Top 18 Social Media Skills To Learn in 2023

Top Social Media Skills

1. Excellent Communication

Having strong communication skills is essential as a first social media skill. This is particularly true if you are representing an organization and interacting with customers. It’s also important to communicate well with coworkers, articulate your ideas and campaigns effectively, and serve as a representative for your brand at a global level.

2. Graphic Design

Having graphic design skills is crucial for social media managers since in today’s world where platforms like TikTok and infinite feeds exist, posts have a limited time to capture the user’s attention.

According to research, the typical individual’s focus now lasts for only about 1.7 to 2.5 seconds, varying depending on the device utilized. Therefore, for your intended audience, your social media specialist must acquire expertise in designing graphics that result in visually appealing social media content and videos that provoke their interest.

A recent report by Hubspot has revealed that 43 percent of consumers favor video content. Therefore, if you haven’t started creating videos yet, it’s recommended that you begin.

It is essential to evaluate graphic design abilities and a natural sense of aesthetics when seeking a social media manager. Possessing these skills can greatly assist in establishing a powerful brand identity.

3. Creativity 

Creativity is a critical factor in effective social media marketing because users are likely to unfollow a brand if they encounter repetitive or uninteresting content.

In order to maintain the interest and commitment of their audience, social media marketers must consistently generate fresh and captivating concepts, inventive strategies, and campaigns. To distinguish themselves from the countless other social media accounts, social media marketers must devise imaginative approaches such as interactive content, competitions, and viral videos.

At the center of all marketing campaigns lies creativity, and this is especially valid for social media platforms, which prioritize visuals. To capture attention and sustain engagement, you must produce striking content such as posts, ads, partnerships, and competitions.

The following are the ways in which the creativity of your social media manager can be utilized:

1. Make a unique content strategy and help the team deliver out-of-the-box visual content.
2. Jump on current trends. . This can be the Fifa World Cup, a new meme, a new trend, the latest news – you name it!
3. Conduct frequent content brainstorms with the team.

Having a good sense of humor and the ability to improvise is an added advantage for your social media manager.

4. Writing Ability

Despite the prevalence of images and videos in social media, writing still holds significant importance. Writing is a crucial aspect of a social media marketer’s job, whether they are composing a tweet or creating a post. If the headlines fail to be attention-grabbing and appealing, it’s probable that people won’t be motivated enough to click.

5. Content Curation 

Social media marketing skills heavily rely on content curation, especially for businesses with limited resources to produce content consistently. To effectively use social media for marketing, one must possess the ability to determine the right timing, type, and manner of sharing curated content while being knowledgeable about relevant sources and the interests of the target audience.

6. Project Management

Social media marketers require strong project management abilities as they are skilled at multitasking. They must establish publishing routines, keep track of contacts, and maintain their social media pages. Additionally, they must manage advertising budgets, collaborate with designers and writers, generate reports, and perform other tasks.

The top-performing social media managers are equipped with excellent project management abilities to effectively manage their tasks, schedule content publication, anticipate future requirements, and monitor and track multiple social media dialogues simultaneously.

7. Aptitude to Learn

As you are aware, technology is an ever-changing field and fresh social media channels emerge along with added features to the ones that are already present – for instance, LinkedIn stories or Instagram reels. Along with this constant transformation, the expectations of consumers can alter unpredictably. Therefore, an adept social media marketer must always be open to learning as the situation demands.

8. Marketing 

Even though social media is the platform you use, you are essentially involved in marketing, which implies that possessing marketing skills is crucial in social media. A sound comprehension of fundamental marketing principles is essential, and although a marketing degree isn’t necessary, a solid understanding of marketing concepts is vital.

9. Flexibility

Being able to adapt to frequent changes in social media is crucial for successful social media marketing. The most effective social media marketers possess the skill of quickly responding or adjusting to new situations or events, positive or negative. Therefore, flexibility is deemed as an essential skill in social media marketing.

10. Strategic Thinking

Strategic thinking is ranked high among the essential social media skills. While social media may appear to be purely recreational, effective marketing through social media necessitates a tactical approach. Although social media strategy can be learned through your education, possessing a mind that processes this way and a proclivity for strategic thinking is beneficial.

11. Relationship Building 

It is important for social media marketers to establish connections with influencers, thus emphasizing the need to cultivate strong relationship-building abilities.

12. Community Management 

Carefully examine the brands that have a substantial social media following and you’ll discover that they share a single trait: community. Establishing connections and cultivating an online community is an essential skill for achieving success in social media marketing.

If the audience you have built is not engaged by the social media manager, the efforts put into creating content will be futile. This is where community management comes into the picture. To successfully manage a community on social media, certain skills are paramount, such as:

• Prioritize incoming communications, and reply appropriately – this can be customer feedback, complaints, appreciation, or simply conversation around your brand and social media campaigns.
• Engage with loyal customers – social media managers should be able to identify the most engaged followers and loyal customers, to turn them into brand advocates. This can entail brand mentions, and direct customer testimonials, as well as user-generated content.

13. Customer Service

Having good communication skills and showing empathy is essential for your social media manager as they are representing the company on social media and may need to interact with customers.

Recent studies reveal that social media has become a frequently preferred method for customer service. As per research conducted by Sprout Social, social media has emerged as the primary medium for sharing reviews on a product or service and for contacting customer service regarding an inquiry or problem.

Consistent engagement with customers through social media can significantly improve their overall experience. A competent social media manager must possess a strong background in customer success to effectively align social media tactics with the goal of enhancing customer satisfaction.

Being a proficient digital marketer is imperative for a social media specialist. Relying solely on social media has its limitations. To unleash the full potential of your audience, it’s critical to integrate your social media marketing with other channels such as email and SMS marketing, influencer advertising, and assorted promotional campaigns.

To optimize social media as a channel and facilitate business growth, the selected candidate must possess a diverse skill set that includes proficiency in various social media management tools, assessing critical elements, such as pricing and features, and determining the most advantageous tool that both benefits the team and is affordable.

14. Strategy and Planning

Having a manager who is not solely focused on executing tasks, but is also capable of quick thinking and strategic planning for the future, is highly advantageous. It is imperative for this individual to schedule regular meetings with management and the marketing team to gain insight into their vision and coordinate social media efforts accordingly. Each campaign must be linked to a business goal and be integrated into the overall strategy.

15. Tactics and Execution

Simply having an excellent strategy is insufficient; the ideal social media professional must possess the ability to carry out each campaign effectively.

Top-notch attention to detail is essential along with complete involvement in the execution process from beginning to end. This includes various aspects such as copywriting, design, publishing schedules, timing and managing paid advertisements.

16. Knowledge of The Latest Social Media Trends

It is imperative that your social media manager is up-to-date with the latest social media trends every day. They should keep a constant look-out for the newest trends and take advantage of them. Capitalizing on social media trends can also lead to creating humorous moment marketing memes such as the one displayed above. Not only do memes make customers happy, but they also enhance the connection they have with the brand. The more customers discuss your brand, the more likely they are to remember your product or service when they are prepared to make a purchase.

17. Adaptability

Being adaptable is an essential quality for a social media manager to possess.

To remain up-to-date with consumer preferences (or to sustain profitability), social media platforms frequently modify their algorithms. With the emergence of new features such as Instagram Reels and LinkedIn carousels, it is necessary for your team to rapidly adapt to these trends in order to maintain a competitive edge.

Your brand strategy should be subject to constant evolution and experimentation with new tactics by a skilled social media marketer.

18. Analytical Skills 

To determine the effectiveness of your marketing, it is essential to possess analytical skills, which is one of the most crucial and beneficial abilities regarding social media. While you could learn how to verify metrics and reports, having an analytical mindset will enable you to comprehend the data accurately, enabling you to make rational decisions rather than depending on presumptions. Ultimately, assessing the success of your marketing is crucial, and an analytical approach is imperative to achieve this.

Your social media manager needs to develop analytical abilities to evaluate the results of your campaigns. They should examine statistics such as reach (viewership and impressions) and engagement (likes, comments, shares, etc.), as well as data obtained from Google Analytics that monitors web traffic originating from social media, to obtain insights that will guide future decisions.

Social Media Marketing Skills in a Resume

In order to secure your desired role in Social Media Marketing, it is necessary to possess a strong resume. Emphasizing the SMM abilities utilized by marketers in their daily work can expedite your hiring process. Take a look at these essential Social Media Marketing skills to showcase on your resume –

1. Planning and Strategy – Life of a social media marketer circulates around making strategy and growth planners on a monthly basis. 
2. Research-oriented – All the insights SMM professionals derive are through a solid research of what’s happening in the marketing. It is essential to have good research skills to make a monthly planner. 
3. Community Building – Social media marketing is just like building a community of your potential customers. Hence, SMM professionals should know how to engage with the right people. 
4. Content Marketing – Quality content is liked by everyone. The chances of your posts reaching a higher number of people increases if your content is powerful and stands out. Thus, this social media marketing skill in your resume can do wonders!