BridalTweet Wedding Forum & Vendor Directory

10 Questions to Ask Before Hiring A Social Media Expert

Wedding Professionals:

In this day and age, so-called ‘social media consultants’ as well as social media tools are a dime a dozen. But do they really have the track record and experience to drive your business forward? Can they provide you with an actionable plan and sustainable tools that will achieve your business goals - without sucking up your budget and time? When researching and interviewing potential candidates or even online tools to help you with social media, consider asking the following questions to separate the “talkers” from the “achievers":

What kind of experience do you have building and sustaining an online community?
Can you offer concrete examples to show how you’ve leveraged an online community to achieve real business goals.
Do you have an active blog?
Do you have a Facebook page and Twitter profile?
When did you start in social media?
How do you build audiences?
What kinds of metrics do you use to evaluate the success of a social media program?
Can you share multiple case studies from clients with budgets similar to ours that show how your firm can achieve measurable results?
What kind of skills and experience will our day-to-day contact bring to the relationship?
Why do you think your firm is best suited for our needs and why should we pick you?

Other qualities to look for:

Relationship Building Skills - As you narrow your search for a social media consultant, consider each candidate’s interpersonal skills. Social media is all about building relationships, and the expert that you hire should be able to cultivate relationships both online and offline.
Responsiveness – Social media is a fast-paced activity. You need an expert who is equipped to quickly navigate today’s online environment. Waiting a few days—or in some cases a few hours—to respond isn’t smart business.
Ability to Trend Spot – You’ll rely on the social media expert to be on the lookout for new trends that your business can leverage. It’s the expert’s responsibility to be able to identify and present new ideas and opportunities.

It is my hope that this list will help you to equip yourself with the strongest social media resources possible in order to truly drive your business forward! Do you have any tips to share with our wedding community about selecting social media experts and/or tools? If so, please comment below.

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Enjoy!

About This Blog: Christine Dyer is the Creator and Founder of BridalTweet. Christine has an MBA in marketing and shares over ten years of marketing expertise with the wedding community. In this weekly blog, you'll find advice on an array of wedding business topics such as how to market to brides, social networking, wedding PR, wedding sales, vendor networking, branding, pricing and much more. Please pass this news along to your own professional wedding network. To receive this advice in your email inbox each week, Sign Up for a Free BridalTweet Membership.

Comment by tobey Lee Dodge on October 17, 2011 at 3:33pm: I really like how you outlined the important questions to ask a social media expert. Most of us just dabble in social media ourselves and don't really know what to ask in order to evaluate competencies in a special marketing arena like social media.

Comment by Regency Jewelers on October 18, 2011 at 2:14am: Great points you make in your summary. The integral skills of positive communication efforts that are lasting and effective are difficult to come by, and aren't concentrated enough. Wonderful article, thank you!

Alexandra

via Regency Jewelers

Rotterdam, NY