What does an SMM specialist do? What you need to know and how to become one
In our new article, we are ready to talk about what smm-specialists do, what skills and responsibilities are required of them, how to learn this profession and where to look for work. In addition, you will learn some useful recommendations for beginners in the field of SMM.
Content:
1. What is SMM and why do we need SMM workers? What does an SMM specialist do?
2. Responsibilities of an SMM manager
3. How to evaluate the level of professionalism and quality of services of an SMM specialist
4. Recommendations for a beginner SMM marketer
5. Conclusion
Over the past decade, social networks have evolved from local communication platforms to global platforms for selling goods/services and promoting businesses. The rapid development of this industry has opened up prospects for the emergence of new in-demand professions, one of which has become an SMM specialist.
What is SMM and why do we need SMM workers? What does an SMM specialist do?
The abbreviation SMM stands for Social Media Marketing. This type of marketing includes a set of activities in social networks aimed at promoting the brand and its products. In simple words, an SMM specialist is a marketer “tailored” to work in social media.
The main activity of an SMM manager is the creation and maintenance of company or brand accounts in popular social networks (Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.). He develops a promotion strategy, analyzes the competitive environment, communicates with the target audience, conducts advertising and marketing activities, and sometimes directly sells goods or services through corporate accounts.
In the early years of the existence of this profession, SMM specialists were mainly engaged in the promotion of groups and communities in social media. Their tasks were to increase the number of subscribers to company or brand accounts in various ways, while observing the SMM rules in order to avoid blocking them or other sanctions.
Over time, the requirements for this category of Internet marketers have increased markedly, which has led to the expansion of the list of generally accepted responsibilities of the SMS manager. In the next section of our article, we will look at them in more detail.
Responsibilities of an SMM manager
The SMM profession involves the full management and coordination of the process of promoting the company and its products in social media. Thus, the duties of this specialist include the following tasks:
- Creation and design of pages in social media. First of all, the social media manager selects the most relevant sites and registers the official accounts of the company, brand or specific product on them. At this stage, the specialist must choose the best platforms for promotion, analyze the target audience, study the competitive environment and other factors. After selecting sites and creating pages, he proceeds to prepare a promotion strategy, then he develops the concept of groups and communities, independently or with the participation of a designer, their pages are designed: cover, avatar, post design, etc.
- Creation and placement of publications. The most daily and routine duty of all that an SMM specialist does is the creation and publication of content. For these purposes, he creates a content plan, which indicates the topics and summary of future posts. The smm-specialist can either prepare content on his own or entrust these tasks to other specialists: copywriters, content managers, etc. Post topics are regulated by the content plan, most often they contain company news, information about new products in the range, promotions and discounts, various information or entertainment content, etc. At the same time, he has to not only write texts, but also create or edit pictures, photos and videos. Therefore, he must be able to work with graphic editors and photo stock sites.
- Carrying out SMM activities. An equally important duty of the SMM manager is the preparation and holding of various SMM events. For example, these include launching viral campaigns, organizing promotions, contests, sweepstakes and other activities to attract subscribers. The specialist also arranges cross-marketing events with other companies or brands (for example, mutual reposts), and also organizes collaborations with popular bloggers.
- Setting up targeted advertising. A professional should not only be able to write interesting texts, select suitable photos for them and communicate with bloggers. Another integral task of this specialist is setting up targeted advertising campaigns in social networks. To do this, he needs to analyze the target audience in order to accurately specify its parameters when setting up targeting: gender, age, location, social status, interests, etc. In addition, the ability to work with the main advertising accounts is required from the SMM manager: Facebook Ads Manager, LinkedIn Campaign Manager, Twitter Ads, etc.
- Analytics. Based on the indicators of campaigns, SMM specialists analyze their results and evaluate the effectiveness of the chosen strategy according to various criteria. One of them is the audience engagement analysis, during which the marketer evaluates its activity (the number of subscribers, likes, comments, reposts) and, if necessary, adjusts the course of the campaign. The collection and processing of analytics data helps to quickly monitor the performance and make timely changes to promotion methods. To successfully fulfill this duty, a specialist must have at least a basic understanding of web analytics, master tools for analyzing traffic, conversion, audience coverage / engagement, etc.
- SMM budget monitoring. Finally, another important responsibility of the modern SMM manager is to control the costs of marketing activities in social networks. After preparing a promotion strategy and content plan, he forms a budget and coordinates it with higher authorities (head of marketing). At the end of the campaign, the SMM manager compiles a report on its results with detailed information about the activities carried out and the funds spent on them. End-to-end analytics services are a very useful tool in fulfilling this responsibility. They help to get detailed information on the ratio of funds spent and the result obtained.
- Interaction with the audience. In addition to all of the above, the work of the sms manager includes elements of communication with the target audience. First of all, this includes feedback in the form of responses to messages and comments under posts. They have to consider the best time to post on Instagram to get more interactions to the posts. The SMM specialist also acts as a moderator and monitors all information posted by users on community pages in order to detect spam or inappropriate content. In addition, an important task of the SMM manager is to work with complaints, false information and other negative information.
How to evaluate the level of professionalism and quality of services of an SMM specialist?
Finding an experienced SMM manager can be a very difficult task, as the requirements for them are sometimes noticeably different for different companies. In general, when considering a resume of a candidate for the SMM profession, one should pay attention to the following:
- Cases. The main evidence of the professionalism of the smm-specialist, like any other specialist, is the results of his work. Therefore, first of all, the employer should familiarize himself with the specific cases of the applicant in order to evaluate the results achieved by him. Suitable evaluation criteria here can also be the quality of the content, the expertise of the strategy and content plan, the accuracy of the analytics, etc.
- Reviews and recommendations. The next important factor in evaluating an SMM manager is the feedback and recommendations of his previous employers. They are especially important for freelancers who perform design tasks for various clients. At the same time, the presence of one or two negative reviews does not always indicate the unprofessionalism of the SMM-manager, but an excess of uniformly good recommendations can become a reason for doubt.
- Instruments. In addition, it would be useful to find out from the candidate a list of the tools he uses in his work. An experienced SMM specialist knows and works with many modern services for creating and editing content, collecting / analyzing data, and other important tasks for his work. If you have studied all the factors, but could not make an unambiguous assessment of the applicant, then a test task will help you solve this problem.
As for evaluating the quality of services of an SMM marketer, they should be evaluated according to such indicators as:
- The number of subscribers. Many employers consider it the most important criterion, but not always an increase in audience volume leads to an increase in conversion rates. The fact is that some unscrupulous SMMs actively use various methods of cheating, which is why the community subscriber base is filled with bots, instead of real interested users. Therefore, this parameter, of course, should be taken into account, but only in combination with other SMM metrics.
- Coverage. Another significant criterion that needs to be monitored when analyzing publications in social networks. This metric measures the number of unique users who viewed a social media post in organic content (excluding targeted ads). It only counts unique views, not counting users who have viewed a post multiple times.
- Link transitions. The next important factor in the effectiveness of the work of the SMM-specialist is the number of users clicking on the links posted in the published posts. The growth of this metric indicates an increase in audience loyalty to the brand. However, the number of clicks does not always directly affect the growth in sales, the conversion parameter is more important here.
- Involvement. This metric shows how actively the subscribers of the community interact with the content in it, and takes into account their likes, reposts, comments and other manifestations of activity. With the help of SMM engagement, a marketer can determine the degree of audience interest in the company's products. However, in some areas, it is not easy to calculate this metric due to the lack of an active reaction of the target audience.
Recommendations for a beginner SMM marketer
SMM training is a complex process that requires full immersion and dedication from the employee. People who are far from this topic may think that the task of a sms manager is to post pictures on Instagram and try to attract the attention of the audience with boring challenges. But in fact, effective social media marketing is a more complex concept. And if you are thinking of becoming an SMM manager who wants all account-based marketing services, you must follow this concept. We have compiled a small selection of tips for beginner SMM managers and those who want to become one:
- Think strategically. Don't look for “wonder tactics” that will help you get a rapid increase in the number of subscribers and an increase in conversion in a matter of days. They don't exist. Instead, it is better to carefully study the target audience, segment all potential customer groups and develop individual promotion strategies for each of the social networks used.
- Act tactically. To successfully implement SMM campaigns, a marketer should not be rigidly obsessed with the strategy he has chosen. It is more effective to constantly change promotion tactics, focusing on the latest current trends and adjusting your campaigns to them.
- Know how to moderate. A social media manager is required not only to regularly create and publish content, but also to constantly communicate with the audience and form a positive image of the company or brand. Such a specialist must carefully monitor all user messages (questions, comments) and promptly respond to them.
- Be able to work with bloggers and opinion leaders. One of the key responsibilities of an SMM manager is to find popular bloggers, experts and opinion leaders, and then organize mutually beneficial collaborations with them. These can be reposts, expert posts, joint videos, etc. Similarly, you can establish cooperation with popular thematic communities.
- Know the basics of design. High-quality content visualization is one of the key components of successful promotion in social networks. Professional SMM managers have been looking for pictures not on Google for a long time, but on photo stocks, and they also work confidently in PhotoShop and other graphic editors.
Conclusion
SMM (Social Media Marketing) is a set of activities to promote companies, brands and their products on social networks. The specialists who perform this work are called SMM managers or SMM marketers.
The list of their job responsibilities includes creating and designing communities in social networks, creating and posting publications, conducting various SMM activities, setting up targeted advertising, campaign analysis and budget control, as well as interacting with the audience. To assess the effectiveness of their work, criteria such as the number of subscribers in the community, the number of clicks on links, the reach and engagement of the audience, as well as the conversion rate, are suitable.
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