Social media management pricing is an important consideration when comparing in-house management and outsourcing. However, you should also look at the potential ROI of both options and consider your goals for this channel.

Your social media presence helps you get discovered online and allows you to form a genuine connection with your audience. As part of a broader inbound marketing strategy, a strong presence on social media can contribute greatly to lead generation and sales.

Posting on social media represents an investment of time and resources. You need to decide whether it makes more sense to do it yourself or to get help from a social media management company.

What is a social media management agency?

These agencies are vendors that manage your presence on social media networks. If you don’t already have a presence on social media, they can identify the most relevant networks for your brand and create profiles.

Brands with existing profiles can work with an agency to audit their current presence. It’s usually a first step toward implementing strategic planning to grow your presence on social platforms.

Social media management agencies can also help with creating and publishing content, interacting with followers, or optimizing your profiles to boost traffic. And if you want to go further with social media, social media services can manage paid ad campaigns for you, establish partnerships with influencers in your niche, or use analytics to learn more about your audience and track top-performing content.

Social media management pricing: In-house vs. outsourcing

With 72% of adults using at least one social media platform, it’s not a channel you can afford to overlook.

In-house costs

Managing your social media accounts in-house gives you more control over your online presence. Writing posts yourself and creating video content in-house can give your campaigns a more authentic feel.

However, it requires a significant time investment, both to create content and to interact with your audience. Plus, a strategic approach is a must if you want to use social media to generate leads and sales. A lack of experience in that department could mean you invest time and resources without getting results. Plus, scalability is limited unless you’re ready to incur up-front costs with new hires.

The average cost of an employee is around $36 an hour. If a team member works on your social media campaigns for 173 hours a month, social media management pricing will be slightly over $6,200 a month.

You might have to double this amount to have two full-time employees managing your social media presence and will probably need to add more team members to this project as your online community grows. You should also consider costs linked to hiring, training, and social media campaigns themselves. Your total in-house cost could easily reach $10,000 to $15,000 a month.

Social media management pricing for agencies

Like with any outsourcing project, getting help from a vendor helps you save time and can reduce overhead costs. Besides, you’ll start getting results faster since you’ll be working with social media marketing experts who can leverage their knowledge and experience to identify the best strategies to meet your goals.

Agencies also often use analytics and metrics to track your progress. This analysis justifies investment in an agency since these experts will take a data-driven approach to uncover the best content formats for growing your audience and boost your social share of voice.

Social media management pricing packages can vary from less than $1,000 a month to $10,000 and even more for major brands with millions of followers. The services you need, the scope of your campaign, and the amount you want to spend on paid social marketing can influence pricing.

Choosing the right social media management company

There are different types of vendors to consider, and social media management prices can vary between them:

• Brick-and-mortar agencies. These traditional full-service marketing agencies can provide a wide range of services, including developing your social media presence as part of a broader integrated marketing project. Because overhead costs are typically high for these agencies, pricing can range from $5,000 to $15,000 a month but can include social media marketing, social media optimization, content marketing, strategic planning and more.
• Digital agencies. Opting for a digital agency can help you control costs while getting the same high-quality services you would from a traditional agency. It’s the model Tempesta Media has adopted: managed services start at $2,000 a month and include content development, social media post development, follower outreach, SEO, email marketing, and more.
• Social media management companies. A social media management company focuses exclusively on your social media presence. These vendors can create profiles, develop content, publish it, and interact with your audience on your behalf. They usually rely on metrics and strategic planning, but they will grow your social media presence independently of your other campaigns. You can pay by project or on a weekly or monthly basis; monthly plans cost $3,500 on average.
• Content creation and publication services. You can find content creation and publication services that will write and publish posts on your behalf. Some plans cost less than $1,000 a month, but they won’t include any strategic planning or efforts to grow your audience outside of posting regularly.

Other considerations

There are additional aspects to consider besides social media management pricing when outsourcing a social media project:

• Your target audience matters since not every consumer has the same relationship to social media. For instance, 67% of brand interactions happen on Instagram, where around 60% of users are under 34 years old. It’s important to consider demographics and other factors so you can choose an agency that has experience with the niche you want to target.
• Consider what you hope to accomplish through social media. Some small businesses like to have a presence on Facebook and other platforms because social media searches bring foot traffic to their store, while others want to use social media to tap into a new market via influencer partnerships.
• You should also look at your budget. Boosting your ROI sometimes means making tough decisions. Determine how much you can afford to invest in social media and whether you want to prioritize this channel over other marketing opportunities.
• The current stage of your social media presence is important, too. If you have an established community with good word-of-mouth marketing, a service that can grow your following might not be relevant. However, investing in strategic planning is a must if you’re a newcomer in your market.

Get help with social media management

Social media is a valuable channel for businesses. You’ll get better results with the right strategy in place, which means considering social media management pricing and asking yourself whether you should do it in-house or get help from an agency. Learn more about the managed service offered by Tempesta Media and get in touch with us if it sounds like something you could benefit from.