Please Don’t Call Me a Guru: The Difference Between Social Media Pros and Social Media Faux
Social media ninja, social media aficionado, social media enthusiast and the most dreaded of them all…. Social media guru. These are some of the wacky job titles I have heard in my time working in social media.
Most folks would think this is just a fun way to refer to a social media specialist but as a working professional every time I hear someone refer themselves as ‘a bit of guru’, I get a gut-wrenching feeling and I just rather walk away from the conversation.
Let me explain to you why most people in the industry regard these job titles as a negative trait.
Social media has always been the wild west of the marketing landscape, ever evolving, never static and it took everyone by surprise. Ten years ago, there wasn’t such a thing as a community manager or a social media manager, there were people who started posting on Facebook and hoped something good might come out of it. As the industry kept on evolving, companies saw the need to hire dedicated people to manage their social channels. Most HR departments were scratching their heads when it came to recruiting for social media positions as there wasn’t a standard professional background or qualifications to point them to the right candidates.
The first social media managers came from all walks of life, some of them had journalistic backgrounds, others had experience in broadcast media and others happened to be the only gen Y in the office who knew how to post a picture on Facebook.
It was around this time when the distinction between the pros and faux appeared.
Social Media Faux
Who is a social media faux? The clearest telltale is the ‘creative’ job title: guru, enthusiast, conversation activator, etc…
A social media faux is a person without any training who claims to be capable of helping businesses grow through social networks. These people usually have an apparent large network of connections on their personal facebook profiles, tend to turn every interaction into a sales plug of some kind and they automate every post and blast it across every network/audience, disregarding whether the content is relevant to the network or not.
As urbandictionary.com eloquently puts it:
‘Generally some no-talent d****g who slummed their way into social media without any knowledge of how to use it for anything other than gaining followers for themselves, attending events, and generally wh***ng themselves out, because they’re 22 and don’t know how to business.’
Business owners can often fall victims to the charms of the ‘gurus’, spend a lot of money getting someone to tweet on behalf of them and have nothing to show in return. If you are looking for someone to handle your social media presence these are some of the red flags you should watch for if you want to keep the gurus away.
- Disproportionate follower to following ratio
- Automated updates on every network
- Lack of human interactions with followers
- Focus only on fans/follower number as main metric of success
- Lack of knowledge about main management/analytics tools
- Hashtag everything, everywhere
- No strategic insight on how to connect your social strategy with the rest of your marketing efforts and your business goals
Social Media Pros
Unlike faux, social media pros are up to date on the best practices for every network and can advise on the best networks to build a community around your brand or product.
Like I mentioned above, in the early years of social media management there wasn’t a formal background or clear guidelines for social media specialists but nowadays there is a set of skills qualified professionals possess.
- Background: Bachelor in Journalism, Business, Marketing postgraduate education in Communications, Advertising or Branding are common elements to find in successful professionals. A great social media specialist is someone who understands marketing and knows how to create compelling brand stories that resonate across social and traditional marketing channels.
- Professional experience: No matter whether they were working freelance or full time, they have helped companies translating their needs into actionable strategies. When it comes to achievements, they can show how their social efforts translated into sales or something more than large fan/follower numbers.
- Solid personal social media presence: In 2018, basically every marketer has some kind of social media presence. Professionals in this field have an active blog, engage in industry specific conversations and usually share relevant updates from news outlets. Though their personal following numbers is not in the thousands of followers, they have built a small but engaged community with whom they frequently interact with.
- Knowledge of every social network: Being a social media professional doesn’t mean being active on every network but it certainly does involve knowing about every network and best practices according to each audience.
- Knowledge of traditional marketing channels: No matter the specialty, any good marketer knows the value of traditional channels.
- Analytics-driven: Engagement rates, bounce rates, click through rates are some of the metrics social media strategists take into account when it comes to developing a content plan. Translating numbers and social listening into insights is key to a successful marketing strategy.
Long story short, social media gurus are not professionals but individuals with large (but not necessarily real) numbers of followers while social media specialists are individuals, with both education and working experience, helping companies tell their story and reach potential customers on social networks. Don’t get fooled by the mystic ways of the social media gurus!
This post was inspired by:
- How to Become a Social Media Guru in 20 Steps by Ian Anderson Gray
- 30 Terrible Pieces of Social Media Advice You Should Ignore by Hubspot
