Speaker 1: Have you always had the dream of becoming a social media manager who can work their own schedule, work from anywhere in the world, and get paid for using platforms you are already using every single day? Then today I am your calling because I am sharing a step-by-step guide on how to become a social media manager in 2024. As a multi-six-figure social media manager and agency owner, I am sharing exactly how I would become a social media manager if I were to start from zero in 2024. Hey, my name is Miel and I own a multi-six-figure social media agency and I now help social media managers do the same. If you're completely new here, make sure to grab my free roadmap to becoming a six-figure social media manager that I will drop in the description below. Now let's get started. So the very first thing I do to become a social media manager in 2024 is to practice your craft without any pressure. Now you have done your research right, you've gathered knowledge on what it's like being a social media manager, the roles, perhaps you have binged watched my YouTube channel, you've taken free courses with Hootsuite Academy, HubSpot Academy, there are lots of free resources out there. But now it's time for you to actually put knowledge into practice. So in order to do that, there are a couple of ways that you can obviously practice without pressure, but here's what I recommend. You can head over to volunteermatch.org and you can find opportunities, and I'm going to completely walk you through it right now, find opportunities to work for someone on their social media as a volunteer so that you can get experience. Because remember, you don't have any client experience right, and you are looking to get your foot in the door. So this is the way to practice your craft without any pressure. And so what you would do here is you would create an account, you would sign up. I'm going to see if I can log in with a Google. So you are going to register here and you can upload, you know, your profile, things that you care for, and then it will actually give you recommendations here. But if you head over to find opportunities, you can actually find your own opportunities. Now you likely want to look for virtual, perhaps you want to look for in person, it depends on you and your location. But let's say you want to look for virtual, obviously the location doesn't really matter. Now if you're passionate about a certain cause, because these are all non-profits, then you can add that here. Perhaps there's a certain niche that you want to work in for social media, that's where that would apply. And then here you are going to mention your skills, marketing and communications, right? And it says here social media, and here too, interactive social media. Maybe there are other ones that you're interested in, like graphic design, that's up to you. Then you can save that, I've now selected two of them. And you can even search by keywords and say social media manager. So what you'll see here, here's a blog manager, here's they're looking for a social media manager to help raise awareness. There are going to be so many opportunities, PR and community manager, social media manager, volunteer, specialist. And so you will pick an opportunity that feels good to you, it looks great, you can learn more about the organization, their opportunities and exactly what they need. And here it will also the requirements, that's important too, how many hours you need to dedicate of your time to them, so that you can see whether that's worth it for you. So then you can say, hey I want to help, and you can apply to them. So that is what you're going to do, and then they will likely reach out, and this is exactly what I have done in my journey. They will reach out, and if you're the right fit, you can start working with them. And there's no pressure, because this is actually a volunteered position, but it builds your portfolio. You can get client testimonials from them, and sometimes this can even turn into a paid opportunity, because you now have experience with them, they know, like trust you. So this is the best way to practice your craft without any pressure. Now if you want to know exactly what it's like, you know, getting actual clients, and I actually have a video on that as well, where I share five ways for you to get clients beginner friendly. So check out that video too. So the second step I do to become a social media manager in 2024, is to check in with my inner circle. Now what do I mean by that? You now have had some experience, right? You are working somewhere on social media, which is giving you confidence, experience, and now it's time for you to kind of start testing the waters, and start looking for an actual first paying client, right? Now there's no better way to do that, than finding someone within your inner circle, aka friends, family, friends of family, who already know, like and trust you, and might need your help. You'd be surprised how many more people that you already know within your circle, that could definitely use your help. Whether someone in your family owns a business, or maybe they know someone locally who owns a business, and could use help. You need to get the word out, and have people start talking about you, and services. So here's exactly what I would do, when it comes to reaching out to your inner circle, right? I suggest you head over to your own Facebook page, where you can actually post to your wall, and you can say something like, hey my Facebook friends, I'm excited to share that I'm starting a new journey as a social media manager. You can mention your current position, right? If you've got a volunteer position in the first step, you can say I'm currently a social media specialist for Ek, and I'm looking to take on one or two more clients. If you, or anyone you know, owns a business, and could use social media help, I would love to talk. Please feel free to message me, or tag them below. Now if you want to go the extra mile, I would say you can even go into Canva, create a nice graphic. You can even list your services, if you're comfortable doing that. Saying hey, I offer these packages, this is what it looks like, this is what's included, and kind of mix it up, so you can experiment and see what works well. You can mix it up and personalize it however you want. Now let's say you don't have a Facebook page, and then I would suggest, you know, grabbing out your contact list, and start, you know, texting people that you already know, and saying hey, this is what I'm doing, if you know anyone. Personalize the message, if you're sending it to individual people, but that way you're getting the word out, and you, you know, get to directly see if there's anyone already within your network. Even if there isn't someone right away, don't be discouraged, because it does get the word out. You will not know what a couple months from now that can mean for you and your business, where all of a sudden people will think about you, and reach out to you for your services. Now if at this point you have found a client, and you want to know what it looks like to onboard them in your business, then check out my onboarding workflow video, where I walk you through exactly the steps on onboarding a new client. Now the third step I do to become a social media manager in 2024, is to get my skin in the game. There is obviously nothing more powerful than practicing what you preach, and so it is important for you to continue to build your brand. The truth of the matter is that social media managers get judged by their own brand, their own social media, and I'm not even talking follower count, but I'm talking about you showing up consistently, all the things that you're telling other people that they need to do for their business, that's what you should be doing as well. Now this can look different for everyone, this may look like you having a website, you polishing up your website, having a you know a good looking company page, whatever that may look like for you, this is a very important step so that you continue to build your brand, and start to attract people with inbound leads, right? The bigger you grow your own brand online, the more people you start to actually attract. So I'm giving you three actionable steps on what that looks like when you're building your own brand, on what I exactly would do if I were to become a social media manager in 2024. First thing I would do is schedule out daily posts. Now I know you are short on time, you're learning and juggling a lot of things, but I need you to show up. So the best way to do it is using a scheduling tool, and just scheduling out posts. If you're still looking for a scheduling tool, you can check out cloud campaign. I actually have a link in the description for a free trial, or check out my video where I give an honest review on cloud campaign. But that is a way for you to start scheduling out content, so that you show up every day without actually having to show up, since it auto publishes. So that's the very first thing I suggest you do. If you look at all my pages from day one, I've been showing up, because that's something I preach to my clients. Now the second thing I would do as an actionable step is to engage with at least 10 accounts on social media that would fit my ideal client every single day. This doesn't have to take up a lot of time, this can be done in like 10 minutes max. And so this is what that would look like. I would go ahead and probably go to Instagram, obviously it's the main platform for a lot of social media managers. And I would, you can type in social media hiring, if you if you're not sure who exactly your target audience is. And then I would look at people that are actually hiring. So here there's a bunch of people who are hiring, because of search. So you can check out these posts, apply to them, engage with them. Now some other ways that you can use to find ideal clients, is for example using the hashtag launching soon. Those are new businesses that most likely don't have a social media manager, because they're new right. And so this is an opportunity for you to say, hey I absolutely love your content, if you can use any social media help, I'd love to talk. And that way you leave a public comment, so you leave the ball on their court. So I would do that to 10 accounts every single day. Okay and you can do that in the DM, you can do it in the comment sections, hashtag search, and kind of switch it up, so that you can see what gives you the best results, so that you can land those clients. And the very third thing, actionable step I would do when it comes to building your brand, is to show up on stories. Now of course I talked about scheduling content on your feed every day, but stories are so powerful, because this is to your most engaged followers. And so it's very important to kind of show yourself, you know, it's very authentic to show up on stories. So I suggest maybe three times a week or so, set an alarm, put a reminder in your calendar, where you show up on stories. Maybe you can talk about your client work, let's say you had that position with volunteer match, like we talked about in step one. You can talk about it, how's that going, what are you working on with this client, etc. But show up and share your expertise, talk about your business, super super important. So these three steps will very much help you build your brand, if you're not sure where to get started. Now if you want to know exactly what a day in my life as a social media manager looks like, make sure you check out my video of being a day in the life as a social media manager. Now the fifth and final step I do to become a social media manager in 2020 for, is to invest in the right resources and tools. Now here's what I mean by that. There are going to be lots of tools out there that are going to be able to help you do your work as a social media manager. But one of the most important resources, and I can't stress this enough, is having a contract in place. You need to have contracts in place between you and your clients, because you are now a legitimate business, right. So there are many places where you can get templatized contracts that are made by lawyers, that you can customize yourself. And I will drop some in the description below. Here's an example of one of our contracts. We customize them based on our business and you know our terms. But it's so important to do that. Another thing you can do is get with a local attorney, depending on where you're located and based out of, so that you can get a customized contract based on your services. So that you for sure know that you're covered at all costs. This is so important and most of the time this is a step that many many social media managers and just business owners might skip, especially when you're just starting out. So that is the top one resource I want you to invest in. It's 100% worth it to protect yourself and your business, since you are a professional business now, right. Now outside of contracts of course there are many tools and resources that you can invest in. It depends on your budget. Of course in the beginning you want to be bougie on the budget. You are just starting out and you're still trying to build your clientele and make money. But as you start to take clients on, I 100% recommend investing in Canva. It's the go-to graphic design software, right. To create content and it's very budget friendly. And then the second tool it would be a social media scheduler, such as cloud campaign that I often talk about. I would recommend these three resources and tools that are probably a must. So you definitely want to have contracts in place and after that you can start looking into tools that you can invest in. So that you can do a fabulous job for your clients and you will see that your social media business is going to grow faster than you could have ever imagined. Now if you stayed all the way till the end, I hope you are excited and ready to start dialing in, so that you can become a social media manager in 2024. If you have any questions for me based on this video and the information I shared, then make sure you comment below and subscribe, so that I can see you in next week's video.