DIY social media marketing - pros and cons

In the modern-day and age, you can hardly hope to have a decent online presence without properly managing your social media profiles. Whether you are a small business or a large company, having a social media presence is a must. And once you read a couple of articles about managing social media, it might seem that there isn't much to it. Add to that the average cost of hiring a social media manager and it only makes sense to consider DIY social media marketing. So, should you tackle your social media on your own, or should you hire a professional? Well, let's find out.

The pros

First off let's list the pros. That way, if you have to make a decision, you will know why you went with the DIY option for social media marketing.

It is cheaper

The most obvious benefit of doing your own social media marketing is that you don't have to pay for a professional. Even a low-end professional will cost you about $35.000 a year. And if you opt for an agency, you can expect to pay between $72.000 and $126.000 per year. Meanwhile, a DIY option leaves all of that money in your budget.

You don't have to work with a middleman

The trouble with social media marketing is that it is not easy to educate someone on how to properly promote your company. Sure, the social media manager does know the marketing aspect. But, how well versed are they in your industry? Well, if you tackle your own social media marketing, you won't have to worry about no middleman. You can convey all your knowledge into clearcut social media posts and promote them without any need for meetings, explanations or improvements.

You can use your industry experience

Social media management doesn't solely mean posting content. You also need to keep track of what the current trends are, both within your industry and the marketing revolving around it. This is much easier to do if you have prior experience within the industry and you know where to focus your attention. So, why should you delegate this to a manager, when you can already use the experience that you have.

By managing your social media you will naturally follow the trends within your industry. This will not only ease your marketing but may also inspire new business decisions for your company. So, by tackling social media, you may even improve your business as a whole.

The cons

Now, as with all things in marketing, DIY social media management does have its cons. After seeing all the benefits, it is easy to think that managing social media is straightforward and that it won't take much time. But, in actuality, there is a good reason why most companies choose to outsource their social media management to more experienced professionals.

Long-term cost

DIY social media management is only cost-effective at the start. But, if you consider the potential long-term costs, you will see that doing your own social media marketing might not be the best idea. Namely, a large number of businesses suffer, not because they don't use social media, but because they do so poorly. If you don't have decent marketing, you simply won't reach your customers. It doesn't matter if you have a top-notch service or a state of the art product. These are simply not enough to make a business successful. Social media marketing is vital, no matter how expensive it may seem. And not hiring a professional to help you is likely going to cost you a fortune in the long run.

Time-consuming

At first glance, it might seem that social media marketing is simple. You go to your profile, post some content, and see numbers go up. This, of course, is far from true. To manage your social media you actively need to follow trends and design marketing campaigns. Every successful social media campaign is based on a ton of research, careful planning and stellar content creation. Speaking of, creating good social media content is all but easy. To have any hope in engaging your audience you need to create the right content, work on brand awareness, and keep track of marketing performance. While modern tools do help, you can hardly expect that your content will look as good as when it is made by a professional.

Inexperience

The more you look into social media marketing, the more you will see just how much there is. The basics of learning include:

• Keyword research.
• Understanding of different social media platforms.
• Content creation.
• Branding.
• User experience.
• Marketing campaign.
• SEO management.

Without knowing all of this, you can hardly hope to gain traction with your content and reach your audience. Again, there is a good reason why companies hire social media managers. And why they tend to cost so much. After all, social media marketing is not something you can learn by reading blogs in your spare time. Only by working in marketing for many years can marketing managers gain the experience necessary to create effective long-term campaigns.

Final thoughts on DIY social media marketing

In theory, you can tackle DIY social media marketing. If you run a relatively small company, and you don't rely much on online marketing, it can make sense to tackle it on your own. But, if your marketing is largely based online, you need to hire a professional to help you out. Even if you are driven to learn about social media marketing, you will soon lose the interest and energy needed to tackle social media marketing with due care. Furthermore, modern platforms like StorifyMe do allow you to create solid content. But, there is no substitute for the experience and expertise that professionals have.