How to Build a Community People Trust with Matt Carnevale

Jan 12, 2026

Matt Carnevale, Head of Community at Exit Five, shares insights from his journey in community building. He discusses how defining 'community' accurately impacts engagement. The importance of trust is emphasized, along with the challenges faced by B2B communities. Matt advocates for treating communities as products rather than just marketing channels. He also highlights the significance of curation and maintaining quality interactions, arguing that genuine connections keep members engaged beyond content.

Ask episode

AI Snips

Chapters

Transcript

Episode notes

ADVICE

Force Connection With Events And Matchmaking

Provide at least one recurring event so members get value by showing up occasionally.
Use matchmaking and targeted tagging to nudge relevant members into conversations.

ADVICE

Onboard Deeply And Curate Proactively

Invest heavily in onboarding and member intelligence; know people deeply.
Use that knowledge to curate matches and proactively tag experts into questions.

INSIGHT

Curation Protects Community Trust

Curating who joins prevents misaligned incentives and bad actors from souring trust.
A few low-quality posts can erode perceived trust faster than many good ones build it.

Get the Snipd Podcast app to discover more snips from this episode

Get the app

#320 | Matt Carnevale, Head of Community at Exit Five, joins Dave for a discussion about community building. They dive into a bunch of the lessons learned from building the Exit Five community over the last few years, including specific plays like onboarding, matchmaking, and moderation. If you’re thinking about community building in 2026, this is a good primer; plus the guys give their opinion on what “community” actually means and whether you should build a private community like Exit Five or focus more broadly on community building.

Timestamps

(00:02) - – Matt’s path from BDR to Head of Community at Exit Five
(09:00) - – What “community” actually means (and what it definitely isn’t)
(13:45) - – Why most B2B communities fail before they ever get traction
(18:25) - – Community vs. content: what gets people in vs. what makes them stay
(23:00) - – Why Slack groups aren’t a strategy
(27:45) - – Treating community like a product, not a marketing channel
(35:16) - – The role of trust, curation, and saying no to the wrong people
(40:51) - – What community managers actually do behind the scenes
(47:46) - – How in-person events changed the Exit Five community
(53:56) - – The biggest lessons Matt’s learned after two years building Exit Five

Join 50,0000 people who get Dave's Newsletter here: https://www.exitfive.com/newsletter
Learn more about Exit Five's private marketing community: https://www.exitfive.com/

***

Brought to you by:

Customer.io - An AI powered customer engagement platform that help marketers turn first-party data into engaging customer experiences across email, SMS, and push. Learn more at customer.io/exitfive.

Consensus - An AI-powered interactive demo platform that lets you put personalized, self-serve demos on your site to turn anonymous researchers into high-intent leads. Learn more at goconsensus.com/exitfive.

Knak - A no-code, campaign creation platform that lets you go from idea to on-brand email and landing pages in minutes, using AI where it actually matters. Learn more at knak.com/exitfive.

Convertr - The enterprise lead data management platform that sits between your lead sources and your CRM, automatically validating, enriching, and standardizing every lead before it touches your systems. Check them out at convertr.io/exitfive.

***

Thanks to my friends at hatch.fm for producing this episode and handling all of the Exit Five podcast production.

They give you unlimited podcast editing and strategy for your B2B podcast.
Get unlimited podcast editing and on-demand strategy for one low monthly cost. Just upload your episode, and they take care of the rest.
Visit hatch.fm to learn more