When appointing a social media agency or asking them to pitch for work, it’s useful, if not essential, to write a brief which outlines what you expect from them.
Here’s a guide on the information we would normally find helpful when being asked to take on a client’s social media channels.
No-one knows your product or service – or what you want from it – better than you. Spend some time trying to work out what you want your product or service to gain from being on social media; whether it’s a larger online audience with which to share news, or the ability to drive people to your website to buy your product.
This will help your agency create a relevant pitch, and a social media content and advertising strategy which really ticks all the boxes.
When creating social media strategy and content, it’s important for your agency to know who your audiences are, as it helps to dictate the messaging used, and even which channels used to reach them.
If you are a new brand and don’t have much of an online presence, ask yourself who you want your audience to be. Social media advertising, particularly across Facebook and Instagram, can be incredibly targeted, and is a great way to reach your desired audience – something we can help with.
Which channels are you happy to use, and where is your audience likely to be? There’s no one-size-fits-all approach, however, if you’re trying to sell beautiful products or holidays to millennials, then Instagram (and to an extent Facebook) is most likely the place to be. On the other hand, LinkedIn or Twitter are more likely to resonate with those looking for corporate business services.
Think about what you would like to talk to your audience about. Your social media agency will be able to develop your content pillars for you, however it’s important to know what resonates with your brand in the first place. Have a think about what your audience will want to hear about, balanced with the message you’re trying to convey to get them to take the desired action.
Paid advertising across Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn is a highly targeted way of reaching your preferred audience, and encouraging them to carry out your desired action, whether that’s to follow your page, visit your website, or purchase your product.
With newly created pages, we’d always recommend setting aside some spend for paid campaigns to get up and running – and it would be useful to know if this is something you’d be open to or have the capacity for. This isn’t just limited to newly-created accounts either, as there are numerous ways to get your audience to take your preferred action from more established pages.
Before writing a brief, it’s important to know the type of work that you’d like your agency to carry out, whether that’s on a campaign or project basis, an ongoing retainer where we manage all organic and paid content, or the setup of pages followed by training for your team. We can then set out a fee structure and suggested approach accordingly.
It would also be useful to know who our main point of contact will be for your business, and how much experience they have of marketing and social media. That way, we can tailor our pitch and any work that comes after it in a way that they’ll understand.
Is there a particular event that you’re looking to promote, or is your product or service only available at a certain time of year? Be sure to advise us of any deadlines or timescales we should be aware of before asking us to pitch or carry out work. We’ll always do our best to accommodate your needs, but sometimes, with very short notice, that is just not possible – and we’d rather be honest about that.
Giving us an estimated budget allows us to put timescales and resources against the work you require, and see if our fees match your budget. It doesn’t need to be a final figure – just one that will allow us to plan out work and pitch accordingly.
Outline what you expect to achieve from your social media channels, preferably with some sensible KPIs (key performance indicators), or metrics. This will help us to come up with a strategy which will meet these goals, and allow us to report effectively and in a way you’ll understand.
We always carry out competitor analysis before starting to work with you, however, if there’s a particular brand that you like or dislike on social media, please let us know. There are also several clever ways to monitor the performance of your competitors, allowing you to make direct comparison between your own and other brands.
Let us know what sort of assets (for example images and video) you have in place for your business, as this will allow us to plan content accordingly, and advise you upfront if there are any assets we think you’ll need for your social media channels.
We hope that the above has given you useful advice on the sort of information we’d require from a social media brief. To find out more about how we can help you with social media, visit our social media page, or email [email protected].