Business owners are already busy running their companies, whether they are a solo entrepreneur or a leader of a small team. They are also aware that marketing is the lifeblood of their businesses.
During the last decade, digital and social media has grown to become important elements of the marketing landscape. Recent entrepreneurial successes have proven that social media can be an effective marketing channel. It is now a must for most businesses to incorporate social media in their marketing plans. That is, if they have the time to sit down and document a marketing plan, let alone a social media marketing plan.
Many entrepreneurs recognize the need to have a social media manager who are expected to: come up with new content to share on social media, regularly create new blog posts, manage the company’s online community, answer questions or respond to comments and monitor relevant conversations on social media. Other times, they are expected to come up with a social media strategy and even manage the company’s online reputation. This role is becoming an important role in businesses, especially small businesses. Due to these responsibilities, social managers easily command a salary of around $50,000 a year.
However, that amount can take a huge slice from the small business person’s profit that they would hire a teenager to perform all the tasks of a social media manager. They could be an internet-savvy youth, or a local high school student who is a whiz with social media or great with computers. Why would the entrepreneur hire them? Mainly, because they are cheap.
Teenagers may know how to post updates on Facebook or Twitter or other social media platforms, but that doesn’t make them business or marketing experts.
A social media manager will know how to: use social media to meet specific business goals, use relevant media platforms for specific target audiences and able to monitor return on investments on social media campaigns and optimize posts for search engine optimization. And these require business experience and training.
Therefore, to have a successful social media marketing, businesses should not hire inexperienced and untrained teenagers as social media managers to avoid unnecessary business risk.