, and email newsletters. Lead salesperson for memberships, sailboat charters, sailing classes and corporate events.

πŸ“š Education

Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, Integrated Marketing Communications

2003 - 2007

San Diego State University

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πŸ’¬ Get in Touch