After I graduated I began searching for many inbound marketing jobs, and secured an excellent role within a position focused heavily on social media in which I’ll be running campaigns and also managing accounts. It took me a lot of time and effort to get the role I really wanted, so I thought I’d share some tips for recent graduates on getting a job in social media marketing, as I’ve been to plenty of interviews and know the types of questions to expect.
Be able to describe accounts you’ve managed
Having really clear and detailed examples of accounts or campaigns you’ve managed is very important. Most interviewers will ask you about this, and it’s particularly useful if you can describe things like:
Most of all, it is important that you describe even negative situations in a positive way, and be able to demonstrate how you can take these experiences and bring positive learning from them to the new role in a way which will benefit the organisation. I found that interviewers didn’t mind that some of the campaigns I’d dealt with weren’t huge, it was more important to focus on what I’d learnt from them, no matter the size.
Have solid examples of campaigns you admire
As well as personal examples of things that work, also think about case studies from some campaigns you admire. What were the best practices you saw from the campaigns? What can you take away from the campaigns and apply elsewhere? Why were they so successful? All these points will help in showing that you have an understanding of social media and when it is beneficial for an organisation. It may be best to use an example that isn’t related to your personal experience; for example if you worked on a B2B campaign previously, you could choose an example that was B2C, to broaden your knowledge.
Be able to describe how you use tools and analytics
Being organised and analysing the work you do on social media campaigns is a real strong point in the eyes of an employer. Data is so important as it directly relates to KPI’s (and therefore ROI) for an organisation.
I won't go into detail about social media and ROI - that’s a subject for another article, but I will say that different organisations will have different KPI’s in mind for their social efforts. Some will focus on gaining followers, some on the conversations etc; and they want to know how these measurable's have an affect on things like sales or visits to websites. This means it must be clear how you used analytics or tools in previous campaigns to measure KPI’s, and how that impacted directly on the organisation.
Even if your tools for measurement were as simple as an Excel spreadsheet - if it worked well for you and you stayed on top of your workload and produced results, then brag about it.
Have knowledge of many networks
This is such a simple point which can be overlooked easily. I found one thing that always impressed employers was my ability to describe why Google+ is so great. It is a great skill if you can look past just Facebook and Twitter and describe why other networks might be worth using and why. For example why is Pinterest so popular with e-commerce or fashion? How do Vine & Instagram provide more human ways of interacting with audiences? Showing that you can be creative with different networks is a really strong skill.
Have predictions for future trends
Employers want to see that you are interested and active in the industry you are trying to break into, and one of the easiest ways to demonstrate this is by following predictions for future trends in social media marketing. The fact that you can show the initiative to be able to follow industry trends will convince the interviewer that you can respond to change and are adaptable. Combine this point with examples of previous campaigns and show how invaluable your knowledge will be to the organisation.
I hope these points are useful, please comment if you feel I've missed anything really obvious out and I'll add it in. I'm also always willing to help out, so get in touch on Twitter @willkennard or on Google+.
Be able to describe accounts you’ve managed
Having really clear and detailed examples of accounts or campaigns you’ve managed is very important. Most interviewers will ask you about this, and it’s particularly useful if you can describe things like:
- Challenges you encountered whilst managing campaigns
- How you overcame these challenges
- What you learnt from the experiences
- What you enjoyed the most
- Something you changed for the better
Most of all, it is important that you describe even negative situations in a positive way, and be able to demonstrate how you can take these experiences and bring positive learning from them to the new role in a way which will benefit the organisation. I found that interviewers didn’t mind that some of the campaigns I’d dealt with weren’t huge, it was more important to focus on what I’d learnt from them, no matter the size.
Have solid examples of campaigns you admire
As well as personal examples of things that work, also think about case studies from some campaigns you admire. What were the best practices you saw from the campaigns? What can you take away from the campaigns and apply elsewhere? Why were they so successful? All these points will help in showing that you have an understanding of social media and when it is beneficial for an organisation. It may be best to use an example that isn’t related to your personal experience; for example if you worked on a B2B campaign previously, you could choose an example that was B2C, to broaden your knowledge.
Be able to describe how you use tools and analytics
Being organised and analysing the work you do on social media campaigns is a real strong point in the eyes of an employer. Data is so important as it directly relates to KPI’s (and therefore ROI) for an organisation.
I won't go into detail about social media and ROI - that’s a subject for another article, but I will say that different organisations will have different KPI’s in mind for their social efforts. Some will focus on gaining followers, some on the conversations etc; and they want to know how these measurable's have an affect on things like sales or visits to websites. This means it must be clear how you used analytics or tools in previous campaigns to measure KPI’s, and how that impacted directly on the organisation.
Even if your tools for measurement were as simple as an Excel spreadsheet - if it worked well for you and you stayed on top of your workload and produced results, then brag about it.
Have knowledge of many networks
This is such a simple point which can be overlooked easily. I found one thing that always impressed employers was my ability to describe why Google+ is so great. It is a great skill if you can look past just Facebook and Twitter and describe why other networks might be worth using and why. For example why is Pinterest so popular with e-commerce or fashion? How do Vine & Instagram provide more human ways of interacting with audiences? Showing that you can be creative with different networks is a really strong skill.
Have predictions for future trends
Employers want to see that you are interested and active in the industry you are trying to break into, and one of the easiest ways to demonstrate this is by following predictions for future trends in social media marketing. The fact that you can show the initiative to be able to follow industry trends will convince the interviewer that you can respond to change and are adaptable. Combine this point with examples of previous campaigns and show how invaluable your knowledge will be to the organisation.
I hope these points are useful, please comment if you feel I've missed anything really obvious out and I'll add it in. I'm also always willing to help out, so get in touch on Twitter @willkennard or on Google+.
