Many business owners are lost between believing they need an SMM specialist and not wanting to pay someone to "just go on Facebook". So first, let's write down what should Social Media Marketer actually do:
- - Manage a publishing calendar;
- - Schedule posts;
- - Curate content;
- - Monitor brand mentions and keywords;
- - Engage with customers and partners (i.e. reply to all comments, reviews, - questions on Social Media);
- - Review analytics and determine next steps;
- - Follow up with connections and on projects;
- - Run experiments to optimize social media posts.
What skills should a social media marketer have?
- - First and foremost, that are the skills of listening, communicating, and problem-solving. Think of someone that would be able to solve any kind of conflict.
- - They should be a storyteller. In a group surveyed, only 24 percent had marketing, business, or advertising degrees, while 50 percent had undergraduate degrees in English, English literature, public relations, or journalism.
- - They should be able to read and interpret data. With social listening and Big Data key to the field, it is essential to understand numbers.
As you can see, social media marketing is a truly multi-skilled field.
So do you need to hire a specialist?
That depends mainly on your budget. It's possible to handle social media
marketing yourself if you use the right tools (Social Media Management and Social Media Monitoring) and if you keep it simple. While on-going customer service is still essential, everything else is optional. You can limit your posts to once a day and cover only a couple of major platforms.