How To Hire A Great Social Media Manager

Depending on the needs of your company, bringing in someone to jumpstart your social media marketing is something that you shouldn’t decide in a rush.

Whether you are running solo or have an expanding business, hiring a great social media manager can be an amazing addition to your social efforts. The value comes from his or her social marketing know-how, deep understanding about connecting with your audience, and knowledge on how to best utilize the social networks.

From 2010 to 2013, the number of social media jobs grew 1357%. ~Buffer Click To Tweet

What is a Social Media Manager?

The main role of the Social Media Manager is to represent your business across all social networks. He or she is responsible for the overall content and social marketing strategies for the purpose of increasing brand awareness, engagement, and traffic.

This type of marketing manager is usually a “jack-of-all-trades” who handles a myriad of roles with superb social media marketing skills:

• Specialist – Creates and distributes content on all social media platforms (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.), manages company reputation, provides social customer care, and facilitates partnerships with key influencers.
• Coordinator – Monitors and updates social media channels, engages with the community in real-time.
• Analyst – Collects and analyzes data, tracks the performance of social media campaigns, and tailors efforts to the right audience.
• Graphic designer – Creates visuals by assembling images, typography, and other materials to make social content engaging.
• Video marketing manager – Facilitates and leverages product demos, interviews, testimonials, and other storytelling methods in video format to reach out to the audience with emotional connections.

The Importance of Hiring a Great Social Media Manager

As of 2015, a search on LinkedIn for “social media” jobs has nearly 60,000 results — and that’s just in the United States. ~Buffer Click To Tweet

Social media helps you get found online. Nowadays, having a website is just not enough. You need to CREATE A BUZZ on your social media or you’ll fall short of customer service satisfaction.

1. Your online presence is an extension of your existing brand and uniqueness you want people to experience when they interact with your business. The social media manager will often be the first point of contact for a potential customer.
2. Deliver top-notch customer service and stay competitive. Presenting yourself and your business out there gives people the feeling that you care enough to get to know them better and their needs.
3. Listen to what’s going on social—as soon as you find out what people are saying about your brand, you can start addressing their pain points and engaging with them, drawing them in to your products or services.
4. Grow our audience and following. Having social media presence is a great way for people to go straight to your online shop. They may not know your company URL but going through your posts on your social media pages will send them to your website.
5. Lead generation – Social media marketing strategies that generate leads such as promotions and social advertising using Facebook ads.
6. An international company, for example, may need an expert who can coordinate efforts across time zones, languages, and cultures.

10 Factors to Consider in Hiring a Social Media Manager

#SocialMediaManager is not a position that should be taken lightly or seen as an entry-level job. A #socialmedia expert handles a variety of responsibilities from content creation to analytics. Click To Tweet

1. Outline the scope of work.

Understand the skills you’re looking for and the timeframe for when you need to run social media campaigns for the business.

Include the level of expertise needed and the challenges you want to solve. Indicate any timelines or target dates that are relevant to your goals.

2. Knowledge of how social media works from a business perspective.

Managing a business page is not the same as sharing a post about your weekend with a group of friends on Facebook.

The candidate must know how to run an effective campaign on social pages, how to utilize the admin features, how to optimize and schedule posts, and understand individual channel algorithms.

3. Ask for track record and samples of work from past clients to see if they write in a way that aligns with your brand voice.

Consider the growth of followers of the pages they’ve managed and the posts they have written. Do the examples show an understanding of how business and social work together?

4. Enthusiasm for social media. Look for someone who has a real passion for the work.

A great social media manager has the capacity not just to be consistently active on social media but also to keep up with the constant evolution of online marketing.

Being a “digital nerd” doesn’t automatically qualify someone to be the ideal social media manager. You also need to be interesting, engaging, and enthusiastic.

5. Creativity.

Whether you have the bandwidth of a steady flow of content or not, the candidate must be creative enough to repurpose your materials or create new ones that will inspire curiosity, humor, and spirit in your posts and updates.

6. The ability to multi-task.

Multiple conversations, questions, and networks often happen online. Make sure that your social media VA can juggle these all at once. Planning ahead is also critical and having immediate access to the right tools is important.

7. Have go-to resources for content.

Curation is a one of the most time-consuming tasks of social media marketing. Great social media managers know where to find amazing content that would interest followers.

8. Knows how to allocate budget for social media advertising.

Ask the candidate to describe a plan for where to allocate your budget and how they would know if it’s successful.

For example in Facebook ads, depending on your company and your market, a minimum $500/month is a good start.

9. Prep for the interview.

Know the right questions to ask and be open to expert social media guidance along the way. This will inform your decision and help you pick the right person.

Ask them:

• What social media platform(s) are best for your business? (and have them explain why)
• Ask them what their first goals would be
• Have they ever had to handle a social media/online reputation crisis? If so, how did they handle it?
• Do they have a blog and do they currently write content for social media channels?

10. Use a job post to attract the right freelancer.

Make your hiring announcement as specific as possible to attract the top talents that you’re looking for.

For example you can put in your job post that you are looking for a social media expert that has a sales know-how, a solid foundation in marketing, and an understanding of today’s social-media-savvy customers

We hope that all these tips will help you in narrowing your list of potential and qualified contractors. If you are seriously considering hiring a social media manager today, Virtual Assistant Talent can help you.

Visit the following link to see how a social media manager VA can help you and what to expect from our social media packages.

We offer free consultation to discuss your business needs with the social media virtual assistant (VA), HR manager, and project manager us. CALL US at 1-866-596-9041 to learn more.

We would love to hear if these tips worked for you! If you have questions or any social media related success stories, please leave a comment below.

References:

blog.bufferapp.com
krusecontrolinc.com
upwork.com
digitalmarketer.com