How to build a collaborative social media team

It wasn't long ago that companies asked themselves whether they still wanted a presence in social media. Most businesses nowadays have at least considered forming a social media team or discovering the best social media management tool at the very least.

For a lot of businesses, being active on social media is still a back burner concept. This results in some brands sending tweets, photos from Instagram, or posts from Facebook to the wrong audience or in a way that can not be monitored. You need to think whether or not you should evaluate your social media policy, and who has the expertise to do it?

Whatever the size of the company, considering the financing, resources and time necessary to build a social media team can be overwhelming. A Go-Gulf study actually found that the bulk of social media teams are less than four people.

On the other hand, you do need the workers to handle all the social media networks in the company properly. Consider social media not as a side project but rather as a big contribution to the marketing campaign.

Social media has the potential to open doors for new markets and offer you a genuinely unique way to connect your brand with those who speak about it. Companies have always sought to target younger audiences effectively, and with 90 percent of those on social media between the ages of 18 and 29, it's the ideal place for your brand to establish deeper ties.

Moreover, here are some keys to create a competitive social media squad.

Know Your Purpose

If you don't have a full strategy ready for your social media team, you may want to start from the start, asking important questions like:

• Who will be involved?
• What social media tools will be used?
• How can we measure our efforts?
• What’s the purpose of your social media channels?

These questions will certainly be answered as you develop your team but understanding the overall objective is crucial. Will your platforms for social media continue to drive engagement? Answering customer service problems? Moving to new audiences? Prove good ROI?

All of these issues are true for companies, but basically you should know why you take social media first. Once you know your path it will be much easier to put the pieces together.

Plan Your Team Structure

You need to prepare our team structure before you start building your team. This will give you a better understanding of who to recruit, where to place positions and who's leading the pack. Corporate social media teams have on average 11 members according to an Altimeter survey. This involves businesses employing more than 1,000 people.

Ultimately, you will determine how many team members you need, depending on the overall goal. Here are some types of workers that could fit into the framework of your social media team:

Content Creators

If you are going to publish content or are already publishing it, you would want to see if those authors, SEO specialists and other content creators might be part of your social scope. Content marketing campaigns are important for your company and it could be a huge success to have those members work with social media engagement.

Content creators are important members of your social team, because they can use social media channels to make posts like Lagunitas Brewing Company fast, enjoyable and engaging. It may not seem like much but in these networks there are thousands of eyes on your brand.

Community Managers

It's important to have community managers entangled with other positions in social media because in even the most aggressive circumstances, they can maintain calm. Twitter trolls are everywhere and you need someone to have the courage.

Your business will do what it can to address problems and you have the ability to make consumers feel like their voices are being heard via social media.

Public Relations

You should always look for ways to grow your brand and social media is a perfect platform for that. Using the PR talent to reach out to others on social media and create partnerships not just with clients but also with other companies.

When you start putting together the pieces of the puzzle, the team gets more of a backbone. Seek to arrange those sections based on management of business and education as well as marketing and communication.

Determine Roles & Duties

Your team should not only understand the structure of the team but also the duties that will be assigned to each role. It can be difficult to schedule team tasks no matter how big the social media team is. In the end, you can make sure that every member of the social media team is well versed in these areas:

Product experts

When members of the social media team know more about the goods they can quickly answer or send questions to the right people. Your team will be able to easily answer questions, or find someone who can.

How the internal business operates

Although knowing where to send questions is vital, understanding all of the company's ins and outs is also crucial. This can include collaborating with the marketing department, sales team or even human resources staff.

Updated on social trends and news

Your social media manager should be up-to-date with all of the industry's newest sites, resources, news and developments or else he or she may be behind the times. The market changes every year and your team should be one step ahead of how to put something new into the process.

Customer service enthusiasts

As social media is more commonly used as a platform for customer support, you need to be able to answer questions and have the drive to benefit clients. Make sure that the team is ready to address any customer service problems and feel comfortable about sharing any material on social media to the world. Team members need to have a witty balance and what's best for the business.

Brand advocates

Your social team will be full of brand ambassadors who want to represent the company to the full. When you recruit people who want to be a voice for the brand, you can get members of the social media team who take the time to learn the company's ins and outs, as well as the social room.

Always Look for Improvements

Everyone knows the world of social media is unruly, but that doesn't mean you can be complacent at all. Make sure that you are always searching for opportunities to strengthen the team, whether it be by data-driven decisions or techniques for social listening.

Effective social media teams are the ones with a pulse to business and an ear to the ground at all times. If the team is able to keep ahead with insightful reviews, you'll be able to see any way you might develop and the areas you're excelling in.

Social media teams will face several challenges when everyone operates on the same profile or network. There are, however, ways of working together without getting on each other's toes. Effective teams will always work together which eventually leads to better output of content.

If we missed something you think is very important in our social media team guide, then send us a comment below!