A lot of people are rushing to start a career in social media management, but the big question is how much can you earn as a social media manager? People don’t go into social media management randomly, this is a very high demand skill. Almost every brand out there are going digital, more than you can imagine. Nowadays social media management is not just a side hustle, unlike before; Social media management is currently a full time legit hustle, in high demand.
Before delving into a specific career its very important to know, if that career can afford you, your dream life so you don’t just waste your time.
This article is not only for aspiring social media managers, its also for brand owners who are looking for social media managers.
In this article we will dive into the details to discover the fair compensation for the essential role of social media managers in the global market.
Who Is A Social Media Manager?
Before we delve into the main phase of the article, its crucial we understand who a social media manager is, and what they do.
Without wasting much time, a social media manager is a media expert responsible for creating, scheduling, curating, analyzing and tracking contents across brands social media platforms. They are in-charge of growing brands online presence engage with audience and achieve marketing goals.
What Does Social Media Manager Do?
Since you already know who a social media manager is, its now important to know, what they do.
1. Content creation & planning
Social media managers are in-charge of creating and planning brand contents.
When I say content creation, I’m not specifically talking about video contents, because that might be what you are thinking. Content creation includes, sharing engaging materials like; texts, images, graphics, and videos across social media platforms.
Not just any content, contents that triggers engagement on brands , and creates value to the audience.
Meanwhile content planning is the strategy, behind every post. This includes what you post, how you pots, when you post, a good contents planning helps to ensure that you post consistently, target real audience, supports marketing goals, and good timing.
If I’m to read your mind right now, I know you might be asking yourself why content creation/planning matters?. However, its important to understand that without proper planning and good contents, your page, profile, or website looks messy, and empty which might lead to bad online presence.
Good contents/Planning helps to build trust and brand awareness, it helps drive traffic, and also keep your audience engaged and loyal.
2. Community Management
Managing social media becomes much easier, when you have loyal audience that will engage, and put your brand first above all competitors. Community management is the process of building, nurturing and engaging with your audience. Your audience are your online family, and you should build real relationship with them. There are humans not robots, they need to feel real love.
Community management involves: Starting conversations, monitoring mentions and tags, responding to comments & messages, handling crises or complaints, encouraging brand loyalty.
3. Influencer outreach
As a social media manager, brands are also expecting that you collaborate with other influencers, to promote products, or boost brand awareness.
Influencer outreach involves: Reaching out to top professionals, collaborating with niche related influencers, pitching out collaborating ideas, negotiating terms/compensation and also tracking performance.
4. Social media advertising
Social media advertising is an integral aspect of social media management, there are paid advertising and organic advertising. The aim of social media advertising is to promote contents, products, or services. Advertising can be done on different social media platforms, like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter (X), Linkedln, Google, and others
Businesses are investing on paid advertising and as a social media manager, you must learn how to run paid ads, this is to help push brands contents/products to their target audience. Paid ads should be run based on demographics, interest, behavior, location, and more.
Look for their best performing contents and push it to a wider audience.
5. Analytics & reporting
Someone said social media managers don’t do anything related to collecting data, I just laugh. As a social media manager, your need to know how to study and collects data from social media platforms. After collecting the data you also needs to summarize the information you got, into an understandable format. This will help to track results, make good decisions, and show results to clients and stake holders.
Analytics & reporting helps in measuring engagement, reach, growth, and ROI, it helps in identifying your audience’s behavior, it shows what type of content performs best.
As a social media manager you need to track, engagement metrics, content performance, audience metrics, Ad metrics (If you are working for a brand that runs paid ads).
6. Strategy development
I want you to see strategy development as the process of curating detailed plan that outlines how brands should use social media to achieve their goals. These is not about posting catchy pictures, and videos. Its about being consistent, intentional like every post should stand out. You need to understand that a clear brand strategy is like your business GPS for a clear brand presence.
Strategy development helps you stay consistent, target the right audience, set clear goals, and measure success.
7. Crisis management
Every social media manager needs to learn how to manage crisis, how do you react to negatives comments.
In nutshell, crisis management can be seen as the process of responding, identifying and resolving to negative events that will affect brands online presence. For instance a bad customer review that went viral. You need to learn how manage stuffs like that.
There are different types of brands social media crisis some of them are:
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Customer Complaints Escalating Publicly
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Brand Missteps
- Security Breaches
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Misinformation
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Employee or Influencer Scandals
As a social media manager you need to; Monitor & identify, assess the situation, pause scheduled posts, craft a thoughtful response, take action & communicate, follow up. All this steps will help you manage online crisis.
(In another article I will explain every step listed above, so you need to keep in touch)
Knowing how much to charge is a very critical decision, like how much will I charge that is enough? What if the client is not okay with my pricing? What if he see’s me as being desperate?, All this questions are valid, very valid. But I will take you down the factors you should consider when putting a price tag on your service, this is not just about social media management:
1. Understanding Your Value
What are you bringing to the table? As a social media manager you need to know your value because that is the foundational step in establishing a fair and competitive pricing structure. You need to do a strategic assessment of your skills, experience and the value you are offering clients, in this aspect you need to be very sincere to yourself. What makes you different from other expert in your niche, if you know your value, pricing will not be that difficult. Make sure you are worth, your pricing, know what sets you apart, your specialty, approach, or experience.
This self-awareness forms the basis for a transparent and justified pricing strategy that resonates with both your expertise and the expectations of potential clients.
2. Market Research
Before charging its important you conduct a market research, this will help you to understands what other experts are charging. Doing market research serves as a valuable benchmark, offering insights into the competitive landscape. Imagine charging $80 for a service, other professionals are charging $600, the client will see you as unprofessional, or you don’t know your value. So to avoid that, its import you conduct a strategic pricing market research.
You need to understand that a well-informed approach to market rates enhances your competitiveness and strengthens your position within the broader business scene.
3. Pricing Models
Understanding pricing models is crucial, you need to checkout which pricing model is available, this might include hourly rates, monthly retainers, project-based pricing, or performance-based pricing.
You should understand that different structure for different models, the best you should do is selecting a pricing structure, that only aligns with workflow, but also meets the expectations of your clients.
On the other hand, if you frequently engage in specific projects, a project-based or hourly model may be more fitting. By tailoring your pricing approach to your work style and the preferences of your clients, you establish a friendly and mutually beneficial foundation for your professional relationships.
How much you charge to manage social media depends on various factors, below are the elements that should determine your price:
1. Content Quality
Nobody is willing to pay you huge, for poor contents. Your post quality should influence on your pricing strategy. You main focus, should not be in setting price, your main focus should be delivering high quality contents, contents that offers value and spark engagement.
Clients will pay good amount, if you offer value.
2. Experience and Expertise
Its important to understand that, brands do pay you based on your experience and expertise, you should focus on building experience, get more knowledge.
If you check the statistics, you will see that top social media managers charges more. Your niche too matters, what brands are you working for? It can be restaurants, fashion, or tech.
Beginners may start lower to build trust, but experienced marketers can charge premium rates.
4. Industry Niche
The pricing situation for social media managers is notably influenced by the industry niche they serve. Rates can vary considerably based on the specific sector, as certain industries demand specialized expertise and tailored strategies.
Social media managers cater to distinct niches, such as technology, healthcare, or fashion. These niches often command rates that reflect the unique insights and skills needed to navigate the intricacies of those particular sectors.
This nuanced approach ensures that pricing is aligned with the industry-specific knowledge and customized solutions required for effective social media management in diverse business domains.
4 Ways to Charge For Your Social Media Management Service
Below are the ways social media managers can charge for their service.
1. Hourly Rates
Most social media managers charges hourly, these is to provide a straight forward and transparent approach. Clients pay for the actual time spent on tasks, making this model suitable for projects with varying workloads.
This method is flexible for clients to pay for precise work. Hourly rate provide transparent breakdown of time invested in task, helping clients understand cost implications accurately.
This approach is beneficial for both parties, providing flexibility in adjusting work hours based on project requirements. It maintained a transparent and fair billing system that aligns with the actual effort devoted to the client’s social media management needs.
2. Monthly Retainers
Some social media managers chose to be paid monthly, they provide clients with a predetermined set of hours or service each month at a fixed rate. This helps to promote continuous collaborations and gives clients the advantage of a predictable budget, this will help them to plan their social media management expenses clearly and effective.
3. Project-Based Pricing
For specific and well-defined projects, social media managers often suggest a project-based pricing model. This means clients pay a set fee for the entire project, providing clarity and transparency regarding costs and project scope.
This approach is advantageous for both the client and the social media manager. It allows for a clear understanding of the financial commitment from the outset, ensuring that the agreed-upon tasks and objectives are completed within the predetermined budget.
It’s a straightforward arrangement that aligns costs with project deliverables, offering a clear and concise structure for both parties involved.
You can also read: How to Become a Good Social Media Manager
Social Media Managers Salary Break Down
This is the part we all have been waiting for? Here’s a salary breakdown for social media managers, based on experience, location, and job level. This can help you benchmark your rates or understand market expectations.
1. Entry-Level Social Media Manager (0–2 Years Experience)
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Freelance/Contract: $15 – $30/hour
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Full-Time (USA): $35,000 – $50,000/year
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Nigeria (Local Roles): ₦100,000 – ₦250,000/month
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Common Tasks: Content creation, basic scheduling, community monitoring
2. Mid-Level Social Media Manager (2–5 Years Experience)
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Freelance/Contract: $30 – $60/hour
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Full-Time (USA): $50,000 – $70,000/year
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Nigeria: ₦250,000 – ₦500,000/month
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Common Tasks: Content strategy, analytics, paid ads, engagement
3. Senior Social Media Manager (5+ Years Experience)
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Freelance/Consulting: $60 – $150+/hour
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Full-Time (USA): $70,000 – $100,000+/year
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Nigeria: ₦500,000 – ₦1,000,000+/month
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Common Tasks: Strategy leadership, brand voice development, campaign planning, team management
4. Specialized Roles (e.g., Social Media Strategist, Paid Media Manager)
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Freelance/Contract: $50 – $200/hour depending on niche
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Full-Time (USA): $80,000 – $120,000/year
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Common Tasks: Paid campaign optimization, funnel strategy, influencer management
Frequently Asked Questions
1. Where to get social media management clients?
To get clients as a social media manager, you need to leverage both online and offline strategies. Scouts for clients on freelance platforms like, linkedln, Upwork, Feverr and others. You can also scouts for clients organically, by submitting proposals to clients offline.
2. Where to learn social media management
You can learn social media management, on online learning platforms like Udemy, Cousera, Linkedln Learning and other learning platforms.
3. Which social media management tool is free
A lot of social media management tools are free, tools like canva, capcut, notion, and others. Although they all have paid version, but as a beginners you can use the free version.
4.Which social media management tool is best
No social Media management tool out there is the best, . Hootsuite and Buffer are popular choices, offering free plans with basic features like scheduling posts and managing multiple accounts. Other options include Tailwind for Pinterest, SocialPilot, and Crowdfire.
Conclusion
Social media management is a very good career, you should be more focus on building your skill and experience because that is what might affect your earnings.
Determining how much a social media manager can charge involves a thoughtful blend of self-awareness, market research, and a clear understanding of the value they bring to clients.
By assessing individual skills, exploring diverse pricing models, and considering the financial capacity of target clients, social media managers can establish a fair and competitive pricing structure.
Continuous adaptation to industry trends, compliance with data privacy, and fostering strategic collaborations contribute to the overall effectiveness of their services.
Reference
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How to Become a Good Social Media Manager
