While online media management is yet to gain acceptance as a ‘real' job, more and more professionals, especially newbies, are trying their hands on it and coming out with flying colours. Trisha Mukherjee reports
Twenty six-year-old Shalini Biswas spent most of her time on social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and linkedIn. She was a self-taught expert in handling the technical nitty-gritties and was also helping her friends sometimes promote their bakery products and raise funds for a start-up. No wonder that she chose to be a social media manager who handles the online operations of several popular brands. Today, she is a well-known entrepreneur in Delhi. like her, there are many youngsters who are choosing social media as a career option. The demand for such professionals has increased in the last few years, thanks to the growing influence of social media. Every brand realise that to expand their reach, they have to rely on social media and those who are trying to establish a brand know that it is only their presence on social media that can help them. So these social media managers are being either recruited by big firms or they are running their own enterprises and making money from their online skills.
Brand call
Surpassing every other form of media including television, social media has emerged victorious with almost 120 million followers. In fact, it has the power to turn around the image of a company, or for that matter, a political party. This was evident in the “landslide” victory of BJP in the 2014 elections.
Social media management has grown to become as indispensable as newspaper advertising was five years back. Also, social media provides a scope for a two way communication process between the providers and the consumers. “You could not think of promoting and growing a brand without advertising in the papers sometime back but now things have started to change. Today, brands just don’t want to simply communicate a message. They want to interact with their target buyers, take their feedback, based on which, they make the necessary changes in their services,” says Siddharth Khanna, CEO, Brand Visage Communications.
Branding and goodwill maintenance are not the only reasons for this sudden upsurge of acquiring space on social domain. Blurring the lines between the real market and the virtual world, social media has taken the responsibility of generating new leads and customers for the companies as well, and that is why, now it is no longer treated as a parallel or substandard medium but is considered a mainstream platform.
Smart career choice
Although social media management might not be one of the conventional career options that are pursued by youngsters, its present trajectory, however, indicates a positive rise. To further advocate the medium’s ability to offer a prospective career, several institutes like Indian Institute of Mass Communication and Asian College of Journalism have included it as a part of their syllabi. “With a big brand to ride on, the course is being promoted in an inviting manner, making students opt for it,” says Anubhav Mathur, faculty, IIMC, Jammu.
Students who realise that being a social media manager can help them mint money in a long run are also looking for courses in foreign universities. Rajiv Singh, social media analyst, says, “Various countries have already adopted it. In India too, social media management is only growing to become the next big thing. In Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), Online Reputation Management (ORM), Social Media Research & Analytics one has diverse career options. Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is considered as one of the 20 highest paid freelancing jobs.”
Required skill set
Facebook, Twitter and Instagram might be a major part of social media, but that is not just what the medium has to it. While the profession might not require a particular set of degrees, technical knowledge is certainly important but a creative bend of mind and leadership quality is also desired. “The know-how of social media is the most important factor. One needs to be aware of all social networking platforms like Facebook, Twitter, linkedIn, Vine, Instagram, Pinterest, Tumbler, StumbleUpon, Reddit and many more. Their applicability and usage is different because of different target audience at each platform,” says Singh.
Along with client servicing, there are other attributes too, that go into the making of a successful social media manager. Keeping a track of public opinion on the company’s products and judging which comments to ignore and which to respond to, is very important. Creativity is always a bonus, for he might often be asked to create interesting and unique brand campaign for the company. Says Khanna, “An aspiring social media manager should be able to think creatively and come up with solutions, both strategic and operational, as he would also need to interact with clients on regular basis and come up with the plan to suit their requirments.” A social media manager should know the big names in the industry and use them intelligently to promote the brand.
To stay in the race, one needs to evolve and update oneself about ever changing dynamics of the social media. Ideas turn stale with every passing moment, so one needs to think out of the box.