How to build a community around a product

One of the mistakes I see founders make when they have a community is they listen too much. Trying to problem solve and change their product/service every single time someone makes a suggestion or has a gripe. I think communities actually work best when you don't have the founder of the company running it but another person on the team that can work on/in the community while also being objective.

This is the ideal solution as you create a community of buyers who will in turn 'sell' your product for you, but it's easier said than done. Creating, managing, and growing the community is a full-time job in itself. I've seen some that seem to be self-sustainable, but I imagine a lot of work was put in at the beginning by the founder and there are probably 'unidentified' internal staff working in the community, so perhaps not self-sustainable after all. It would be good to hear from others as to how much time they put into building a community around their product.