Hey everyone! Happy Friday, we made it another week. Social is a grind…and I hope you’re able to disconnect a little this weekend. One thing I always say is that the better you can disconnect, the better content you can (and will) create. So disconnect and enjoy the weekend!

Today’s issue is a good one. We’re diving into social strategy advice and I share some other goodies.

In this issue, we will go over the following:

Let’s dive in.

-Sam

Someone recently asked me what my favorite thing about working in social media was.

And it’s this 👇

I seriously love developing brand social strategies.

I love breaking down a brand strategy and catering it to social media to bring it to life. I love developing channel strategies. I love developing campaign strategies across social, creator, and partnerships. I love crafting a social DNA and strategy that drives brand, community, and commercial growth. I love developing strategy decks. And I love pitching strategies and presenting my work.

So today I want to provide some social media strategy reminders. Because I am constantly in the strategy world - whether I am crafting strategy or speaking to it.

So If you recently joined a new brand and started a new role. Or if you’re just doing a routine social media strategy update, then lock in. This is for you.

Your social strategy should match brand strategy. Why? Because brand is social. Social is brand. Your social media strategy is simply an extension of your brand strategy, and therefore should greatly align with the brand strategy itself. So when you are crafting your social media strategy, make sure it does align. Your social vision should support the brand vision. The social pillars should also align with brand pillars. Your social voice should be the exact same as the brand voice (with maybe a few tweaks).

Your social media strategy deck and strategy is NOT just for you. This is the biggest realization I have had over the years. When you are developing a brand social media strategy, it’s really not just for you. It’s also for executive leadership, your manager, and cross-functional team members. Your strategy is also there to get buy in, to inspire your team members, and to unlock resources to execute against it. When you present your social media strategy to your peers, the goal is to have them so inspired by your vision, strategy that they are asking you how much money you need to execute.

Your social media strategy is there to prevent micromanagement. When you present your social media strategy to leadership and team members - you gave them a chance to chime in and voice their opinions on your social strategy. Once it’s approved and bought in, you are then in execution mode. Your strategy gains trust. Once you have trust, there should be less micromanagement (emphasis on should). Your social media strategy is your offensive playbook for social execution, but also your defense to internal team members.

Provide Action Items. Your social media strategy should provide action items. You went through your social vision, channel strategies, tone of voice, community strategy, and more. So now what? Make an action item list. What resources do you need? Who needs to approve those resources? Your peers are so excited about your strategy…but what’s next? Make it clear on what needs to be done after presenting your social strategy to bring it into execution mode.

Establish primary and secondary social channels. If you don’t have unlimited resources and bandwidth, then you will most likely need to establish primary and secondary social channels. Because you can’t do it all. At the end of the day, your brand needs to be the most active on platforms where your community is the most active. You need to be community inspired. So make it clear in your strategy on what platforms will take the most energy, time, and strategic resources. And then the platforms where you will simply maintain.

I could make a list of 100+ reminders for you when crafting social media strategies. And maybe i’ll share more in the near future. But when you are crafting and presenting your social media strategy, keep these 5 things in mind. I hope you found this helpful today!

Before you go…here are a few quick hitters for you.

✍️ View the archive. Learn more about social media topics across strategy development, career development, social insights, and more in the archive. New issues weekly

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Thanks for reading and hope you have a great week!

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