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  >  Career   >  What You Need To Become A Successful Freelance Social Media Manager

Becoming a freelance social media manager may seem like the dream for a lot of people. After all, who doesn’t want to get paid out to sit around posting on social media? However, sharing posts to your blog, personal profile, and so on is vastly different from becoming a social media manager, especially for more prominent brands and corporations. And as a freelancer, the last thing you want to do is to lose a paying gig due to not being able to provide proven results and benefit for the accounts you are managing.

There are many different benefits to becoming a social media manager, not least the attraction of being able to choose what work you do and when you do it. Add to the mix you can work from home, and typically freelance social media managers earn more than their employed counterparts. It is easy to see why the rise of this job role is becoming more and more attractive to people in this industry.

But the reality is not everyone is cut out for a career managing social media. While it pays to be a little bit more outgoing and friendly, these aren’t the only skills you will need and assessing you are a right fit for the job can help you make a more informed decision before embarking on the new career.

What Exactly Does A Social Media Manager Do?

Marketing, customer service, and community development are all enhanced by using social media platforms by businesses. As a freelance social media manager, your job is to assist a company in becoming more social. You might be surprised to learn how many firms find it challenging to accomplish this on their own.

A freelance social media manager is essentially a social media guru who helps brands navigate social media and stay relevant and control their image and visibility online.

They accomplish this by assisting their customer in adhering to best practices for building an audience and connecting with that audience. As an additional service to their customers, they advise them on introducing their products and services using a “social approach.”

This post looks at some of the skills you need to make it as a freelance social media manager.

Creativity

Creativity is one of the most significant characteristics of practical social media marketing skills. If the content shared by a brand is repetitive or dull, social media consumers are more likely to unfollow the brand. Social media marketers must constantly develop fresh and exciting ideas, innovative initiatives, and campaigns to keep their followers engaged and hooked on their platforms. Social media marketers will need to create new and creative ideas to differentiate themselves from the millions of other people on the internet, from interactive content to contests to viral videos.

And if you cannot produce this yourself, you need to know who to work with to create the content you need at a level required for your brand. From photographers to content writers or a video production company, you need a reliable contact if you don’t possess the skills.

Be Able To Write

Even though photos and videos dominate most social media abilities, writing is equally important. Writing is a vital element of any social media marketer’s job description, whether you’re publishing a blog post or crafting a tweet. If the headlines aren’t compelling or magnetic enough, it is likely individuals will not be inspired enough to click on them.

A Good Project Manager

Social media marketers, who are multi-taskers extraordinaire, require strong project management abilities. They must plan publication schedules, keep track of contacts, and keep their social media profiles up to date. They will be required to run reports, meet with designers and writers, manage advertising budgets, and perform various other tasks. The most skilled social media managers will stay on top of all jobs and will understand when material needs to be released, what to plan for, and how to keep track of all the many social media conversations that are taking place.

Create Content

Content curation has long been an essential component of social media marketing expertise, particularly for firms that do not have the resources to produce a consistent stream of new content on their time schedules. Marketers need to be proficient in content curation since they will know when and how best to post content on social media platforms and be knowledgeable about content sources and audience preferences.

A Quick Learner

Nothing ever stays the same for long, so skilled freelance social media managers need to be able to adapt what they do to changing requirements and algorithms along with new features or even platforms to work on.

From Twitter introducing Fleets to Reels on Instagram, there is a lot to learn, and as social media evolves and changes over time, so will the skills and knowledge you require.

Keep looking for new methods and ways of working out, get the required results and push the content you share to the top of people’s feeds to maximise engagement. Remember, what worked once won’t work forever, so keeping abreast of changes is vital and critical to being an excellent social media manager.

Knowledge of Marketing

Even though you are utilising social media as a tool, you are still marketing, which means marketing is a must-have social media talent. You must have a firm grasp of fundamental marketing principles. You may not require a marketing degree, but you do need a solid understanding of the fundamentals of how marketing works.

Have Excellent Analytical Skills

You need to determine whether or not your marketing strategy is effective. As a result, one of the most essential and practical social media skills is thinking analytically. You can learn how to check metrics and reporting, but having an analytical mind will help you make sense of all that data—allowing you to make informed judgments rather than relying on assumptions—order to make informed decisions rather than relying on assumptions. You need to be able to prove what you are doing is working and getting the desired results for the brand.

If you aren’t, you need to know what is and isn’t working and put a new plan into action to get the right approach based on the data you collate as a freelance social media manager. Your clients will expect to see this and rely on you to do what is best for them without compromising their brand image.

Do you have what it takes? While you do not need to excel in all of these areas, you need to be competent and efficient in providing the results and data to back up what you are doing and have some knowledge and skill level in these areas.

Check out what you need to get started as a freelance social media manager.

Rates

You need to work out your rates when you agree to work with clients. Settle on a sum you are happy with. In the beginning, while you are building your skills, you may find that your fees will be more moderate. As you build up experience and proof of results, you can adjust your prices accordingly. You can look online for the typical fees for freelance social media managers to get an idea of what to charge.

Register as Self Employed

You need to make sure you are set up and registered as a freelancer with the government. This will usually involve you filling in a form online and submitting your tax returns along with the money you owe yearly.

Set Up A Bank Account

While there is no legal requirement to have a separate bank account for your business and your funds. When it comes time to file your tax return, you might find it beneficial to separate them. 

Get Insurance

As a freelancer, you need to be covered in the event of any issues, so this means getting the appropriate insurance to cover you in your work. Insurance can also protect you in the event of not working due to accident and illness. But check the small print carefully to know what you are covered for when you take out freelancer insurance.

A Website

Before you begin selling your services and signing up clients, it is a good idea to create a website that demonstrates your capabilities. This serves as a digital “storefront” for your work, which will assist you in attracting new clients.

Additionally, it is a fantastic location to present examples of your work, introduce yourself, and establish an online presence, in addition to pointing potential clients to your website for additional information.

In conclusion

Becoming a freelance social media manager can open up many opportunities for the right person. After all, successful social media marketing for brands is part of their marketing efforts and should be treated as such. If you are up for the job, nothing is stopping you! It is well suited to someone who is creative but can also get results and provide a good ROI for their clients.

 

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