Social Media Consultant or Employee: What’s the Best Hire for Your Small Business?

4. Demonstrate professional integrity at all times by being consistently prompt and reliable with social media updates, blog posts or tweets? Hiring the right fit for your company starts with assessing how well your new hire fits within your company culture. He or she should also have the right personality and ethics — and they should align with your brand.

Hiring an In-House Social Media Employee

Another option for small businesses that desire to boost their online presence is hiring a permanent employee to serve as a social media coordinator or manager.

A successful social media strategy entails so much more than staying on top of Twitter and Facebook comments and updates. It’s about customer service, recruiting, vendor relations and a many other external communications.

When is the right time to bring someone on permanently to handle social media development? Perhaps once you’ve decided to build your company brand or when staying on top of social monitoring becomes too much for the current staff to handle.

Remember that, whether you decide to outsource social media or add a permanent role within your company, this person will be speaking to the world on behalf of the company. Therefore, not only should your new social media leader have technical knowledge, he or she must also possess the mature perspective of an effective team leader to guide your social media strategy and produce raving fans.

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Photo Credit: Benetton

Dean Vella writes about social media training and Internet marketing for University Alliance.