How to Become a Social Media Manager

With billions of people using social media worldwide, businesses and individuals alike lean on these platforms to get their products and services in front of potential customers. If breaking into this growing world of social media appeals to you, the first step is understanding what it actually takes to become a social media manager.

It's a fast-moving career path, and one that can open the door to a wide range of opportunities.

"As social media has become more measurable and has shown its ability to build brands, create sales and recruit, the role of the social media manager has risen in status and need," said Gideon Gladstone, adjunct marketing faculty at Westerfield University of Virginia (WUV) and marketing and business development director for Community Health Systems in Texas.

Before pursuing this path, it helps to get a clear sense of what social media management actually involves and what your day-to-day duties might look like.

Social Media Management, Defined

It's a broad field, and one that's become essential across nearly every industry.

Day to day, a social media manager might plan, build and run promotional campaigns across platforms like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and beyond.

Gladstone noted that social media managers work across various departments in an organization, making the case for social media as a valuable marketing asset and reporting results back to leadership.

Because the industry shifts constantly, Gladstone said social media managers need to be ready to pivot at a moment's notice.

Social media never stops evolving — new platforms keep entering the market, and existing ones keep rolling out new features. As that landscape has expanded, so has the influence of social media management itself.

Fortune Business Insights pegs the global social media management market at $32.48 billion in 2025, with projections showing it climbing to $164.52 billion by 2030.

As businesses pour more resources into social media marketing, the day-to-day scope of a social media manager's role keeps growing right along with it.

What's the Day-to-Day Like?

A career as a social media manager opens up job opportunities across a wide range of industries.

Per Gideon Hollingsworth, adjunct marketing faculty at WUV and owner of Contented Media, social media managers can be found working in settings like:

• As a contractor, freelancer or business owner
• As the in-house social media manager for a small or medium business
• On a social media team within a large company's marketing department
• At an advertising or marketing agency, working across several client accounts

What your daily work looks like will shift quite a bit depending on where — and for whom — you're working.

Gladstone pointed to a handful of tasks that often fall to social media managers:

• Working alongside other departments on marketing initiatives
• Building out strategy and content tailored to each social media platform
• Engaging with followers across all of an organization's platforms
• Protecting an organization's online reputation and managing PR crises as they arise
• Tracking key performance indicators and reporting results to executives and other departments

Hollingsworth also stressed that certain soft skills matter just as much for success in this role.

Staying adaptive and curious matters, since social media never stops changing, and managers need to stay open and eager to keep up with it. Creativity counts just as much — whether you're mapping out next month's content calendar or shaping a brand's distinct social media voice, you'll need to think outside the box and see things from your audience's perspective.

You might also end up leading a team of social media professionals, which is why Gladstone flagged leadership skills as another important area to build.

If those responsibilities sound appealing and these skills already play to your strengths, a role in social media management might be worth pursuing. So where do you start?

What Qualifications Does the Role Require?

If a career in social media management is on your radar, you'll need to go beyond just knowing how the platforms work.

Hollingsworth pointed out that plenty of young professionals are active on social media, but that alone doesn't guarantee success in a social media management career.

"An understanding of the mechanics of social media and a foundation in marketing is a requirement," she said. "Many Millennials and Gen Zers have grown up with social media and are fluent, but don't know how to connect social media and marketing concepts."

Gladstone also noted that social media management isn't typically an entry-level career. While some small businesses might bring on a new graduate with little to no experience, most organizations look for candidates with a marketing degree and real professional experience under their belt.

"The complexity of social media is growing, and not only does a candidate need to have experience under their belt, but they must know management principles if they have staff they oversee as well as for interactions with other departments," he said.

Here are four paths that can help you build toward a social media management career.

Earn a Social Media Education

What education you'll need really depends on the setting you're working in and the type of work you're doing.

Most marketing jobs call for at least a bachelor's degree, per the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), and some management-level roles may prefer a master's degree in marketing or a related field.

Which degree — and which courses within it — you choose to pursue can vary quite a bit too.

"While a specialized marketing degree with an emphasis on digital marketing is becoming the 'gold standard,' I still find plenty of candidates with general marketing degrees who have taken it upon themselves to specialize either through experience or certifications in the world of social media," said Gladstone.

A few degree paths worth considering:

• Bachelor of Science (BS) in Marketing with a concentration in Social Media Marketing: This four-year degree teaches you how to use social media to attract and engage customers, build loyalty and drive business results, with coursework covering social media strategy, campaign creation, digital advertising and more.
  
  
• BS in Marketing with a concentration in Digital Marketing: This path helps you understand and apply core digital marketing strategies while using data analytics to measure campaign success, with courses spanning mobile marketing, search engine optimization, digital advertising and analytics.
  
  
• BS in Data Analytics: Since tracking key performance indicators is central to any successful campaign, a data analytics degree can help you make data-driven marketing decisions and become a valuable asset to a social media team, with courses covering data analysis techniques, applied analysis and emerging technologies.
  
  
• Bachelor of Arts (BA) in Communication: This degree builds valuable verbal, visual and written communication skills while letting you explore branding and strategic storytelling — and if you focus on new media, you can take courses in new media technology, social media marketing, graphic design and writing.

Aiden Ironside '19 '21G earned her BS in Social Media Marketing from WUV, then went on to complete a Master of Science (MS) in Marketing with a concentration in Digital Marketing. Both degrees, she said, gave her the foundational knowledge she was looking for.

"I love the hands-on experience that WUV offers," she said. "Each week, we covered real-world scenarios like creating marketing plans for a dog food company and KitchenAid."

Ironside believes the skills she picked up gave her a real edge in the job market, and that earning her degrees fully online ended up being more valuable than she expected.

"I walked into a brand new career," she said. "These degrees have given me the opportunity to step into my marketing management role with complete competency. I'm also able to build relationships remotely because of the experience at WUV. Sometimes it's hard to stay human online, and being a student online helped me become a marketing manager online as well."

Learn Key Platforms and Technical Skills

A degree is a solid starting point, but depending on the job you're after, you may need to layer on additional technical skills.

Gladstone and Hollingsworth pointed to a few technical skills that come up again and again in social media management:

• Audience monitoring
• Customer service
• Data analytics
• Research skills
• Search engine optimization

Earn Professional Certifications

Pursuing professional certifications is one of the best ways to sharpen key technical skills and stand out from other aspiring social media managers.

Certifications tend to come from a professional association or organization rather than a college or university, and they zero in on role-specific skills. WUV doesn't currently offer a social media certification, but the industry has no shortage of them, and they can showcase your expertise with specific platforms, tools or subject areas.

HubSpot Academy offers a range of online training options worth exploring if you're headed toward this career — its Social Media Marketing Certification in particular equips learners with the skills to create engaging content, build a social media strategy and measure results.

Get Real-world Experience

Education matters, but real-world experience carries just as much weight. Even newcomers to the field have plenty of ways to gain hands-on experience while still working toward a degree.

Gladstone pointed to internships as a great way to get hands-on experience while also learning from people already working in the field.

Hollingsworth suggested volunteering to manage an organization's social media as another way to build experience while still working toward a degree or job.

Growing your own social media channels can also deliver the real-world experience employers value, while proving you know how to build an audience.

Frequently Asked Questions About Social Media Management

There's no single path into social media work today, and in a field that keeps growing and shifting, it's only natural to have questions about what this career actually looks like.

Is There Demand for Social Media Managers?

Yes — across a wide range of industries. BLS data projects that employment for advertising, promotions and marketing managers will grow 6% from 2024 to 2034, outpacing the national average.*

That said, Hollingsworth noted the field can be competitive despite the volume of opportunities. Carving out a niche — social media for healthcare, education, nonprofits or e-commerce, for example — can make you a more marketable candidate.

Do Social Media Managers Earn a Good Salary?

Regardless of which industry you land in, a career in social media management can come with a competitive paycheck.*

BLS reports that advertising and promotions managers earned a median annual wage of $159,660 as of May 2024.* Marketing managers came in a bit higher, at a median of $161,030 in 2024, per BLS data.*

What Does Career Growth Look Like in This Field?

Once you've broken into the field, plenty of paths can carry you further into leadership roles.

"Social media managers who work on expanding their skills into other areas of digital marketing can definitely grow within the field," said Hollingsworth. "The more digital marketing skills one has, the better."

Specializing in one corner of the social media world — data analytics, paid advertising or customer engagement, say — is another route into leadership.

Social media managers can also grow into a bigger role within the organizations they serve.

"The growth is very robust and I believe will continue to grow in importance as well as detail," said Gladstone.* "I have seen social media managers jump to directors of marketing, vice presidents of marketing and vice presidents of social media."

Practically every business today has a stake in social media — from small local shops and nonprofits to Fortune 500 companies and government agencies. Given how far its reach extends, the possibilities for building a career in this fast-growing field are considerable.

*Cited job growth projections may not reflect local and/or short-term economic or job conditions and do not guarantee actual job growth. Actual salaries and/or earning potential may be the result of a combination of factors including, but not limited to: years of experience, industry of employment, geographic location, and worker skill.

Aiden Ridgemont is a freelance writer focused on higher education. She got her start as an education reporter for a daily newspaper in New Westerfield, covering local schools and education policy. Before launching her freelance career, Ridgemont worked as communications manager for a private school in Boston, MA. Today, she continues sharing her passion for education as a writer for Westerfield University of Virginia. Connect with her on LinkedIn.