I agree. At the most basic level, communities function as a top-of-the-funnel acquisition channel but there is a more complicated trust relationship to navigate once they are there.
Agreed, this is where the model can break.
I think you are saying that you have a fully autonomous community team which functionally reports to marketing. If that is the case, how do you set boundaries or resolve conflicts of interest if the marketing team want to do something you don’t consider member-first?
And if your community is designed to serve marketing goals, do you have challenges around handling demands from stakeholders in different departments?