HOW TO GET STARTED AS A SELF-EMPLOYED SOCIAL MEDIA MANAGER WITH ZERO COSTS
FIRST OF ALL… CONGRATS SIS!
chances are if you’re reading this blog you’ve made the big decision to start on your venture of becoming a self-employed social media manager! I feel honored that you choose this blog to dig in and learn more about starting your biz. there are a million different articles online on how to approach this new endeavor (trust me, i’ve read them all), but i wanted to put together this cute little blog on how to do it, without wasting time searching high and low on the ol’ google machine.
the bite-sized nuggets i’m about to share with you is how is how i was able to start my own successful social media agency at no cost and how i coach others also. you can read more about my journey here. although this blog is geared towards smms, it can really be applied to all osp’s (online service providers) and va’s (virtual assistants), so don’t feel like you can’t find some gold in here because you’re not in the social media realm. if you subscribe to the “all i need is wifi and a dream” mentality, but don’t’ know where to start, this blog is for you. i’ll continue to share and update this blog with more information that will be helpful to you, as time goes on, so please continue to reference this as you blossom into the bad bitch that you are.
note: in this blog i am not sharing the legalities and cost of becoming an owner of an LLC and naming your business. to learn more, you can file through your state, here’s my fave place. if you’re going to spend money on anything when you start, please prioritize incorporating your biz to protect what you’ve worked so hard on!
now, let’s dig in, shall we?
before going into the field, ask yourself these two questions: 1. “is this something i will enjoy doing everyday for the next three years?” 2. “is this something i will enjoy doing, even if i don’t get paid to do it?”
asking yourself these questions is important, because you need to create the mindset that this career path is not just a hobby that you’ll give up (like i did with sourdough bread making during quarantine), but that you’ll actually have some skin in the game. also, understanding that you may not have 4 or 5 figure (or even 3, tbh!) months in the beginning of your career, depending on your experience, but you’ll still enjoy improving your skills in the field because you actually enjoy it, it’s not just for the moolah. having the right mindset going into this career will keep you on the path of growing your agency or biz.
psssst - this mindset will also help you when developing your name and mission, if you haven’t done so already 😉
next, start documenting all the experience you have in the field that can be relatable and transferred into this field. although, hindsight is 20/20, try doing this as soon as possible. go back in the archive when you wrote that one blog for your old job last year and document that as copy. go through your lightroom app and find photos that you zhuzh’d up with great edits. scroll through your canva account and snag any graphics you made that you can show your creativity. see where i’m going with this? any of this content that can be related to the field will be helpful to place in your portfolio! if you don’t have any experience in anything yet, start doing this asap. social media copy is short, refined copy with hooks, that can be used and found anywhere so don’t be afraid to get creative! oh! and don’t forget to link everything to a google drive or dropbox so it’s easy for you to update for you and simple for your leads to look through when they view your portfolio.
once you have everything documented, start creating your portfolio! if you’re unsure where to start with design, canva has some great templates you can start out with. you’ll want to make sure the theme is on brand for you, so you should have some colors already picked out for your new biz. if you haven’t narrowed down your brand colors yet, i recommend using canva’s colorwheel to come up with primary and secondary colors that compliment your brand. don’t spend a million hours editing every single thing in the portfolio, focus on making it attractive and clean, but let your work speak for itself.
your portfolio should be based towards your niche or ideal audience. if you haven’t yet, narrow down on who you want your clientele to be and who you serve. for example: if your ideal client is female entrepreneurs, limit documenting your experience of creating graphics for your brothers carwash and detail service. although that experience is important, it’s not relatable to your ideal audience.
i reco making a separate instagram/facebook account for your biz that is geared towards your niche and that way you can easily get referred out through that platform. it’s easier to build a community that knows exactly who you are and how you will serve others if it’s specific to your branding and not 80 photos of your dog (like i do on my personal ig). use the separate platform to share your education/tips/ideas/etc and build an audience and start creating a recognizable voice! and please, pinky promise me that no matter what anyone says, do not buy followers to make it look like you’re an expert. it’s not a good lewk, honey.
along with creating your social media pages, put together a landing page that makes it incredibly easy for a potential client to get in touch with you. if a lead has to click on five different things to get to your website, your contact page, your portfolio, etc, you’ll lose them. you can create a free landing page AND website on canva! just link your content page in your bio and wham bam thank you ma’am, you now have a place for people to easily get in touch.
brainstorm packages that reflect your niche, experience, and interests. shop around and look at what your competitors are offering and their cost, you’ll want to be competitive in the field with pricing and packages, but also charge your worth! when creating packages, don’t just pick a random number that you think ‘sounds good’ (i tried that route, spoiler alert: it doesn’t work). if you don’t know how to charge for your services, you can read about what to include in the cost here.
okay so now you may be wondering… okay but how does this help me get clients? two reasons: 1. it creates the mindset (yup, lots of mindset shifts here!) that you WILL be getting inquiries, that you WILL be getting clients and 2. it saves you the time of a lead prolonging interest in your services. think of the time between someone saying they’re interested in your services to the time they actually book you as a window.. the goal is to make that window as small as possible by removing doubt and creating ease. when you have systems in place, your turn around time is quicker, thus the clients decision making is quicker. don’t wait until you get a lead before putting this together, you’ll have a higher risk of losing their business, due to time alone.
if you’re looking to start gaining clients, don’t be afraid to offer your services at an introductory cost. join va groups on facebook and start interacting with those who post who are looking for help in your field. although not mandatory, a lot of people offer their services at a very low cost to start in order to build their portfolio! if you know people that own a biz or parents of friends that do, offer to take over their social media for a month at little to no cost and use those as examples for your experience. Pro tip: record the analytics/insights also so you can share this in your portfolio also!
offer a referral program for clients. tbh, i’ve never paid for advertising of my business and have booked out for the past six months and will be for the next six… i’ve received all of my clients through referrals, my instagram, or va groups. that’s how important those three things are. referrals are everything in the online community, so your experience with one client definitely matters. a referral program that benefits you and the client will always work best. for ex, a referral program can be: 15% off your services for one month, a free week of work, 2 hours of copy, etc.
post on freelance sites like UpWork, Fiverr, etc. these sites are a search engine used to find freelancers. so your ideal audience is already looking for you and your skills. your portfolio will come in handy when you post on these sites!
if you have the bandwidth, you can apply to entry level or part time social media positions if you don't have experience but want something more corporate, for several different industries, to get your feet wet! the pay isn't much, but definitely something to consider taking on if you need more 1:1 help while you build up your portfolio, especially if you know this is the career path of your dreams. linkedin, glassdoor, and ziprecruiter are great places to start!
these are all things you can do today to start as an owner of a social media agency at no cost. one of the reasons i love where we’re at as a society is that you can literally do anything and be a business owner. there’s a demand and a need for your skill, don’t keep it to yourself, turn it into a career! the best part is now you don’t have to put on pants or a bra and you can stay home and pet your dogs and bring in income. talk about the dream, right?
if you found this blog helpful, but need more 1:1 coaching, i’d love to help you. you can book my disco partner package where i’ll coach you and guide you to demand more, make more, and be more. it may be a one-woman show right now, but you grow, girl.
chat soon, babe 💕
kati
