02 Nov 10 Questions You Should Ask Your Social Media Manager

It can be difficult to evaluate the success of your social media marketing initiatives when social media is just one of the many marketing tactics you oversee. It’s an issue that a majority of marketing executives face, and one that we’re always working to help our clients with.

The key is to be willing to ask questions – the right questions, that is. Empowering yourself with the right questions can help you understand if you have the right team managing your social media marketing.

So… what are the right questions? Glad you asked. Below we’ve compiled a list of 10 questions to ask your social media manager that will help maximize the success of your social media marketing efforts.

10 Questions to Ask Your Social Media Manager

• Who are you trying to reach and what are you trying to get them to do?

We often see brands doing a lot of different initiatives across social media because the brand naturally has a lot it wants to say to a lot of potential audiences. But backing up a minute, consider the target audience that your brand most wants to reach and the actions most critical for these audiences to do to help clarify why your brand is doing what it’s doing in social.

• How do new clients find us and how do they evaluate us against our competitors?

So many brands focus on the channel (Facebook? TikTok?) without thinking about the buyer’s journey. Understanding how your client discovers your product/service and how social media authentically ties into that path to purchase is key. For example, we invest the most time in our blog as it helps our search engine optimization strategy, which we know converts to leads and ultimately customers. While we keep our Facebook page up to date, we don’t see leads coming from it, so we don’t invest as much time in it as a consumer brand might want to.

• What social channels should we be on?

As we mentioned above, lots of brands focus on the channel… and only the popular channels at the moment. But once you launch a channel, you need to support it. Just because a current trend is talked about a lot, like TikTok or Clubhouse, it doesn’t mean you have to be there. Do the research and decide what channels/spaces are best for your brand.

• What should we stop doing in social media?

Given many brands have had a social presence for years, asking what your brand should stop doing is even more important than considering what it should start doing. This is the time to reconsider everything in light of what is able to drive success, rather than having activities that are sacred because your brand feels obligated to continue.

• What are our competitors doing that we’re not doing, but should be?

It’s important to know that your social media manager isn’t just hyper-focused on your businesses, but your competitors and the industry as a whole. Use your competitors as a test for what works with your audience and what doesn’t so that your team doesn’t waste efforts.

• What is our reactive/engagement strategy?

Reactive social media is one of the key differences between social media and other digital tactics. So many users look to social to see what customers are saying and current customers will stay if you have a good reactive strategy in place.

• What do you think “social-first” content means?

We find everyone has a different answer for this question and this term is used ALL THE TIME. But when a social media manager’s idea of social-first content doesn’t align with your brands, it’s not going to end well. Be sure to spend some time on this one making sure there is a clear definition and examples for all parties.

• How are we measuring the success of our other marketing generally? How are we measuring the success of our other digital marketing? Can we create similar measurements for our social media efforts?

Social media marketing doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It’s one of many marketing channels that brands can invest into varying degrees. At least some of the measurements of success should ideally align with other channels so that managers can compare across channels.

• What are the year-to-date roll-ups of success from your social activities by channel and by posting frequency?

As previously mentioned, often we find zooming out at the raw measures of rolled-up success to help clarify what is truly driving the most results, as well as the frequency of efforts that just aren’t paying off. Many clients have seen a high organic cadence on certain channels worth it, while others are simply “not worth it” compared to the investment in time those channels require.

• What would you do with extra budget and why would it be a good investment?

So many brands focus on organic posting only, for example. With a small investment in media, they could drastically increase the number of people seeing that content. That’s just one example when being constrained by what the brand is doing “free” could be limiting success. With good metrics and a plan for measuring them, a test might show that social is more efficient than other places your brand is spending time and money.

Hopefully you found this list of questions to ask your social media manager beneficial to understanding the state of your social media initiatives and gaining confidence in those executing those efforts. But whether you use these questions or not, make sure you’re asking meaningful questions that ladder up to the business versus focusing on vanity metrics, going viral, or the latest trend in the social space. This approach will be more valuable to you in the long run.

If you need any assistance with your brand’s social media marketing, contact our team of experts today. We offer full-service solutions for brands or we can act as an extension of your internal teams.

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