Looking to hire a social media manager for your agency or marketing team? Wondering what salary you need to pay a full-time manager in the US or the UK?
In this article, we take a look at the essential questions you need to address as you start your recruitment campaign:
With these questions answered you can budget accordingly and attract the best talent for the role.
The first item you can check is the current salaries of social media managers. We compared three sites - PayScale, Indeed, and Glassdoor - to find social media manager salaries in the US and the UK.
PayScale has compiled the largest salary profile database in the world using crowdsourcing and big data technologies.
The average salary for a Social Media Manager in the UK is £25K per year, ranging from £19K to £30K.
People in this job generally don't have more than 10 years' experience. For the first five to ten years in this position, salary increases steeply, but any additional experience does not have a big effect on pay.
In the US, there's a slightly different outlook. The average salary is $56K per year, ranging from $37K to $83K.
But there's also higher pay for more experienced managers who have strategic planning skills. An Experienced Social Media Manager earns an average salary of $74K per year, with the top earners reaching $104K.
PayScale's US data also shows there is a steady increase in salary based on the number of years experience:
There's also a significant difference in pay by location. For instance, Social Media Managers in San Francisco can expect to earn 60% more than the national average, while those in Houston receive 6% less than average.
The salary data on Indeed comes from employees, users, and past and present job advertisements over a 24-month period. There's a similar trend to PayScale, with the US paying higher salaries and rewarding senior positions further.
Figures compiled by Indeed show the average Social Media Manager salary in the US is approximately $56K per year, compared to £33K in the UK.
Likewise, the average Senior Social Media Manager salary in the US is approximately $81K per year, compared to £42K in the UK.
Glassdoor is one the fastest-growing jobs and recruiting sites. They gather information from employees to build their database of company reviews, salary reports, and interview questions.
According to their data, the national average Social Media Manager salary in the UK is £34,580, ranging from 24K to 50K. For those managers located in London, the average salary rises to £37,189.
In the US, the national average is $65,178, ranging from $43K to $100K.
You may prefer to hire a freelance social media manager for a particular project or client. As per salaried positions, the rates vary. Jobs advertised on Indeed ranged from £12 - £20 per hour and £200 - £250 per day. On Upwork, the estimated monthly billing rates charged by intermediate-level, U.S.-based specialists range from $400 - $10,000 depending on the size of the account.
Based on the PayScale, Indeed, and Glassdoor data, you need to factor in the country, location, and experience when deciding how much you should pay a social media manager.
When you examine adverts and job postings for social media managers, you'll quickly notice how much each position varies. And that's understandable. Some roles are for in-house marketing teams, while others are for marketing agencies.
Here's a snapshot from a recent job posting on LinkedIn for an in-house position with the Barclays Pingit division:
If you're hiring for an agency, then your requirements will be slightly different. For instance, you might be looking for someone who has experience of managing several clients. Here's an example that the digital marketing agency Giraffe Social Media posted on Indeed:
It's clear that different positions have different duties. Some require minimal experience, and some are senior roles. Some positions want a social media manager to manage everything, and some focus on creating and publishing content.
To help you narrow down your social media manager role, we've pulled examples from some postings on LinkedIn and Indeed highlighting the various responsibilities and requirements. And then, we've added our thoughts on what personal qualities a social media manager needs to succeed.
The responsibilities of a social media manager fall into three sub-categories: manage, support and collaborate.
A social media manager needs to manage various tasks. Here are the most common criteria we found:
Strategy - becomes more significant in senior positions:
Content - either creating or managing the creation of content:
Social media channels - ensuring the brand is using the optimum social channels:
Social media communities on various channels - engaging with each network audience:
Campaigns - planning, managing, and monitoring on-going campaigns:
Team members - motivating direct reports:
Budget - working to paid adverts and team budget:
Reporting - measuring and reporting on the effectiveness of campaigns:
A manager needs to help senior and junior social media team members.
Senior managers and directors:
Junior team members:
Social media managers need to work with internal and external stakeholders to be effective.
Teams and individuals:
Third parties and agencies:
As well as deciding on the responsibilities of your social media manager, you'll need to consider your requirements. For instance, will they need a degree or industry qualification in marketing? And what experience should they have?
Education:
Experience:
With responsibilities and requirements sorted, you'll need to consider what qualities your social media manager should possess. These soft skills can often be the differentiator between an ordinary social media manager and a great social media manager. That probably means you'll pay a higher salary, but get a greater return on your investment. Here are seven qualities that make a social media manager really stand out:
Now that you've established the responsibilities, requirements, qualities, and salary for hiring your social media manager, you'll want to consider the interview process.
To help you along, we've compiled a list of over 60 interview questions separated into three stages that will help you assess their knowledge, problem-solving skills, and cultural fit.