As social media becomes an increasingly important part of how companies do communications, marketing and sales, one of the key positions is community and social media managers – people who monitor the social media landscape, and engage in conversations with customers, partners, investors, suppliers and employees.

From the outside looking in, being a community manager looks like a glamorous position because you’re in the middle of the action – and getting paid to use social media tools all day long.

But the reality is that being a community manager is a lot of work that involves a lot of unglamorous blocking and tackling. Many community managers spend all day in front of their computers, trolling the social media landscape for mentions about their company, products and markets.

And the expectation is you’ve got to respond right away – waiting a few hours to respond and engage is seen as bad form.

So rather than being glamorous and exciting, being a community manager can be intense and a grind. It’s a position that plays to someone whose digital engaged with a willingness to do what it takes to meet internal and external expectations – even if it means long hours.

“My day starts on Twitter and it doesn’t really end,” said Alicia Dantico, who handles Twitter for Garrett Popcorn. She told Associated Press that she keeps her BlackBerry all the time so can be on call for her followers in different time zones. “It’s driving my family crazy, but that’s OK.”

The time commitment made by Dantico is pretty typical of community and social media managers for large and small companies. Given social media is such a new activity, the people who are being paid to do it still need to justify their jobs so working long hours is part of the gig.

What I wonder about is the life span for community and social media managers. How long can someone be that digitally engaged before you come down with a bad case of digital burnout?

For now, it’s still the honeymoon period for community and social media jobs but there may come a time pretty soon when the novelty wears off. Then, what?

Note: It’s also my belief that community and social media managers play an important part in a company’s marketing and communications because they work in multiple areas: communications, marketing, business development, customer service and sales.