Aug 25 Pros and Cons of your Social Media Team Structure

One of the best things about working at an agency is the variety of brands we get to work with on a daily basis. With different clients comes different social media team structures that we work with. Social media teams are structured depending on how the brand divides their internal vs. external resources, and there are pros and cons to each approach. Here we’ll look at two social media team structures and the pros and cons of each.

The One-Person Show

Many clients that we work for only have one person who oversees all social media marketing for their brand. This role is usually a ‘Social Media Manager’ and they are responsible for integrating social efforts with other marketing disciplines. With limited internal resources, this usually means the day-to-day execution is outsourced to an agency. This relationship normally starts with the agency developing a social strategy for the brand, with input from the Social Media Manager. Once the strategy is complete, we have a better understanding of the level of services that are needed to best support the brand. The services usually handled by the agency include: strategic consulting, community management, content production, reporting, and paid media.

Pros

The main benefit of working with an agency is the expertise you are getting. At Ignite, we live and breathe social media marketing since it is 100% of what we do. We are able to apply learnings and insights from other clients and stay current with the industry. Additionally, having one point of contact at the client level can help things move more efficiently internally.

Cons

No outside agency knows the brand as well as those internally. With only one or a few people being very close to the brand some of that internal knowledge can be lost if the agency is not closely kept in the loop and trained properly.

In-House Social Team

The other side of the spectrum is when there is an internal social media team that handles most of the day to day execution but needs an agency to help fill in the gaps. Most of the time, a social strategy is already in place and the internal team has identified an area where they can save time by outsourcing the work. At Ignite, we do ‘a la carte’ services for many of our clients depending on their needs. For the most part, it usually falls under community management, reporting, or paid media management services.

Pros

You have a team that is very close to the brand and has a good line of sight in to everything else that is happening across the organization. Just outsourcing a piece of the day-to-day activities can be more efficient for everyone involved.

Cons

Social media changes daily, so it can be hard to keep up to speed with everything going on in the industry if the majority of the team is focused solely on one brand. Also, when there are a few people who sit outside your organization, it can be hard to make them feel integrated and give them the context they need to be effective.

Whether you are a one-person show or have a full in-house team, we would love to help take your social media marketing to the next level. Get in contact with us here.