5 tips to help you choose the right social media manager for your business

Most of the time, I train businesses in how to handle their own accounts. Sometimes though I do have to admit that it’s not for everyone and I may suggest you develop a strategy and content plan and then hand it over to a third party or staff member to implement.

If you’re going to hire a third party, it’s best to not take them at face value - there are a lot of people who think that running personal social media profiles is the same as running professional ones. They are completely different.

Being a good photographer does not make someone a good social media manager. Being 'young' also does not necessarily make someone a good social media manager, nor does popularity. Managing multiple business accounts requires a number of skills and a far deeper understanding of the intricacies of each channel.

5 things you should consider before appointment

1. Have a look at their own accounts to get a sense of what they are capable of. Look for red flags like poor spelling and grammar, unimaginative content and poor execution. Have a look at their engagement and reviews and a little peek at their followers to see if they seem genuine.

2. Ask them to provide you with a couple of references. When you call the references you’ll want to know things like: how long they have been handling the account; what results have been delivered; how have the results been presented; their ability to react to any issues; and, results on ad campaigns if relevant. You can see the word ‘results’ is repeated here a few times.

3. Make sure you put some written KPIs in place - these should include engagement levels, genuine follower number growth, high quality presentation of your brand, response times, and number of posts a week across your channels. Be clear on your expectations and write them down so there is no room for misunderstanding. Add to your KPIs or contract that they must not promote that they are managing your social media. Authenticity and trust are central to an audience’s brand engagement - knowing it’s a third party posting could be very damaging.

4. If you are planning on spending any advertising money in this space, ask to see results of campaigns they have run in the past. If they only talk about ‘boosting’ then it probably means they do not know how to use the suite of advertising tools available.

5. Experience and qualifications. It’s ok to ask for these. A good social media manager will become a part of your team so go and poke around their LinkedIn profile too and see what they’ve been up to.

Other things to look out for:

Organisation skills - these have to be spot on. Ask them what tools they use to run posts and reports and how they prioritise accounts.

Research skills - ask them where and how they will find curated content for you. What systems do they have in place for research? How do they factor that into their posting schedules?

Hopefully that helps you to get the relationship off to a good start. Setting clear expectations of what you need will lessen the chance of any awkward situations and wasted marketing budgets. It will also weed out the people who aren’t capable of delivering results for you.

If you’d like to know more or have a specific question, please get in touch.