Are you looking to step up your game as a social media manager? There might be ways that you could be better serving your clients. In this article, you’ll discover the five activities you should have at the top of your priority list as a social media manager.
There are plenty of tasks you could have on your to-do list. In fact, it’s probably fairly full at the moment. However, not everything needs to be done. Instead, by focusing on these five activities, you’ll be able to deliver the best results possible for yourself and your clients.
1. Create A Strategy For Your Clients
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From the very beginning of your working relationship with a client, creating and sharing a strategy with them is important to your success. A strategy can help inspire your client to have confidence in the work you will be doing, as they can see your plan and what you intend to achieve with it. There are a few things that every good client strategy should do.
Set Reasonable Expectations And Goals
You want to ensure that you and your client are on the same page from the beginning. There’s not much worse as a social media manager, than getting to the end of a client relationship and having a dissatisfied client because of a miscommunication at the very beginning. In your strategy lay out precisely what your client can expect. Show them the goals you intend to hit, as well as any timeline information you can share. This is also a great time to talk with your client, to ensure there aren’t any additional goals they’d like you to meet that you haven’t accounted for in your plan.
Educate Your Clients
Some brands and businesses believe they “should” be on social media, but perhaps only because their competitors have an online presence. Include in your strategy any relevant statistics or supporting information that can show your client how social media can benefit their business. From building brand awareness to creating lasting relationships on Instagram, social media can become a very valuable marketing tool. After all, 90% of Instagram users follow a business account – maybe your client doesn’t know that number.
Do Background Research
Before you start creating content for your clients, of course you’ll need to do background research. Start that now, when you’re still creating your strategy. Show them what you’ve learned about their company, industry and needs. Give them specific, concrete examples of how you can help them organically grow their following, for example, and then convert those followers into customers. Everything you show the client should align with their brand and business.
By taking the time to create a strategy before you begin creating content, you can set yourself and your client up for success in the long run by establishing boundaries, goals, and a plan.
2. Establish Organization
No matter how many clients you have or profiles you’re managing, you need a system in place to keep you organized. It’s too easy to get distracted and lose sight of little details – but it’s the details that make all the difference to your success. Here are three easy steps you can take to ensure all of your projects will be organized.
Use Third-Party Tools
Scheduling tools and programs can be a lifesaver for a social media manager. You don’t have the time to individually live-post every client’s post every single day. Even if you did have time, perhaps the ideal time to post for a particular client is 3am – you don’t want to have to remember to wake up then just to post on social media. Instead, invest in scheduling tools that allow you to post and manage content ahead of time so you can have a chance to disconnect, too.
There are other types of third-party tools you should incorporate into your business, too. One is a communication tool to streamline any conversations you need to have with your team members, contractors or anyone else. Another great tool to invest in is a storage and sharing platform. This way you and your team members can easily share files and documents. You’ll want to ensure that you keep everything organized between your various clients, too.
Create Budgets
Before you get started with a campaign, you should create a budget for it. This budget should include all of the resources you need, from tools to platforms to contractors and more. List out everything you need to complete this campaign and ensure that you have access to all the necessary resources.
Outsource Some Tasks
You do not need to be doing every single task that goes into social media management for a client. So, take some time to decide which tasks you need to (or want to) be doing and which ones are easy to be delegated to someone else. The specific tasks you delegate are up to you. Maybe you love doing graphic design, so you don’t want to give that up, but you’re happy to hand off the actual scheduling of the posts. If you’re not sure where to start, write down a list of every step that has to happen for this campaign to work. Then, find a few steps that you can delegate.
The more organized you can be with the project, the more efficiently you’ll be able to complete it and deliver results to your client.
3. Time Management
Your most valuable resource is your time, so it is critically important that you manage it well. Once you have your systems in place and running smoothly, you’ll be able to move through your projects more quickly, allowing you to have more time for other things. Here are four key tips to maximizing your time management.
Prioritize Your Tasks By Value
Sometimes the work day can get away from you, and the next thing you know, you look up and it’s 4:30 pm. It can be easy to lose track of time, especially when we’re working through small tasks that feel urgent but aren’t important. Before you sit down to work next, make a list of the tasks you need to do, and rank them by importance. Then, do the most important one first. Not the most urgent – but the most important. Once you complete your most important task, you can move on down your list. Then every day you’ll know that the most important thing has been completed.
Create A Routine That Works For You
Routines help people accomplish more because we don’t have to think about each and every step before we do it. Outline your ideal routine and then follow it for a few days. Many people like to start with creative work first, even before they check their emails. This way they can check things off the to-do list before someone could send them something new to do. See if that works for you. Maybe you’ll find that you need to make a few tweaks so that it better fits your personality or what you need to get done. Establish a rhythm so you can flow through your days smoothly.
Schedule Tasks For Certain Days
You can create weekly rhythms and routines, too. Try to plan all of your meetings for one day and content creation for another. Create a time when you’re going to schedule out your posts and block off time for invoicing. Whatever you do on a weekly basis, try creating a chunk of time that you can schedule for each major task so that your brain doesn’t have to switch between tasks frequently.
Repurpose And Recycle Content
Believe it or not, you don’t have to have 100% brand new content to publish every single day. The vast majority of your client’s followers likely won’t even see their post the first time. So, recycle posts that performed well. Tweak them a little or add a different graphic, and then post them again. Give it a few weeks before you repost it, and their followers won’t even know the difference.
By expertly managing your time, you can serve your clients well and ensure that you’re performing at the top of your ability for them.
4. Social Media Monitoring
This one probably seems obvious. A social media manager should be monitoring social media. Not only should you be watching the campaigns you’ve created for your clients, but you should also be watching your competitors and their general industries online. Here are three things to watch.
Put Benchmark Metrics In Place
You probably already did this when you were creating your strategy and discussing your campaign plan with your client. Know the benchmarks that your campaign should be hitting, and monitor frequently so you know if you’re on track or if you need to make changes. Benchmarks are great because they give you something to work towards on the way to your end goal.
Analyze Instagram KPIs
Key performance indicators are important across the board on social media, so make sure you know which metrics to track. On Instagram, you want to look for shares and saves of feed posts, and engagement and DMs on Stories. Direct messages in general are also a good indication of how the followers are liking the brand and their content. By analyzing these KPIs, you can see how effective your campaigns are.
Keep An Eye On The Competitors
You don’t need to stock the competition, but glancing at them often is a good idea. You obviously don’t want to follow their lead or their strategy, but it’s important to know where they’re standing. If they’re using Instagram’s new Reels feature, it might be a good idea to try it out for your client. If they aren’t using it, it still might be a good idea to try it out – you could be first to market with it among your client’s competition. You never want to be behind their competitors, and watching them is an excellent way to know what they’re doing.
By monitoring various social media accounts and keeping current on the trends and news in the industry itself, your clients can be confident that you’re making the right decisions.
5. Continue To Learn
Social media is one of the fastest-changing industries right now. As a social media manager, you should be always exploring and learning more so that you can keep your skills sharp and over-deliver for your clients. We have three tips for ways you can keep learning while you’re working.
Try New Strategies For New Trends
Whether it’s the newest dance trend on TikTok or a new marketing strategy using Instagram Stories, new trends are always appearing in social media. Set aside a little bit of time each week to play with new strategies and new ideas so that you can do some hands-on-learning and adapt to new trends quickly.
Improve Your Writing
Writing is key on social media, even on visual platforms like Instagram. Your beautiful image or graphic might capture someone’s attention, but it’s the copy in the caption that will actually inspire them to take action. Spend some time working on your writing, either by taking a course or simply writing every single day. After all, practice makes perfect!
Keep Up To Date With The Industry
We alluded to this earlier – social media is always evolving. Make sure you know what’s going on by reading articles and watching what’s happening on the app (like Instagram’s new fonts they just released for in Stories). Consider investing in courses to improve your skills and learn new strategies, and listen to podcasts for up-to-date information from experts on specific platforms.
Continuing to invest in your own education can help set you apart from other social media managers. Your clients will appreciate the fact that you’re knowledgeable about the industry and ready to learn and try new things.
Putting it All Together
Social media is an excellent marketing tool, and it’s up to you to deliver on that for your clients. Show them the importance of having a social media strategy, and then ensure that you and your team are set up properly to execute on that strategy. Manage your time well so you can stay on top of your tasks, and keep an eye on the various social platforms so you know how your campaigns are doing. Finally, by keeping up to date with the changes in the industry, you’ll become an expert in the field in no time. By prioritizing these five activities, you serve your clients more fully.