What Traits Should You Seek in a Social Media Manager? - Web Marketing Wednesdays

Welcome back to Web Marketing Wednesdays (WMW), Southwark Consulting’s weekly roundup of news and notes from the digital marketing world! This week’s edition of WMW explores the key traits you should look for in your social media manager, takes a peek at the latest data on how folks are spending their ‘screen time’ and offers some helpful LinkedIn marketing tips. As our regular readers know, the aim of this column is to provide a concise rundown of key news items and tech tips for higher ed admissions and marketing staff. Read on for all the latest news…

As more and more schools (and admissions offices) seek to delegate and centralize social media responsibilities, the WMW team would like to share a great article and infographic we’ve uncovered about the key traits one should look for in a social media manager. The article, ‘Ten Desirable Traits of Social Media Managers‘, highlights key attributes and converts them into easy-to-grasp personnas like ‘the concierge’ (one-on-one attention as needed), ‘the gardener’ (nurturing community), ‘the sponge’ (someone who absorbs the emotional temperature of the community), ‘the traffic cop’ (routing requests to the right team members) and more. In short, this checklist is a great way for admissions and higher ed marketing professionals to evaluate who should be running their program’s social media efforts.

This past week, a study of media consumption habits was released that garnered extensive coverage across the web. The study, conducted by Millward Brown, showcased data on how Americans spend their screen time and highlighted evidence that smartphones have surpassed televisions as the ‘first screen’ (e.g. the screen that people spend the most time viewing each day). While the study was US-focused, it’s likely pointing to a trend that holds true across the developed world – and one that has major ramifications for schools and their marketing strategies. In short, if applicants are spending the vast majority of their daily screen time in front of their iPhones and Android devices, schools need to think carefully about how they are serving their content on mobile devices. It so happens that Southwark is currently running a study to examine the ways that leading business schools reach today’s mobile device-oriented applicants. Stay tuned for much more on this topic.

Finally, we will close this week’s edition of WMW with a set of resources and articles focused on using LinkedIn for marketing. While the articles available run the gamut (from how to set up your personal LinkedIn profile to building a LinkedIn Group or business page), there is likely something for everyone here. Check out the Social Media Examiner’s compilation of short LinkedIn strategy articles here.

That’s the news for this week. Thanks once again for tuning in and sharing your love of WMW with the higher ed universe!