Career Advice

Get advice from other social media professionals. Learn what it takes to build and make an impact in your career. Get inspired with our stories and resources.

  • 86 Topics
  • 200 Replies

86 Topics

Jonathan Zuluaga
Community Manager
Jonathan ZuluagaCommunity Manager
published in Career Advice

The next round of connections is now open!Apply by July 25th

Ready to elevate your career and build deeper professional connections?Join the next round of the Arboretum Mentorship Network! Whether you’re looking to mentor emerging talents, find a seasoned guide, or dive into social media strategies with peers, we’ve got you covered with our three unique programs:Peer ConnectEngage with fellow professionals to share insights and solve challenges together.Apply NowMentor/Mentee ProgramGet matched with a mentor or mentee to support your professional growth.Apply NowSprout Platform NetworkingExchange tips and strategies with other Sprout Social users to maximize your platform usage. Apply NowDon’t miss out on this fantastic opportunity to gain invaluable insights, forge meaningful relationships, and elevate your skills in a vibrant community of social media pros. Apply now and take the next step in your professional journey! Apply by Thursday, July 25 at 11:59pm PST to be part of this amazing journey!Learn more about the program: https://community.s

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Jonathan Zuluaga
Community Manager
4 days ago
Jonathan Zuluaga
Community Manager
Jonathan ZuluagaCommunity Manager
published in Career Advice

Connect and Grow: Apply by June 27!Arboretum Mentorship Network

Ready to build deeper professional connections?We’re thrilled to announce that applications are open for the next round of connections in The Arboretum! Whether you’re looking to be a mentor, find a mentor, dive deep into social media strategies with peers, or share tips with fellow Sprout Social users, now’s your chance to expand your network and grow your skills.By joining, you’ll gain invaluable insights, forge meaningful relationships, and elevate your career in social media. Don’t miss out on this fantastic opportunity to connect, learn, and thrive in our vibrant community of social media pros and enthusiasts.Apply by Thursday, June 27 at 11:59pm CST to be part of this next round of connections.✅ Learn more and apply now: https://community.sproutsocial.com/p/mentorship

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Jonathan Zuluaga
Community Manager
1 month ago
Katy4Riskonnect
Advanced User
Katy4RiskonnectAdvanced User
asked in Career Advice

Sr. SMMs & Directors - How did you get your company to provide an elevated title for your role?

Hey fellow SMMs, Sr. Social Strategists & Global Social Media Directors:  I have led Riskonnect’s Global Social Media program for a full year now and have a team of 3 direct reports that we call our ‘Social Team’ but since we’ve never seen social media as a stand-alone role at Riskonnect, I still have the title ‘Digital Marketing Manager’ even after a recent raise in 2024. I’m up against the fact that there really has not been a social media career path at Riskonnect, since I’m the first SMM to truly lead a team there and to have more of a focus solely on social media (also serve as a project manager for our Digital Marketing team and I manage our email newsletter as well). My director is wonderful -- truly -- the best -- but doesn’t see any need to change my title since title changes are typically a fledged out thing with an actual promotion affiliated with that update.  For me it feels like ‘Digital Marketing Manager’ really doesn’t reflect the fact that I manage a social media p

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lisa.rodrigo
Advanced User
1 month ago
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Frequent User
PSportFrequent User
asked in Career Advice

Recruiter for Social Media Leadership Positions

Does anyone know of a recruiter that specializes in social media business development and leadership positions? Thank you!

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chrismwoods
Engaged User
4 months ago
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Frequent User
PSportFrequent User
asked in Career Advice

Recruiters for Social Media Roles?

Does anyone know of a recruiter that specializes in social media business development and leadership positions? Thank you!

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P
Frequent User
4 months ago
Laura Porcincula
Community Manager
Laura PorcinculaCommunity Manager
published in Career Advice

Celebrating Black Excellence in Social Media and Marketing

In honor of Black History Month, we are recognizing the achievements of Black social marketers and creators. Let's celebrate, uplift, and show appreciation to our Black peers this month and throughout the year!Here are some ways you can show your support:   

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talissa.beall
5 months ago
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New User
ashtonyoungNew User
posted in Career Advice

Any advice for advocating for investment in social media?

For some context, the company I work for is a small business and all of our clients are small businesses as well. There’s generally a very limited margin for their marketing budget, which limits the amount of growth we can achieve using pure organic social with barely enough time to plan, create content, and post. This puts us in a little bit of a pickle, as we are faced with the task of proving our worth using data that shows the contrary. So I’m calling on the seasoned SMM’s of Arboretum! How would you advocate for the potential of growth without a portfolio to show that strategy works?

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New User
7 months ago
Katy4Riskonnect
Advanced User
Katy4RiskonnectAdvanced User
asked in Career Advice

What tasks for social will you hand off and/or remove from your program for 2024?

So often, we are constantly adding things to the task list as SMM.  What tasks will you either hand off to a Social Team member, or remove from your program for 2024?  I will be handing off Hiring posts, writing emails, and creating LinkedIn events for our program in 2024 to another member of our social team in order to make space for the new tasks I’m taking on. 

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Engaged User
7 months ago
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New User
melissa.riekeNew User
posted in Career Advice

Staying true to self.

This year my social media journey “offically” took a turn to a full time position.  I have worked as a photographer for myself for over 12 years and my talents got recognized.  It was a wonderful accomplishment to be recognized for my years of work by an outside company.  It is exciting to get to put my skills to work in this new position.

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A
Frequent User
7 months ago
katie.gould
Engaged User
katie.gouldEngaged User
asked in Career Advice

Attracting Talent in 2024

One of the primary goals of our B2B company’s presence on social is to attract new talent. A triumph from the year was increased job applicants due to our social media presence, which was previously nonexistent. Since I was brought on just a year ago, seeing this direct impact has helped validate my efforts (and my job!).The challenge in 2024 will be to keep this up. Our small team is discussing how to make job posts more engaging than just a simple description of the role. We would like to create a series of video shorts where we interview current employees about their experiences.How do others creatively promote job openings?

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katie.gould
Engaged User
7 months ago
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New User
robbie.schneiderNew User
asked in Career Advice

Staying Current In 2024

Our travel/education budget may be hit for 2024. What are your favorite (inexpensive and accessible) ways to stay current in this ever-evolving industry?

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Nycole
Advanced User
7 months ago
april.hunt
Frequent User
april.huntFrequent User
asked in Career Advice

Online mentors?

Social media marketing is my second career, meaning I didn’t grow up intuitively knowing things like video film and editing.I love Sprout and NISM webinars (thank you, @Jonathan Zuluaga), but I tend to learn best seeing it done in front of me.Anyone had any success with that kind of mentor relationship? How do you go about finding help when you need things that seem very basic answered? Curious to see, too, if @ashley.manivong, gets any leads on virtual training that might help.Thanks! 

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Jonathan Zuluaga
Community Manager
7 months ago
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Frequent User
nicole.millerFrequent User
asked in Career Advice

Best Resources for Growing Knowledge about Social Media

Hi all! I am new to the world of social media and I was given the responsibility for managing social posts for a fairly large company! I am wanting to take time outside of work to learn good strategies and tactics to implement on our social page and really take ownership of it. Any tips from long-term or more tenured social media managers would be so appreciated! 

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dustin.zick
Frequent User
7 months ago
Jonathan Zuluaga
Community Manager
Jonathan ZuluagaCommunity Manager
published in Career Advice

Giveaway Extravaganza: Day 1Holiday Giveaway Extravaganza

Kickstart your week by sharing a standout moment from your social media journey! Whether it’s a thrilling triumph or a hurdle you conquered, your story enters you to win a $50 Amazon gift card and a Wireless Lavalier Microphone. Join in the giveaway by sharing your experience in the Career Advice Forum!How to Participate:Share a moment from your social media marketing journey. It could be a triumph that made you proud or a challenge you successfully overcame. Let's celebrate and learn from each other's experiences!Go to the Career Advice Forum, create a new post and drop a link to the post that you created there in the thread below to be officially entered  into today’s giveaway.Want to see be the first to know of the other upcoming prizes and challenges? Subscribe to our giveaway thread:Want to see the other giveaways? See the full line-up here:  The Promotion begins at 9:00 a.m. Central Time (“CT”) on December 11, 2023, and ends at 11:59 p.m. CT on December 11, 2023. To participate i

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Jonathan Zuluaga
Community Manager
7 months ago
AngKudlack
Engaged User
AngKudlackEngaged User
posted in Career Advice

My Social Media Marketing Journey Moment

I recently received my Sprout Social Publishing certification! 🏆 It was a challenge I gave myself in order to learn the platform really well. What I didn’t expect were all the other things I discovered along the way! Things such as finding the Arboretum, all the helpful study guides and resources that are available and social media marketing strategy tips that have already helped me think about planning for next year. This was not an easy certification by any means. It took a lot of preparation and thought, but I was excited to go through the process and learn as much as possible! 

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AngKudlack
Engaged User
7 months ago
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Engaged User
clayton_normanEngaged User
posted in Career Advice

Standout Moment: Launching LinkedIn Live and Going HAM on Repurposing

I started a new job in this year making a jump from higher ed social to a multi-brand B2B/B2C company. One of the first things I noticed was that all of the brands we own were severely under-leveraged on video content including live content.For a long time I’ve wanted to get into making LinkedIn live video content, so when one of our brands hosted a week-long educational summit and wanted to find ways to keep attention on their incredible topics and speakers after the summit was over, I proposed a LinkedIn Live conversation recapping the week and key takeaways from the summit speakers.I got us a Streamyard (def check them out) plan, wrote a brief and a loose script and then scheduled a date to go live.We had over 1,500 attendees at the live broadcast from all over the world tuning in and, even better, we were able to trim out some great moments in the live conversation that we turned into 6 Reels and videos for LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter to make the content go even further. It was

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C
Engaged User
7 months ago
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Advanced User
stacykAdvanced User
posted in Career Advice

Standout Moment

My standout moment is being the social lead introducing a brand new brand, Goodmiles Running Company, to the Milwaukee community & the world! It’s been awesome building a brand from the ground up and really seeing the community grow over 2023.

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S
Advanced User
7 months ago
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Advanced User
Jennifer JonesAdvanced User
posted in Career Advice

Recognizing What Deserves Recognition

Social media moves at such a quick pace that social media professionals tend to move just as quickly, always trying to be a step ahead rather than fall behind. But in that rush to always know what’s coming next, we forget to celebrate the moments that have so quickly come and gone - even moments of excellence.If you’re like me, you’re always so busy trying to surpass your last greatest effort that you sometimes miss just how remarkable that effort had been. Oftentimes, we don’t take the time to sit and appreciate the strategy and creativity that we put into something like a social media campaign, so we miss the fact that others may find value in that work beyond the norm.Luckily, I’m part of a company that took the time to not only notice that value, but went a step further in seeking out an opportunity to have it recognized at a larger scale. Earlier this year, that effort resulted in a social media campaign that I led becoming a finalist in the Social Media Campaign category of the P

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J
Advanced User
7 months ago
april.hunt
Frequent User
april.huntFrequent User
posted in Career Advice

Standout moment: Translating skills

My standout moment in social was realizing the skills that I had developed as a journalist not translated so well to working in social media. Key among them, honestly, has been the willingness to admit when you don’t know something but being eager to learn.t’s astonishing just how quickly social moves sometimes, but a willingness to try new things has served me well.

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april.hunt
Frequent User
7 months ago
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New User
carlisle.russellNew User
posted in Career Advice

Standout Moment: Increasing Organic Social Engagement by 100x (for real!)

Project OverviewDr. Josh Axe is a leader in the health & wellness online space, most well-known for his Nashville Private Practice, his website DrAxe.com, and his NYT Bestseller Eat Dirt.Then, in 2016 Dr. Axe co-founded Ancient Nutrition. This supplement brand has a mission of helping connect modern lifestyles with ancient nutrients (and they created powdered bone broth and collagen which we all know is super trendy these days!)As you can imagine, because of these amazing accomplishments and innovations, Dr. Axe and team didn’t have much issue growing an engaged following.However, the did have one big problem.Creating content that communities engage with on-platform is one thing, while creating content that encourages your community to make a purchase is a different story.The Dr. Axe brand and the Ancient Nutrition store needed a collaborative social media strategy that built brand authority, engaged users, and drove transactions.As I was hired to manage their social media full-tim

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C
New User
7 months ago
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Frequent User
marisa.stephensFrequent User
posted in Career Advice

Standout Moment: Social Sets the Stage for Recruits & New Hires

A standout moment for me was when one of the Senior Executives came to tell me that while interviewing a candidate and beginning to describe our company culture to them, the candidate stopped and said no explanation was necessary. From following our LinkedIn page, they had already seen everything they needed to know that our company is an extraordinarily special place to work. One of the best compliments I could ever receive - and proved that I was making a true difference with our organic posts! That was a few months after I started in my current role. Now I’ve been with the company for nearly 3 years, and I continue to hear from recruits and new hires all the time about how our social media helped them make the decision to come work for our company. 

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M
Frequent User
7 months ago
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Engaged User
rachel.pittmanEngaged User
posted in Career Advice

Standout Moment

A standout moment in my social media journey this year is leaning into video content creation and UGC for our social channels! We’ve seen a significant increase in utilizing content created by our community and creating our own video content! 

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R
Engaged User
7 months ago
morgncam
Engaged User
morgncamEngaged User
posted in Career Advice

Achieving What They Thought Couldn't Be Done

In 2022, we all saw the emergence of Taylor Swift and how her brand is so powerful, especially to a higher educational audience (aka students). As she announced her first new album in a few years (Midnights), I decided last minute to use that as a way to bridge our brand to her. With nine albums at the time, I took a deep dive into what each album represented and matched those with a relevant business degree. For example, I matched her debut album with our staple general management degree because “it’s the OG, the one that started it all, and had a great foundation to build on. It really gives you A Place In This World.” By using song titles to show the connection between the degrees and the album, we were able to connect all nine albums with nine areas of the business school.This was posted on Instagram the night before Midnights released and our students ended up loving it. I knew it was a success when I overheard students talking about the post while on campus. I really couldn’t hav

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morgncam
Engaged User
7 months ago
N
Frequent User
nataly.daviesFrequent User
posted in Career Advice

Standout moment: Show me the data!

We are a small social team working in a technical industry, so when it comes to social media we talk through numbers and strategy. I’m only a year and a half into this profession and the area I’ve been growing in is reporting. Using the reporting features in Sprout, we are able to have conversations with our partners about the success, and not so great success, with data. In addition to collecting this information, honing down on tagging has aided us much more than we anticipated! There is much more to learn when it comes to analytics and showing our leadership the power of social media marketing! We are proud of these recent milestones in showing results through metrics. 

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Jonathan Zuluaga
Community Manager
7 months ago
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Engaged User
kiyauna.mEngaged User
posted in Career Advice

Standout Moment: Employee Engagement

A triumph in my social media journey this year was finally launching our employee engagement/advocacy program. This had been in the works for over a year and a half, but it was great to finally check it off the list. We started by creating a series of internal videos to educate our team members on the importance and power of social media. We followed that up with prompts to complete after each video and a company-wide huddle to discuss the topic of social media further. So far, it has been well received and we’ve seen an increase in the number of people who’d like to build confidence sharing on social media. Still lots to work on in 2024, but...A WIN!

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K
Engaged User
7 months ago
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