YES, YES, YES!!!

A part-time business is a great way to start. Going all-in on a business without first testing the waters and gaining experience can be risky. When I left a high-paying corporate job to work for a start-up I didn’t just make the move one day. I worked for the StartUp evenings and weekends before making the switch.

Here is why starting part-time is a good idea:

It gives you experience:

Starting out part-time gives you experience and a good base prior to making the leap to a full-time business owner. It also allows you to establish yourself, without relying on your business to be your sole source of income. This can reduce the pressure and stress of getting started.

You’ll have confidence that people will pay you:

Many people want to start a social media business because people ask them about social media, or because they see an opportunity. What they don’t know is whether or not people will PAY THEM to do social media. I can tell you now, plenty of people will pay you to run social media, but you may need time to find the right kinds of clients who have budgets.

It can be managed part time:

Managing a few social media accounts for small businesses doesn’t have to be a full-time job. If you can carve out time to consistently commit to your clients, you’ll be able to manage a few clients in addition to a full-time job. Just make sure that you have the time consistently set aside.

You can make extra cash:

A part-time social media business is a great way to make some extra $$ in addition to your regular income. If you are thinking you’d like to be a social media entrepreneur, this extra income can build you a base that you can use as seed money for your business.

 

 

 

If you want to start a social media business, the main thing that you’ll need is CLIENTS!!! People who will pay you for your services. If you don’t have clients, you are basically dead in the water.

So, how do you find clients?

The first step is identifying the types of businesses that will actually make good clients… getting them to sign up for your services is a whole different blog post (or 10).

When evaluating a business to determine if they’ll make a good client, consider the following factors:

1) Do they have an established and profitable business?

Businesses that aren’t making money won’t have money to invest in marketing – especially marketing that generates returns over time vs. direct response marketing. If they aren’t yet profitable or they aren’t established, chances are they won’t be able to hire you. Even if they can hire you, they will probably be more difficult clients because they will feel like they are spending a lot of money, but they may be one of your smallest clients.

2) Do they invest in marketing?

A company that doesn’t do any marketing will be difficult to sell on social media marketing. Start with companies that spend on marketing already — it is easier to get a budget allocation than it is to create a new budget.

3) Is social media a good choice for them?

I’ve seen marketing agencies turn through clients faster than you can say “good-bye” because they had an excellent sales team, but they were working with a lot of businesses that really shouldn’t have invested in social media. As a result, even though the agency did a great job, they had huge turnover and were constantly selling and onboarding new clients.

4) Are their competitors doing it? And doing it well?

Many businesses can be easily persuaded into running a social media campaign if they see that their competitors are doing it (and doing it well). Look for businesses that are nailing their social media strategy and approach their competitors. For example, one local restaurant hired a social media manager who did an excellent job. Most of the other restaurants in the area didn’t really do much on Facebook. After one restaurant was successful, they all wanted the same success and within 6 months 5 neighboring restaurants had hired professional social media management services.

5) Does word of mouth drive their business?

Social media is like word of mouth on steroids. Most businesses rely on word of mouth to get new customers, and social media marketing is a strong strategy to amplify word-of-mouth. These businesses can be easy to sell on social media because you can easily demonstrate the value.

Determining how much to charge as a consultant is difficult. There are HUGE variances in what consultants charge, and it depends on how you structure your offerings.

There is no single answer to this, and you’ll have to get feedback along the way.

Some of the things to consider are:

• Are you selling your time or a result/deliverable?
• How experienced are you?
• How much will your knowledge/advice impact their results?
• Are they used to hiring consultants? What rates are they used to?
• How big is the project?
• Is it retainer based or one-time?
• What is the market rate in your local market?

 

Launchest includes a complete pricing guide with industry ranges for different experience levels, but here are some top-level guidelines:

1) HOURLY: Charge hourly if the scope of the project isn’t clearly defined, or if you aren’t sure how much time/effort it will take. Agree to a range upfront, but the client will only pay for what they use. This is low risk for the client.

2) PROJECT BASED: If the project can be clearly defined, consider charging a flat rate for the entire project. This gives the client and you a clear idea of the total scope and investment. Most project based quotes are based on estimated time investments, but this reduces uncertainty and the need to track hours.

3) RETAINER BASED: You agree to set monthly services for a monthly rate. This allows for a long-term relationship where you contribute a set amount each month.

The specific amounts to charge are variable based on the factors above, so you’ll need to use your judgment and have a dialogue with the client to determine how much they are willing to invest.

Many people starting a social media business aren’t sure how to charge or how to build a price list. When offering social media management services, there are 3 basic ways to charge clients:

 

1) Setup Fee + Monthly Rate

Some social media managements charge a setup fee to account for the time and effort it takes to create the profiles. Once the profiles are created, the payment plan will switch to a monthly rate.

 

PRO:

If a client doesn’t stick with you for management, you have appropriately charged them for the setup investment.

 

CON:

Some clients will be uncomfortable with a large upfront payment – especially since during the setup stage they won’t see any tangible results.

 

2) Hourly Rate

Some social media management companies will charge based on an hourly rate. The client will have a slightly different bill each month based on how much time and effort was invested.

 

PRO:

It is very transparent and fair to both you and the client – only pay for what you use.

 

CON:

Most clients want some certainty of what they will pay each month and don’t want to be responsible for a big bill if a problem arises (or if you take more time). This also doesn’t account for when you are thinking about the client during time when you aren’t “on the clock”.

 

3) Standard Monthly Rate with Contract

Most social media management companies charge a standard monthly rate and have a minimum commitment. The setup time/cost is absorbed for the duration of the contract vs. requiring an additional upfront investment.

 

PRO:

It is easier to pitch a single flat rate to a client vs an upfront large charge. This is probably the easiest billing option to sell-in.

 

CON:

If you spend a ton of time, you may not be making great money (although most social media managers

Many people who start managing social media or become social media consultants aren’t sure what to charge. This is a VERY difficult question – especially since most existing social media consultants don’t want to share their secrets.

I’ve reviewed countless social media plans from agencies of all sizes over the years, and have seen lots of different pricing models.

There isn’t a “one price fits all” solution to the complex issue of pricing.

Your price depends on a number of factors:

• Your background and experience (more experienced professionals can typically demand more).
• What is included in your package/offering (are you just posting updates, managing the community, using designers, running contests).
• The amount of time the client will take in communications (some clients will call every day, others trust you to execute and aren’t very hands on)
• The size of the client (larger clients usually take more time, require more approvals and expect higher quality delivery)

• If you are posting vs community building (simply posting updates takes less effort than partnering with a client to build community)
• How much content you will create (some clients will give you tons of images and ideas, others expect you to do it all)

The bottom line is: from a high level, you’ll want to essentially figure out how much time managing a client will take to manage and price accordingly on the pricing scale.

So what is the pricing scale and range?

In Launchest we give you a number of complete pricing guides and packages that match market rates, but here are some general numbers:

• The cheapest social media management will generally cost $500/month. This is usually either a small firm or a low-end management company that does no community management or like-building and only focuses on posting generic status updates. This will usually only include 1 social network or just posting the same thing on multiple social networks.
• Most social media management costs $2,000 – $7,000 a month. Most companies that manage social media professionally will charge in this range to manage a few social networks. It is a big range, and depends on the factors mentioned above.
• For comprehensive social media and online marketing management, $10,000 a month +. This is the range for large companies or agencies that are managing multiple aspects of online marketing (like inbound marketing, blog posts, etc).

The bottom line is that there are pretty big ranges. Consider packaging your services in a way that both makes you money and at the same time provides good value to your client.