What skills does a social media manager need to have?
Social media manager is a wide-reaching term, and often refers to people who plan social media strategies, create content, analyze results, and everything in between.
It’s a varied job role therefore the best social media managers are required to have an extremely broad set of skills.
If you’re an aspiring social media manager, or thinking of becoming one and you’re looking to up your game and score more clients, then it’s important to hone and nurture the important social media skills you need for the job.
In this article, we’ll be looking at the essential skills every social media manager needs to have, and how you can improve and develop your skills using self-study and online resources.
Let’s get started with the first and probably most important skill that every social media manager should possess.
1. Creativity
Social media is saturated with brands and influencers trying to get noticed, and therefore it’s super important to be able to develop and implement creative strategies as a social media manager.
There’s no blueprint to follow when it comes to social media marketing, so it’s important to bring a level of creativity to your role that will help you to come up with fresh and engaging content ideas for your clients.
No matter what your social media marketing strategies are focused on, your content ideas should be creative enough to cut through the social media noise, and boost reach and awareness for the brands you’re working for. Here’s an example of what we mean:
Weetabix is a tried and tested household brand that people don’t really think about, and because of that, their social media presence left a lot to be desired.
However, this beany broadcast from the company was so creative that it inspired customers all over the UK to get involved in the fun. It brought humor, and debate to their comment sections, and boosted their social media visibility substantially. This post got over 131K likes and over 20K comments.
Ways to Improve your creativity
Creativity naturally waxes and wanes, but there are some ways you can hone your creativity in order to stay on top in your role as a social media manager. Here are some resources to try:
Creativity inspiring online courses – Check out sites like Skillshare, Udemy, and LinkedIn Learning and take part in some creative courses that will help you develop new creative social media skills and keep your frontal cortex healthy.
Fill your day with creative activities – Even when you’re not working, you should try to partake in creative events. For example, you could consider taking part in virtual events hosted on Creative Mornings, or listen to podcasts like The Accidental Creative.
Think outside the box when crafting social media posts – Don’t be afraid to change things up and try new content ideas. Consider apps like SweepWidget and TryInteract for adding new and interesting games and quizzes to your social media posts.
2. Design Skills
A keen eye for design is also essential if you want to succeed as a social manager. When working for brands and companies, you’ll be in charge of managing their brand image online, therefore it’s essential that you can create professional and visually appealing content that helps to build the brand’s reputation.
It’s extremely useful to know your way around popular design tools like Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, and InDesign.
However, if you don’t have these skills, then you should at least be familiar with popular visual editors like Canva.
Whether you have time to spend hours agonizing over an upcoming post, or you need to create a quick graphic on the fly to add to your Instagram Story, you need to be able to create a professional design quickly and easily and spot any flaws in your designs before they’re published.
Take this post from HubSpot for example:
On the surface, it looks like a simple graphic. However, the color scheme, graphic elements, and tiny details such as the 3D effect of the paper slip make it look more professional and suitable for use on a brand’s business account.
Ways to improve your design skills
Online design courses – There are tons of courses online that will help you to improve your design and social media skills. Search on platforms like Skillshare and LinkedIn Learning and you’ll find tons of courses that can help you develop your creative design skills, learn new design programs, and more.
Keep up to date with design trends – What’s considered ‘good design’ is forever changing, so it’s important to stay up to date with current trends so your content doesn’t look outdated. You can stay up to date by subscribing to design magazines like Print, and Digital Arts.
3. Writing
As a social media manager, you’ll be in charge of planning and creating content for the brands that you work with. Therefore, great social media skills and particularly writing skills are extremely important, as you’ll essentially be the acting voice of all the brands that you work with.
So, any written content you create needs to be engaging, professional, and also grammatically correct. It’s always a good idea to only produce written content in your native language.
If you’re producing social media content in English, but you don’t speak English natively, consider outsourcing writing to a native English speaker, or have your content checked by an editor before publishing. This will ensure the quality of your writing is up to standard.
After that, the main thing you should focus on is making your written content as compelling and engaging as possible. Here’s a great example of this:
This Twitter post from Know Your Lemons is snappy, straight to the point, but also very attention-grabbing. It uses the definition format, an interesting literary device, as well as relevant hashtags. It’s also written in a casual but concise tone that makes it easy for readers to understand.
With social media, you may not always have a ton of words to work with, but it’s still possible to make your writing engaging, compelling, and personable.
Tips for improving your writing for social media
Check your grammar – Use apps like the Hemingway app and Grammarly to ensure that your writing is coherent and grammatically correct. While these tools aren’t foolproof, they can provide an easy way to sense check your writing.
Expand your vocabulary – Follow social media accounts such as Miriam-Webster to learn new words, slang terms, and more.
4. Community engagement skills
When planning your social media campaigns, it’s important to fully understand the online community that you are targeting and create content that is engaging for them.
To do this, you need to be able to put yourself in the shoes of your average follower and consider what type of topics and content will be the most interesting and personable.
The best way to do this is to stay up to date with current news and adapt a brand voice that is more relatable for your audience. Here’s an example of this:
Wendy’s is a huge nationwide corporation, but this post advertising a free offer is written in such a way that is much more relatable to followers. It uses colloquial language and bridges that gap between the corporation and the consumer. This is the perfect way to create engaging content that inspires comments and interactions from consumers.
In addition to crafting relatable posts, it’s also super important to respond to comments in a friendly and relatable way.
Pro tip: By using a tool like Sendible, you can easily manage all of your interactions in a unified social inbox, and this means that you can quickly respond to most of your commentors. When doing so, air away from constrained, business-like responses, and engage with the community on a human level.
5. Customer service and complaints management
No matter how hard you try, not all of your brand interactions will be positive on social media, and you have to be prepared for the times when you do come across disgruntled followers that are looking for solutions to their problems.
The key to customer service and complaints management in these situations is to be patient, polite, and understanding.
Also, you should aim to take the conversation to a private outlet as quickly as possible to prevent damage to the brand’s image. Here’s an example of a great way to handle complaints on social media:
JetBlue’s customer made a public twitter complaint about a broken TV on their flight. The social media rep responded quickly and personally and asked a follow-up question to show that they were genuinely interested in resolving the issue.
Then, they swiftly took the resolution process to their DM’s, whilst publically noting their suggested resolution for other social media users to see. They avoided generic responses that can further aggravate customers and dealt with them in a timely and professional manner.
Extra tips for handling negative social interactions
When working with brands, be sure to ask them how they would like their complaints handled, as they may have processes in place for this. Also, consider using a tool like Brand24 to monitor brand sentiment and mentions, and this can help you notice negative comments or complaints right away.