With over 30,000 social marketing jobs listed on job search sites on any given day, freelance marketing opportunities abound for people who know how to make waves in the social media sphere. According to David Armano’s recent article in the Harvard Business Review, 57 percent of businesses plan to expand their social media spending in 2012. But it isn’t enough to just have a popular Facebook Page or 101 followers on Twitter. While social media marketing is still a very fluid environment, hiring managers are looking for some solid resume items when searching for their next social marketing maven.
Proof that you are immersed in social media
If you are looking for a social marketing job, you can bet that the hiring manager wants to see what you are already doing out there (besides posting pictures of your latest trip to Yellowstone). If you don’t have any job experience like this, don’t panic. There are many ways to get experience and develop the skills. Take an online class in social marketing. Get an internship. Volunteer at a local non-profit. Start and build a new social media project about an interesting topic where you can gather followers and subscribers. In short, get involved!
Show them the numbers
While you’re getting involved, keep track of your successes. Hiring managers want to see how much you were able to grow engagement and followership on your previous social marketing efforts. You need to be able to quantify that your efforts bumped up the number of people commenting, sharing, re-posting, etc. by X percent over so many weeks—or that you increased buzz and followership to an organization’s Facebook, Twitter, Google+ or social media outlet du jour by a certain number of people over a certain amount of time.
Know how to make (good) waves
Armano explains, “Ideas, opinions, media, status updates are all part of what make social media a powerful and often disruptive force,” Candidates looking for freelance marketing opportunities must stand out—provide tangible evidence showing the excitement they’ve generated in social media. Hiring managers are inevitably looking for funny, creative people who never seem to run out of ideas—and who know how to use those ideas to generate positive, on-going conversations in the social sphere.
Social marketing jobs will go to the candidates who know how to make and ride social media waves. So get out there, make waves, and don’t forget to measure them.
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