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Social media is an amazing avenue for businesses to reach out and connect with consumers. It is a place where brands can showcase their products or services, thought leadership, and culture. When executed properly, social media can increase sales, help you gain brand ambassadors and attract greater talent.

However, this can only happen with the help of a good social media manager. So what skills must they possess? Why are those important and how will they affect your success?

Here are five skills we believe are important and essential for every social media manager today.

What to Look for In a Social Media Manager

Before we get started, let’s clarify what a skill is. Not to be confused with a personality trait, a skill is a particular ability that can be learned. Knowing how to work with certain platforms or knowing a different language are great examples of skills. In order for one to claim expertise in a skill, they must work proficiently and efficiently in it.

1. Copywriting

Writing is a principal skill for all marketers. However, it is especially important for those who manage social media. It has been found that the ideal length for tweets is between 120 and 130 characters, while the ideal character count for a Facebook status is 40 characters. Social media managers are tasked with the duty of writing not only great copy—but copy that is short yet engaging. In order for a social post to attract audiences and gain engagement, it must tell a captivating short story that provides value or solutions to a need or problem.

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A social media manager should be a concise writer that also embodies a touch of personality. They will be the voice of your brand on social media, so ensure that they not only walk the walk, but talk the talk.

2. Customer Service

Conversations are constantly happening on social media. Whether it be a tweet or a formal review, your consumers are talking about you and to you. A social guru should have experience dealing with both happy and frustrated consumers, as they will come across disgruntled clients in the form of messages, comments, posts, and tweets.

Social media is the perfect place to display your level of customer service. When replying to an unsatisfied consumer, a social media manager must provide an empathetic response and solution, making the client feel heard and valued.

3. Graphic Design

It’s true: images equal engagement. Tweets with images get a whopping 150% more retweets than those without and Facebook posts with images get 2.3x more engagement than a word-only status update. Being able to produce eye-catching photos that will get someone to stop scrolling down their feed plays a crucial role in your social strategy.

This is why your social media manager needs to have experience in graphic design. While you may already have a graphic designer on your team, having a social media manager who also knows how to edit and correct graphics will make your social efforts more efficient and effective. Images need to be posted on social media consistently to get the highest amount of engagement possible. Besides creating social graphic posts, they will also need to know how to edit photos for advertisements.

4. Analytics

Whether it be social media insights or Google Analytics, a good social media manager knows how to read and dissect metrics in order to determine what needs to be changed in a social strategy. For example, they can find out what time not to post by observing when you get the least amount of engagement. The person who manages your social efforts should know which numbers to track and record so that you reach your set social objectives. It is also important that they know how to interpret Google Analytics so they can see if your social efforts are increasing site traffic and driving qualified leads.

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Social media managers should also be A/B testing various aspects of your social strategy to help refine it. Examples of this include running Page Like ads with different images and writing different copy for the same post. They need to have a keen eye for analytics in order to properly execute these tests and examine the results.

5. Budgeting

Your social media manager will be given a budget to help grow their social efforts, whether it be weekly, monthly, quarterly or annually. They should have experience handling large amounts of money and know how to properly track their spendings. The job will also require them to allocate their spendings to maximize growth and increase the probability of driving leads.

Do you have a stellar social media guru on your team? What are some of the skills they have that aren’t mentioned in this list?

A great social media manager can help bring your social media to new heights. Elevate your game in an easier and more efficient fashion with the help of SOCi. Contact us today to see what we can do for your social media efforts.

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