As a B2B marketer, pinpointing the best marketing communities can give you a leg up in your career.
If you think you can get by without them, think again. Going it alone is much tougher—I’ve tried that and wish I had joined a peer community sooner to build relationships and learn from others’ experiences.
In this guide, I’ll share my top recommendations for digital marketing communities based on my 10+ years of experience as a B2B marketer and member of several marketing communities.
Each community offers digital marketers unique benefits for networking, learning, and professional growth.
This post will help you find the ones that best suit your needs.
A Quick Overview of the Best Marketing Communities
Ready to dive in? Here’s a quick rundown of the best marketing communities I’ll be covering:
- Pavilion: Best for B2B Networking in Marketing & Sales
- Exit Five: Best for General B2B Marketing & Brand Strategy
- CXL: Best for Community-Driven Marketing Courses
- DEMAND Community: Best for Ad-Focused Demand Gen
- Product Marketing Alliance: Best for Product Marketers
- GrowthMentor: Best for 1-on-1 Mentorship for Founders and Marketers
- CMAweekly: Best for Customer Marketing & Advocacy Professionals
Pavilion: Best for Senior B2B Marketers Who Work Cross-Functionally in Go-To-Market
Pavilion is one of the leading peer networks for go-to-market professionals, providing a global platform for professionals to connect and grow.
What sets Pavilion apart is its focus on go-to-market professionals in Marketing, Sales, and Partnerships where members actively engage in teaching, learning, and growing together.
The multi-tiered membership allows everyone, from growth-minded professionals to CEOs, to find their place within the community.
Pavilion provides valuable networking opportunities, especially on a local level. Each member’s location is displayed in their name, and local meetups are organized by community members.
As a Pavilion Associate member for years, I’ve found the #marketing_demand_gen, #crossfunction_partnerships_alliances, #city_toronto, and #pavilion_general channels to be particularly active and helpful.
The paid Slack account ensures that all messages and files are available and searchable, a feature that is not available with the free version of Slack that many peer communities use.
Pavilion also offers courses, such as CMO School and CRO School, through Pavilion University. . When I speak with senior marketing leaders (VP Marketing, CMO) and they mention taking an online course, I hear Pavilion most often.
My ratings: Based on my experience, I’d rate Pavilion:
- Networking Opportunities: 9/10
- Resources: 8/10
- Cost: 7/10
Price: Varies based on membership tier.
Pros:
- Runs on a Slack “Enterprise Select Plan”, which means threads don’t disappear after 90 days, making it a robust repository of information .
- Pavilion Staff help members get the most from the community by answering their questions, helping with matchmaking, etc.
Cons:
- The professionally run community comes at a price. Pavilion members often have the cost covered by their employer through an L&D benefit.
There’s a relatively low engagement rate in some channels (i.e. question posts with no response or only one or two responses).
Who’s it best suited for? Growth leaders, experienced marketers, and startup founders.
Exit Five: Best for General B2B Marketing & Brand Strategy
Exit Five, led by one of the most well-known B2B Marketers, Dave Gerhardt, is a vibrant SaaS marketing community that offers a platform for all professional levels and positions within B2B marketing.
It started as a Facebook group and now runs on Circle, a community platform.
Gerhardt’s reputation in B2B marketing adds credibility to the community, making it a promising choice for growth marketers in this field.
When you sign up, here’s their pitch to validate your choice:
“You’re in good company here – we have a growing community of 3,835 B2B marketing pros that are all here to advance their skills and grow their careers.
Recently, we were named the #1 marketing community by The CMO, so you know you made the right choice.
We have 38% monthly active users (MAU) in this community, which would make us one of the highest engaged communities on Circle based on their benchmark data for communities of our size.”
There are three main parts of the community:
- Community Spaces: Here you’ll find general discussion spaces, like Get Feedback, Recommendations, Hiring or Looking for Work, Ask Anonymously, and Community Events.
- Dedicated Spaces: Find function-specific discussions on product marketing, marketing operations, demand generation (growth marketing), content marketing, ABM, and agencies.
- On-Demand Resources: Access videos, templates, and swipe files from Exit Five leaders and crowdsourced content from the community.
As I see it, the on-demand resources alone provide enough value to give the community a shot.
The community is quite active; there are roughly half a dozen responses to each post (that’s high relative to other marketing communities.)
Price: Annual – $23/month (paid as $275/year). Monthly – $30/month ($360/year). 7-Day Free Trial (credit card required).
Pros:
- Covers all professional levels and positions within B2B marketing, attracting industry leaders and marketing professionals.
- Led by one of the most well-known thought leaders in B2B marketing.
- On-demand resources provide instant value
- Matchmaking with similar peers to have 1:1 conversations.
Cons:
- The subscription cost to be in the community; it ain’t free
- There is a lack of local community-based spaces (e.g., Toronto Marketers). (You can search to find members in your location, but there doesn’t seem to be a shared space to discuss with them.)
My Ratings:
- Networking Opportunities: 9/10
- Resources: 9/10
- Cost: 7.5/10
Who’s it best suited for? B2B marketers, content marketers, growth marketers, and experienced marketers.
CXL: Best for Expert-Led Marketing Courses
CXL specializes in conversion optimization, analytics, and growth marketing.
What stands out about CXL is the quality of educators who teach the courses. CXL says the top 1% of marketing practitioners instruct in their courses.
For example, the instructor for LinkedIn ads is AJ Wilcox, who is a leading specialist on the topic (I do a lot of LinkedIn advertising in my role in B2B SaaS growth marketing, so I know who’s a thought leader in that space; AJ is it.)
Same for Steve Watt instructing the course on Account Based Marketing. These teachers are world class marketers.
CXL courses come with practical downloadable resources, ensuring that learners can apply what they’ve learned.
As I understand it, subscribers gain access to a private community to network and receive support from fellow professionals worldwide.
While I have yet to experience this community personally, CXL’s strong reputation and expert course instructors make it a promising choice for those seeking to advance their skills.
My Ratings:
- Quality of Education: 9/10
- Networking Opportunities: Not sure
- Cost: 7/10
Price: It’s priced as a subscription to all 120+ online courses. The price varies depending on the subscription term: monthly, quarterly, or annually.
Pros:
- Quality education from top experts in their respective fields.
- Breadth of courses to be a well-rounded marketer.
- Subscription pricing makes it perfect for Marketers in between roles who have the time to “binge” content.
Cons:
- There’s no option to pay-per-course, which makes it harder to justify the price if you only have time to do one course (though you could sign up for the monthly subscription). CXL also seems to have dropped the 7-day free trial it was offering, now only offering trials to approved teams.
- The depth of course content is perhaps a bit too shallow for advanced learning (e.g. the ABM course is 3 hours long and is described as “best suited for novice, beginner, and intermediate-level ABM leaders and practitioners.”)
Who’s it best suited for? Digital marketers, Indie hackers, SEO marketers, social media managers, and agency marketers.
DEMAND Community: Best for Ad-Focused Demand Gen
DEMAND Community, created by Metadata.io, is a helpful niche community specifically for demand gen and growth marketers.
Given that Metadata’s platform is for ad management, the community naturally has digital marketers looking to connect and share ad-focused strategies and tactics.
I’ve been a member of the DEMAND community since it’s inception, and I’ve found the #linkedin-ads, #templates, and #tools-and-resources channels particularly helpful.
While it’s an excellent resource for demand gen marketers, those outside of this field might not find it as beneficial.
Nonetheless, if demand gen is your game, the DEMAND community is a no-brainer to join, as it’s free and has many experienced growth marketers.
My Ratings: Based on my experience, I’d rate the DEMAND community:
- Networking Opportunities: 8.5/10
- Resources: 7.5/10
- Cost: 10/10
Price: Free access
Who’s it best suited for? Digital marketers, growth marketers, paid ads specialists, and growth hackers.
Product Marketing Alliance: Best for Product Marketers
Product Marketing Alliance offers a diverse platform for product marketers.
With over 44,000 members, the alliance provides an extensive network for professionals in product marketing.
The #pmm-questions channel is especially active, and local channels like #pmm_toronto offer opportunities for connecting with peers in your area.
However, it’s worth noting that some profiles may not be real. Scroll through the community members and you’ll see profiles with names like “100pour100forme78”, which raises questions about the authenticity of the member count (even 1/10th of their alleged member count would be impressive (and much more realistic.)
Nonetheless, the active channels and networking opportunities make it a viable choice for product marketers.
My Ratings:
- Networking Opportunities: 8/10
- Resources: 7/10
- Cost: 10/10
Price: Varies by tier. There’s a free tier (Insider Membership) and 3 paid tiers (Pro, Pro+, and Executive+) ranging from $42/month to $250/month.
Pros:
- Active channels like #pmm-questions and local channels like #pmm_toronto
- Large member count for networking
Cons:
- Some profiles may not be genuine
- Much of the engagement is from PMM staff
Who’s it best suited for? Product Marketers (of course)
GrowthMentor: Best for 1-on-1 Mentorship for Founders and Marketers
GrowthMentor provides a personalized mentorship experience that sets it apart from other communities.
The platform offers 1-on-1 calls with over 700 vetted growth marketing mentors across diverse skills, roles, tools, industries, and locations.
It also has a Slack community with 1,000+ members. There are “city squad” channels for local networking.
This wide array of mentors ensures that founders and marketers can find someone who aligns with their specific needs and goals.
Although I have yet to experience GrowthMentor first-hand, I tried a similar 1:1 online B2B marketing mentor/mentee matchmaking service when Pavilion had it.
I found value in connecting with a couple of mentors and speaking with them every quarter or so.
GrowthMentor’s unique personalized mentorship offers it a promising choice for those seeking 1-on-1 guidance.
My Ratings:
- Mentorship Quality: 7.5
- Networking Opportunities: 8/10
- Cost: 6.5/10
Price: PRO: $99/month $297 billed quarterly, or $299/month for 5 seats on a team
Pros:
- Offers personalized mentorship experiences
- Wide range of mentors to choose from
Cons:
- I haven’t tried this one first-hand, but looking through the mentors, they don’t seem to be “household” names, so you might have to take a leap of faith on their capabilities.
- They seemed to have dropped their “Lite” price tier for $49/month, which helped lessen the upfront cost to try it out.
Who’s it best suited for? SaaS founders, In-house marketers early in their careers, individual contributors and other marketers.
CMAweekly: Best for Customer Marketing & Advocacy Professionals
CMAweekly is a vibrant community for customer marketing and advocacy professionals.
It’s free to join, making it accessible to professionals at all levels.
I’ve been a member of it for over a year, and in that time, I’ve found the most active channels to be #general, #announcements, and #jobs being particularly engaging.
However, as the community operates on a free Slack plan, access to messages and files older than 90 days is limited.
For now, you can simply message Mary Green, the wonderful community leader, to ask what you’re looking for. This ensures that valuable insights aren’t completely lost. That said, you still can’t search for older content.
My Ratings: Based on my experience in the community the past year or so, here’s how I would rate the CMAweekly.
- Networking Opportunities: 9/10
- Resources: 8.5/10
- Cost: 10/10
Price: Free
Pros:
- It’s the most engaged peer community for Customer Marketing & Advocacy Professionals, overtaking the larger Customer Marketing community
- Channels like #general, #announcements, and #jobs are very active
- Free to join
Cons:
- The free Slack plan limits access to messages and files older than 90 days (currently 55,000 messages and files are hidden)
- Like any niche community, it can be an echo chamber, with most information and opinions reflecting and reinforcing each other’s.
- The community organizer, Mary Green, wants to sell the community. Without her leadership, engagement in the community may drop.
Who’s it best suited for? Customer marketing and Advocacy (CMA) professionals.
Choosing Your Marketing Community: Some Advice for Marketing Professionals
It’s not easy to pick the right community (or communities, if you’re ambitious) and get value from it.
It requires knowing your options, joining the right ones, and getting the information you need from the community on-demand.
Consider the engagement levels of each community, the alignment with your specific needs and goals, and whether you would need to actively participate in it to get what you need from it.
After all, a community is only as good as the community members who contribute to it.
These marketing communities are valuable because of active participation in discussions, sharing experiences, and contributing valuable insights.
Not all marketing communities are equal.
Some offer more valuable resources and support than others.
Other communities lack active engagement or are filled with self-promotion, offering little value to members.
It’s important to look for communities with frequent posts and a reasonable amount of engagement and responses.
Communities with too little engagement tend to wither, as no member wants their posts to go unanswered.
Ultimately, the best marketing community for you is one that aligns with your professional needs and goals in marketing.
Whether you’re a growth marketer, content marketer, or some other type of marketer, there’s a community out there just for you.
Frequently Asked Questions About Online Marketing Communities
Why should I join a marketing community?
As the saying goes, “Alone, we can do so little; together, we can do so much.”
Communities are places where marketers can connect with their peers, exchange ideas, learn how to improve their marketing efforts, and advance their careers.
Digital marketing continually evolves, and all types of marketers — growth marketers, content marketers, social media marketers, etc. — need to stay connected to their peers to be able to adapt.
These marketing communities serve as a valuable resource for networking and skill development.
Do I have to pay to join these communities?
It depends on the specific community you are interested in.
Some are free to join, while others may require a subscription fee.
What other marketing communities are?
Beyond the online communities on this list, there are many others.
Fellow marketers form groups on Slack, Reddit, Facebook, and other online platforms. Some other marketing industry communities include: Demand Curve, HubSpot Community, Growclass, RevGenius, and Superpath, to name a few.
How do I choose the right marketing community?
Choose a marketing community that aligns with your professional needs and goals, considering factors like engagement levels, resources offered, and alignment with your specific field of marketing.
