So you’ve hired a social media manager to handle your social media accounts. It takes time to manage so many accounts and see growth and that’s time you just don’t have as a business owner. While social media is widely used for sharing funny memes, and picture perfect content, your social media manager should do much more than that when it comes to their clients.
Marketing Objectives
You social media manager should know and ask about your marketing objectives and follow them. There could be many marketing objectives for your business and it’s important your social media manager is knowledgeable in all of them. This is after all what is going to make it worth it in the long run.
Tracking progress
Keeping up with how many followers you gain each week or month is great but not all of these followers will be potential clients or customers. If you track how many organic engagements you get, you will gain a greater understanding on how your day-to-day strategy is working rather than being swayed by the big numbers your ad gets. While ads are great for exposure, the insights may not be as relevant.
Ads show the number of impression your content is receiving, but did you know some ads count impressions where if one account has been shown the same ad 100 times this counts as 100 impressions. So while the big numbers may look great, the organic ones are where you want your social media manager to focus their energy on. Being smart on how you track your progress and statistics is just as important as the insights themselves.
Engagement
If your social media accounts aren’t active this may be a big concern. One of the biggest parts of hiring a social media manager is to get the activity on your account that you don’t have time for. This is a time consuming part of the job and extremely important. Just as importantly the content being published needs to be engaging to your audience. You social media manager should be researching and learning your audience and what interests them, as well as their needs and how your business can help them.
Along with being active on your accounts, your social media manager should be keeping track of inquiries and directing them to the right people or resources within the company. If someone inquires about a service you offer, they should make the initial contact with the customer, then direct them to the professionals in your business if they can’t answer the questions, or feel it’s better left to the experts in that area.
Scheduling & Calendars
Scheduling content is not just a trick of the trade, it’s necessary. This is how content can be posted at any and all times, based on your insights of optimal times to post. Keeping a calendar of content planning is a habit your social media manager should be doing. This is key to not only organization, but to have a plan for future content. Social media should have a goal, and planning in advance helps you stay on track. Your social media specialist’s efficiency improves with the use of a content calendar. New content isn’t delayed to the last minute, rushed to get out and susceptible to simple mistakes.
Content Curation
Content is another one of the biggest jobs for a social media manager. This is probably one of the main reasons you hired them in the first place. You didn’t have time to find or create content, and still don’t. Finding relevant content that meets your audience’s needs and interests is an important part of a social media manager’s job. While your social media specialist doesn’t have to be a professional photographer. However, they should be creative in the type of content and images to capture.
They should also be somewhat photo savvy or have connections to a photographer they can work with. Making an attractive graphics is part of their job! If your social media manager works remotely, they should at least be sending you content ideas that are easy enough for you to accomplish yourself, or for a hired professional to take, and they should not be using only stock photos on your account.
Customized graphics
Part of branding is being recognizable. Your business colours are a big part of who you are, as is your brand’s voice and logo. Use these things as much as possible. Don’t promote other’s graphics or words. Your social media manager should get creative and create a template that you can post quotes on, or promote sales. This helps increase brand awareness and makes your content original and shareable. Let others promote your business and graphics not the other way around.
Trends
Your social media marketer should be keeping up with the latest trends for your industry and on social media. This also means keeping up with algorithms on social platforms. If video content is doing the best, your social media manager should be encouraging videos. If other businesses in your industry are active on Youtube, Pinterest, LinkedIn etc. then you may want to consider being on these platforms as well. Your social media manager should keep your business visible so opportunities aren’t missed to be seen and heard.
Research
Many social media managers overlook research. It should be done on your business/industry, on the things you offer, and the people you are selling to or targeting. This is actually an important part of their job as well, if they don’t know what you offer and the people you are targeting, how will they be able to cater your content or ads to the exact people that want and need to see your business.
Social media managers are important and helpful for your business. Social media is growing . . . and definitely not going away anytime soon. You want your businesses social media presence to be made known. Your social media manager should be posting content that is relevant to your industry. They should be doing their homework to send out content that is appropriate to your industry. When done correctly, social media managers can help increase brand awareness, sales, grow digital presence, generate new leads, retain existing customers, along with so much more.