Community strategy
from the rare CMO + Chief Community Officer
I built Serial Marketers and the AI Marketers Guild over a decade — and sold them together to Marketecture Media in 2025. Now, as a fractional CMO and Chief Community Officer (CCO), I teach founders, B2B teams, and media companies how to build durable, monetizable, eventually-acquirable communities — without making the expensive mistakes I already made.
Teach you to fish. Not run your community for you. The fastest way to kill a community is to make it depend on an outsider.
Featured / cited in
Marketecture Media · Serial Marketers · AI Marketers Guild · Adweek · HubSpot · Unita
"Serial Marketers is by far one of the most valuable marketing communities I've been part of. Thank you for creating this epicenter of value!"
"AI Marketers Guild has been impressive to watch and participate in. If you're a marketer or working in growth at a company, large or small, you should consider checking out this community."
Community work covered in
The receipts
A decade of operator scars — sold to a strategic acquirer
Most community advisors talk theory. I'll show you what I built, what I broke, and what we sold.
5,000+
Members in Serial Marketers — built organically over ~10 years, no paid acquisition.
1,000+
Mid-senior marketing leaders in the AI Marketers Guild — Walmart, Snap, MLB, Pfizer, WMG, Amazon.
Double exit
Both communities acquired by Marketecture Media (May 2025). Now Chief Community Officer.
"AIMG has the best approach to learning AI today."
— Anthony D'Angelo, CX + Engagement Strategy Lead, Fingerpaint
Community members & sponsors have included
The CMO + Chief Community Officer combo
Most community pros can't connect community to revenue. Most CMOs don't actually understand community. I do both — and I've sold the work.
Two communities. One double exit.
Founded Serial Marketers (5,000+ members, ~10 years) and the AI Marketers Guild (1,000+ members, mid-senior marketing leaders). Acquired together by Marketecture Media in May 2025 — a rare community-led double exit.
CMO + Chief Community Officer
Most community pros can't tie community to revenue, brand, or GTM. I sit on both sides — currently Chief Community Officer at Marketecture and a fractional AI CMO. Community is a growth lever, not a cost center.
Every mistake — already made
Wrong platform. Wrong founding members. Wrong sponsor deal. Wrong pricing. Wrong programming cadence. A decade of operator scars means your team skips months of expensive trial and error.
AI-native community ops
Onboarding, programming, sponsor matchmaking, member intelligence — all designed with AI workflows from day one. Most community consultants are 12+ months behind on this.
Three ways to work together
All three teach you and your team to operate the community yourselves. None of them have me running it for you.
Community Strategy Sprint
4 weeks · fixed fee
From $7,500
A focused diagnostic + strategy doc. We pressure-test your premise, define the member you actually want, design the operating model, and hand you a 90-day launch plan. Best when you have an idea but haven't shipped it yet.
Best for: Founders/teams pre-launch or stuck at <500 members
Build + Launch Engagement
3 months · retainer
$10K–$20K/mo
Embedded with your in-house community lead. We pick the platform, design the rituals, recruit the founding 100, ship the first events, set up sponsor or membership monetization, and write the playbooks your team will run after I leave.
Best for: Companies launching a community as a GTM moat or product line
Ongoing Advisor
2–4 hrs/month
From $3K/mo
Monthly working sessions + async access for your community lead or founder. We unblock decisions: programming pivots, pricing changes, sponsor packages, exit conversations, hiring. Pattern-matching from running two communities to acquisition.
Best for: Existing communities at an inflection point
What you (and your team) walk away knowing
Every engagement transfers a decade of community operator know-how into your team. These are the muscles you build.
Avoid these
Mistakes I already made — so your team doesn't
These five mistakes cost me real money, real members, and years of correction. Skip them.
Picking the wrong platform too early
I migrated. Twice. Each migration cost real members and weeks of operator time. We'll pick once based on your members, your monetization, and your moderation capacity — not the latest hot tool.
Letting the wrong founding members set the culture
The first 100 people define the next 10,000. I let some loud-but-low-fit members in early at Serial Marketers and spent years correcting it. We design a vetting model and cultural canary tests up front.
Monetizing before the community is sticky
Sponsorships pitched too early signal desperation and erode trust. We sequence monetization so revenue accelerates the community instead of cannibalizing it.
Confusing audience with community
A newsletter is not a community. A Slack with 4,000 lurkers is not a community. We design the rituals, peer interactions, and contribution surfaces that turn an audience into something acquirable.
Building dependency on the founder
If the community dies when you leave, you don't have a community — you have a hobby. Every engagement focuses on systems, playbooks, and member-led leadership so your community survives (and is sellable) without you.
External sources
Don't take my word for it
Coverage and interviews about the communities and the exit — verify the receipts yourself.
Marketecture Media acquires Serial Marketers and AI Marketers Guild
"David Berkowitz becomes Chief Community Officer."
— Marketecture Media
Marketecture Adds Serial Marketers and the AI Marketers Guild to the Family
"Continued expansion into brand marketing through community."
— Adweek
Episode 125: Serial Marketer David Berkowitz
"On the evolving role of community in marketing and what it's like to build community after community."
— Marketecture Pod
Growing a Community Organically — Interview with David Berkowitz
"On growing Serial Marketers without paid acquisition."
— Unita
AIMG: The Community Helping Demystify AI for Marketers
"On founding AIMG and curating the right room of marketing leaders."
— The Letter Two
David Berkowitz is one of the only operators who is both a fractional CMO and a Chief Community Officer with a double community exit. He founded Serial Marketers (5,000+ members) and the AI Marketers Guild (1,000+ mid-senior marketing leaders), and both communities were acquired together by Marketecture Media in May 2025. He now advises founders, B2B teams, and media companies on community strategy, design, monetization, and exit — teaching them the playbook rather than running their community for them.
- •Founded Serial Marketers (~10 years, 5,000+ members) and AI Marketers Guild (1,000+ mid-senior marketing leaders)
- •Both communities acquired by Marketecture Media in May 2025 — a rare community-led double exit
- •Currently Chief Community Officer at Marketecture Media in addition to fractional AI CMO work
- •Three engagement formats: 4-week Strategy Sprint (from $7.5K), 3-month Build + Launch retainer ($10–20K/mo), Ongoing Advisor (from $3K/mo)
- •Focus is teaching teams to build the muscle in-house — not running the community as an outside operator
- •AI-native community ops baked into every engagement (onboarding, programming, member intelligence, sponsor matchmaking)
What does a community strategy advisor actually do?
I help founders, CMOs, and operators design, launch, and grow professional communities — and avoid the 5-figure mistakes I made building Serial Marketers (5,000+) and the AI Marketers Guild (1,000+) over a decade. We work on positioning, member acquisition, programming, monetization, governance, moderation, and the eventual exit story. I teach you to fish — I don't run your community for you.
What makes you different from other community consultants?
I've built two communities to a double exit (acquired by Marketecture Media in May 2025) and now serve as Chief Community Officer alongside being a fractional CMO. That CMO + CCO combo is rare — most community pros can't connect community work to revenue, brand, and GTM. I can. I've also lived through every mistake: the wrong platform, the wrong pricing, the wrong founding members, the wrong sponsor deals. You skip those.
Will you run my community for me?
No — and that's the point. The fastest way to kill a community is to make it depend on an outside operator. I help you and your in-house lead build the muscle to run it yourselves. Engagements are typically 3 to 6 months of intensive coaching plus systems setup, then a lighter-touch advisor cadence.
What kinds of organizations hire you for community work?
Three patterns: (1) B2B companies launching a customer or category community as a GTM moat; (2) media companies, associations, or VCs spinning up a community as a product line; (3) founders or solopreneurs trying to turn an audience into a paying, durable community. I don't work on consumer fan communities or moderation-heavy mass-scale forums.
How do engagements work and what do they cost?
Three formats: a one-time Community Strategy Sprint (4 weeks, fixed fee), a Build + Launch engagement (3 months, retainer), or an Ongoing Advisor relationship (monthly retainer). Pricing starts at $7,500 for the sprint. We scope on a 30-minute discovery call so the engagement matches your stage, team, and revenue model.
What's the AI angle on community work?
Communities are one of the highest-leverage places to deploy AI right now — for member onboarding, content programming, sponsor matchmaking, conversation summarization, and member intelligence. As founder of the AI Marketers Guild and a fractional AI CMO, I bake AI workflows into every community engagement. Most community consultants are 12 months behind on this.
Free 2-minute diagnostic
Where is your community actually stuck?
Answer 7 questions. Get an honest read on your stage, the biggest risk in your way, and what to fix first. I'll personally review your responses and follow up with a deeper diagnosis if you leave your contact info.
Question 1 of 7
~2 min total
Where is your community today?
Be honest — vague answers get vague advice.
Pick one to continue
Free guide · PDF
5 Community Mistakes (and how to avoid them)
The 5 most expensive mistakes I've made and seen across a decade of building Serial Marketers and the AI Marketers Guild — and the playbooks that turned them into a double exit. No fluff.
Building (or fixing) a community? Let's talk.
Submit an inquiry. I personally review every request and reply within 1 business day.
Prefer to read more first? David's full background · All services