In today’s interconnected world, companies in all industries need to publish APIs and cultivate a developer community to access and use them. To be competitive today, attracting and supporting developers is essential. The key to cultivating a vibrant developer community that uses your APIs and supports your platform is a good developer relations program. DevRelate, the Community and Academy for Developer Relations Professionals, provides a multi-part certification program. Each of the instructional courses are full of practical and insightful instructions that will give you a solid basis of knowledge on which to build your program. The courses are designed to be completed at your own pace and quizzes at the end of each course allow you to assess your retention and understanding of the concepts presented.
Completing the course videos and passing the quizzes indicates that the developer relations professional is well equiped to start, enhance and manage an effective Developer Relations program. Being certified also shows that a developer relations professional understands the wide range of the skills, best practices, metrics, and operational features required to cultivate a world class developer outreach program including:
- Business Strategy – An essential component in starting a developer program – and an integral aspect of maintaining a strong one – is tying your program to your business strategy. Whether you have an established developer program or are still planning one, you must consider what you set out to do and what your company will get out of it.
- Know Your Developers – If you’re going to run a successful developer program, you need to know who that developer is. This will provide the foundation for supplying the developers’ needs as you create or enhance your program.
- Basic Program Elements – Every developer outreach program provides a set of basic features. While there are many additional features that are part of most successful developer programs, without the basics your program will be sorely lacking and will most likely not be competitive.
- Outreach That Works – No matter the industry, you need to reach out to developers who can benefit your platform and draw them into your program with resources and tools that will, in turn, benefit their careers. You first start by categorizing developers into several, quantifiable “personas” based on social characteristics, tech adoption, industry, or other characteristics specific to your situation. After you’ve explored and defined your personas, the outreach methods you use can be tested against the personas for effectiveness.
- Loyalty and Partnership – explores understanding community characteristics, sustaining core strengths while identifying areas of improvements, planning according to needs, and providing resources that inspire loyalty. Developers will be drawn to your program for different reasons. Some developers will see their relationship with your program mainly as that of a consumer – taking advantage of the tools and support your program provides. Making a developer feel like a partner with your company through your efforts will keep them active and loyal.
The bottom line
Being a DevRelate Certified Developer Relations Professional means that you a trained, tested and ready to be an integral part of your company and developer community’s success. It shows that you are a committed and enthusiastic member of an elite global community of Developer Relations Professionals. Course graduates receive a certification from Evans Data which will add to your career potential and you’ll be listed in a special directory of Developer Relations graduates so that companies who are looking for developer program professionals can find you.
If you know other Developer Relations Professionals, including your team members, that would benefit by learning the skills and best practices of managing a world class developer relations program, encourage them to join DevRelate and take the certification course. Also invite them to watch the certification overview video.
