Beyond the Feed: What Social Media Management Looks Like

What do social media managers actually do? If you’ve ever been mistaken for an “influencer” or asked why social media should cost more than $12 an hour, this episode is for you.

Laney Goff is joined by Ella Gunnell to unpack the most frustrating—and funny—misconceptions about working in social media. From being left out of the marketing conversation to constantly educating clients on algorithm updates, Laney and Ella share what really goes on behind the scenes.

Whether you're a social media pro or a business leader looking to better understand the value behind the role, this episode brings both insight and laughs.

Prefer to listen while multitasking? Hit play and let’s break down the truth about one of the most misunderstood jobs in digital marketing.

Transcript

Laney Goff: Welcome back to the Untamed Social Podcast. This is episode 10 and today, Ella Gunnell is back with us. Welcome back. We're so excited!

Ella Gunnell: I am here.

Laney Goff: I don’t know if everyone else is but I am.

Ella Gunnell: This is my second episode back, so getting into the groove of things.

Laney Goff: It's your season two debut, right? Did you do any in season two? Okay.

Ella Gunnell: I did one episode before this.

Laney Goff: Oh, darn. I thought I was gonna be the first one to get you on season two.

Ella Gunnell: I know, sorry to disappoint.

Laney Goff: Yeah. Um, Ella had a baby just to, to let that be known. That's why she hasn't been here, but she's back and she's back with Stella, which is all that matters. And today we're gonna talk about something really, really, in my opinion, funny. Um, because I, it makes me think about like, when somebody in my family asks me what do I do?

It's very hard for them to conceptualize my job. And so, I don't think that's obviously just my family, but I think that a lot of people have a misunderstanding about social media management in general. Um, so we're gonna bust some myths today and talk about what it actually looks like to be a social media manager.

Um, and I think that social media managers just don't get the credit that they deserve. I think one of the, the biggest myths out there is that if you're a social media manager, you're not in marketing. Like it's not considered marketing to a lot of marketing people, if that makes sense.

Ella Gunnell: Yeah, totally. I have to put this out there. I was a marketing major in college, um, and one of the reasons that I gravitated towards marketing, and I

chose it, is because I felt like it was pretty broad. Like there's branding, there's market research, there's, um, kind of like the advertising portion of it, right?

Like there's so many facets of it. And as I'm saying all of those things, we do every single one of those things on social media.

Laney Goff: Yes. Yeah, it's funny, I mean like, and it's so true. And I think that, I just posted a couple of weeks ago on LinkedIn, just a very simple static image that said like, dear social media managers, just in case you forgot, like you're marketers too. And it blew up. And there were so many people in social media who responded and resonated with that.

And I think that's just because we feel like we're like the underdog, kind of like that. And that's true too because I feel like sometimes brands don't take social media as serious as they should. Um, and so maybe that's kind of like the root of it. But at the end of the day, like, just like you said, we do everything.

Like it's so much more than just posting or scheduling content. It's literally brand strategy there. We have copywriters, proofreaders on our team, people who are in charge of community management. That's huge that a lot of people miss out on, or a lot of brands miss out on like, it's so much more than you could ever imagine.

Ella Gunnell: And it's funny too because part of marketing is knowing how and where you're gonna reach your ideal audience, your target, and people are just on social media more and more these days. So maybe that was true, like, you know, 10 years ago, 15 years ago, that like social media wasn't an important part of your marketing, but now it's like everything, like you have got to be on social media and it can't be an afterthought.

It has to be integrated into your marketing strategy that you already have.

Laney Goff: Yes. To be honest, I feel like we should be like. We should have already surpassed like priority for all other marketing, but, but that's really not the case. I mean, there are some brands who get it obviously, but there's a lot of brands out there who don't understand that and they're still investing in billboards.

Ella Gunnell: Radio ads.

Laney Goff: Buc-ee's is crushing it with billboards. I'll say that. But they can keep that going. But also like you're right, it's something where like times have

changed. Everybody's on social media. That's where they're consuming the majority of their like downtime. So why would you not take advantage of that and why are we still like the scum of the marketing?

Ella Gunnell: I know it's so true. I always am a little, hesitant not hesitant to tell people what I do, but everyone's like, oh, what do you do for a job? I'm like, social media management. Like I just know what's going through their head is like, oh, you like do silly little dances and like trending audios and stuff and you post it. I just, I know that people don't fully grasp what we do yet, so I think that we're talking about today is very important.

Laney Goff: It's so important. It's so important. I know the other day it's funny, people always get it wrong too. My pastor at my church was talking to people and he, he was like, this is Laney, she's an influencer. And I was like, nope.

That's so far from what I am, but we'll roll with it, it's social media, I guess we'll roll with it.

Ella Gunnell: Close enough.

Laney Goff: Yeah. It's funny. So obviously like that's, I feel like the number one kind of myth is like, we're not as important as, as people should view us as, but there's a lot of other things that people get wrong about social media management.

Ella Gunnell: Yeah, and I think that another big thing that people tend to get wrong, which kind of stems from their view that like social media isn't really marketing, is that social media management should be inexpensive. I think people still totally have this idea in their head. They're like, oh, I can just hop on Fiverr and I can just put, you know, go reach out to a little college student or high school student and have them manage my social media for like $12 an hour.

Laney Goff: Yeah.

Ella Gunnell: And if you wanna do that, that's great. Like, if that's all you care about is like having stuff on your page be posted, then that's great. But when it comes down to it, if you're gonna want like a strategy that actually moves the needle and actually does work for your brand in terms of like growing your audience, branding, all of that, you're gonna have to invest a little bit more.

Sorry to, sorry to break it to you.

Laney Goff: And sometimes a lot more. I mean, let's, let's be honest about it. Like, well, and I think that there's this misconception too, because there are a lot of like freelancer social media managers who do you know, this side work and that's great. Go for it, girl. I, that's how I started out, you know, like I'm all for that.

But at the end of the day. You know when you have like sort of a boutique agency, kind of like how we do things where we're very specialized, not in the sense of like we only work with one type of brand, but we're specialized in the sense that we have so many different people on our team who specialize in different things.

Like to me, like you'll always be our Instagram girl. Like if I ever have an Instagram question, you are the one who knows everything about it. I'm TikTok. You have people who are, you know, we've got our video editor, graphic designer, like everyone is really just an expert in their one thing, and we know who those people are.

So it makes us really unique and it offers more to what the brand needs. And that's what you're paying for. Like, it's not just us posting, you know, and doing, one person isn't doing everything. We've got 10 people touching one account in order for a week's worth of posts to go out.

Ella Gunnell: So true. It's impossible for one single person to be as good at all of those things as it is for like 10 people who specialize in their one thing. Like they, we just have really good people on our team who excel at what they do, and you're just not getting that same quality.

Laney Goff: Yeah, there's just no way like that you can do it all and know it all. I mean, and if you've got somebody who says that they know how to do everything and they're great at everything from beginning to end of posting, then I mean, I'm gonna question you because that's just really, that's too difficult. You know, like I, I can't pretend to know everything about Instagram 'cause I'm not on Instagram. It's just not the case.

Ella Gunnell: Yeah, so true.

Laney Goff: Yeah, and I feel like also like people, you know, you tell 'em the pricing of like a full service social media management package, and if you're quoting them three grand or higher per month, the sticker shock, I get it. But at the same time, like how much is it costing you to have somebody who's doing a very mediocre job who's taking on everything and they don't have the capacity to do all of that, and all you're doing is just showing up. You're not actually posting strategic, meaningful content that's gonna resonate with your audience. Then you're wasting money and you're also wasting the opportunity to grow and to build your brand and to get more awareness for it.

Ella Gunnell: Yeah, and here's, here's the other thing, besides just like, the level of expertise that we, a full service social media management company will provide. But it's sincerely just like the sheer amount of work that we do to create a social media for a business like, everything from building your strategy.

Um, we often help customers with their branding and help them get that narrowed down, like designing stuff for them. We do reports, analytics. We make all the assets for people a lot of times. Um, if we're not, then we often will edit for them. We write their content, we manage their community. Like we're in people's dms, like we are in the thick of it all the time.

Laney Goff: Yes.

Ella Gunnell: So that just like level of work, you're not gonna get for $12 an hour.

Laney Goff: Yeah, and obviously like if it wasn't a real thing, then we wouldn't be making money and we wouldn't be successful. So obviously, like if there's proof in the pudding that yes, it might seem like a lot of money, but the amount of work that goes into it, it pays off. And that's why we have brands that have been with us, you know, for a decade. Um, and I think that that just speaks volumes to the type of social media manager that you're choosing. You're gonna pay the price for what you're getting. Definitely.

Ella Gunnell: Absolutely. And for, you know, for some businesses that may not be worth it, but a lot of businesses come to us because they're ready to take it to the next step and actually start seeing results. And that's when you might wanna look at maybe, maybe it's time that I do hire a, a full service social media management company.

Laney Goff: Yeah, because most of them need it. Like I can't tell you how many times I'm scrolling and I see a brand and I'm like, wow, you could really, really benefit from like not having your secretary create your posts anymore.

Let's just step it up a notch. I promise it'll make all the difference. 'Cause like we said before, that's where everybody is like, I don't know why people are just skimming over that, that like they don't spend all of their time on social media.

'Cause we know they do.

Ella Gunnell: Yeah, for sure. I think that that leads us into another myth that people have, and that is that social media success is always measurable. This one is a little bit tricky to explain. Do you wanna try to...

Laney Goff: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think, um, like the number one thing that we get when we get prospects who are, you know, reaching out to us for the first time and they're like, you know, we wanna grow our following. We wanna get this many website clicks and this many book sales, and they've got all of these monetary goals and they've got number goals, but, what we always, always lead with is that like, go ahead and get that outta your mind because that's not why we are here. We're here to help you with brand awareness. Social media is so much different than say a commercial or a billboard or something like that, a radio ad. I mean, like, the, the principle is still the same.

Marketing is still the same no matter what, where like people need to hear or see something seven plus times in order to feel ready to invest in that product or service. But at the same time, like social media gives you an a, a much more approachable and easier access to that community. So that you are able to like, make that transition with them and they, they miss out on that and so they think, oh, okay, like if I just post this and it resonates and goes viral one time, we're gonna go crazy and we're gonna have all these sales and blah, blah, blah.

And it's like, no, that's not what we're looking for. We're looking for repeat offenders. We want people to come in and keep coming back. And then also share it with the people in their lives to say, hey, this product or this service changed my life. Let me show you it and to send it to them. So that's the type of virality you want, not necessarily views and numbers that way.

What you want is to have that awareness where you're always top of mind and the people who are your current customers are referring you out and doing that work for you.

Ella Gunnell: Yeah. And that kind of thing is, is harder to measure. And I think the other important thing to point out is that the numbers don't always mean what they think you mean. And our clients specifically, like you said, will often chase followers or virality or kind of these like big shiny numbers. Um, but the reality most of the time is that that doesn't mean a whole lot, especially if you're not, turning those numbers into conversions.

Laney Goff: Yeah.

Ella Gunnell: And it depends on what your goals are, and that's something that we can help you with. Like what are your goals and then what are the numbers that matter to help you achieve those goals? Because it's not always what you think.

Laney Goff: It's not, and I've been saying so much recently, the cost of a follower is so high right now. Not even just a follower. The cost of a like, I mean, people just aren't liking content the way that they used to. It seems like such a simple process to just double tap on something to like it. But people feel like their likes are like treasure.

I do. I mean, I'm not gonna lie. Like if I rarely like something on TikTok, if I'm scrolling and I see something that I'm like cracking up at, I'm more likely to send it to somebody than I am to tap the like button.

Ella Gunnell: Yep.

Laney Goff: Shares are obviously much more valuable, but at the same time, like when you have this in your mind that like followers are so important, blah, blah, blah, it doesn't matter when you're not.

You, you're not at the same level that you were in the past where it was so easy to gain a follower or to gain any type of engagement. So you have to work 10 times harder to get people to commit. And brands these days don't realize that. They think that it's, it's normal to just get a crazy amount of engagement or whatever, but that's actually not the truth.

So when you see numbers and you're like, wow, my following only went up 50.

50. It could, depending on what your, you know, current count is and, and how the audience is engaging with it, like that could actually be really transformational for a brand.

Ella Gunnell: Right, like imagine if just, you know, 10% of those people turn into customers, that's five new customers a month. Like that's very respectable depending on what business you're in, right?

Laney Goff: It is so true. It's so true. Um, but also in addition to that, one thing that I always think of when it comes to like metrics that you really don't consider is consistency. Any algorithm is going to like how you show up when you show up on their platform. And you have so many brands out here who are just willy-nilly, like posting when they get a second.

Or like if you've got a marketing team or a social media management team, like for instance, we have a consulting client and they have like a social media team. But that social media team also does a lot of other things and can't solely focus on the social media side of things. So they're falling behind.

There's no consistency behind what they're doing. And so I've come in to kind of like be that push for them to say, hey, I've been checking the content calendar. Why isn't the content already scheduled for next week? And so, because I've been there to help support on that end of things, that consistency has helped them tremendously.

But you don't see that because all you're thinking is numbers as far as followers and engagement. But at the end of the day, when you're showing up consistently, that's pleasing the algorithm and that's just gonna push you out further.

Ella Gunnell: Yeah, absolutely. And when we talk about one of the most important aspects of social media management, which is building your brand. That's not really something that's measurable, and it's not something that happens overnight. It's something that takes small, sustained efforts over time, over and over again, every day, every interaction, every, you know, reply to someone, every post, every story that is gonna build your brand, um, and help people to perceive your brand in the way that you want. And like Laney said, like that requires time and consistency. And that's something that, you know. That's not really measurable, but it's so important.

Laney Goff: Yes. Like we, I remember, so we used to, and I don't even know if we talked to you about this since you came back, but it might have happened before you went on maternity leave, but, so when we would bring on a new client, we would still do like monthly dashboards of first month we would do a dashboard, show them the numbers, what increased, what decreased, whatever.

And finally I was like, why? Like why are we giving them this? Well, we know for a fact that there's not gonna be a huge shift in that first 30 days. We always say it's gonna take three to six months. So now if we get a new client, we're doing dashboards, not until that third month that we're working together, because why are we gonna show you numbers that we know you're not gonna see any results in that first 30 days.

And a lot of brands have to understand that just like you said, it takes time and nobody wants to, nobody has the patience for it, which is a problem.

Ella Gunnell: Yeah.

Laney Goff: That's why you hire us. Just sit back and let us do our thing.

Ella Gunnell: We got it. That's the thing too, is I think that, this isn't, um, I think a, this isn't one of our myths that we had already discussed, like going into this episode, but I think a lot of people don't realize how much we can take off their plate. They still think like oh I have to like be in charge, but you'll just like post for us. Like, no, we pretty much take it like all off your plate. Like please just let us.

Laney Goff: I mean, like obviously we, we communicate, we communicate a lot. Let's be honest. I mean, any, any client that we have, we are in constant communication with them. Um, and mainly like, I feel like the one thing that we ever need from our clients is just content. And it doesn't even necessarily have to be like fully polished, ready to go content.

We just need something. Like we just need the raw assets and then we're good to go. If you can give us that we're done, like you sit back. And then you just reap the benefits of all of our hard work and your money.

Ella Gunnell: Yeah, I feel like we've had a lot of clients say that to us. Like, oh my gosh, I'm just so happy that like, like it's just so much easier now. I'm not having to worry about anything. Like Strella just takes care of it all for us and that's...

Laney Goff: Yeah. And in fact we were talking about that today in our creative meeting about that client who was asking questions and it was obvious that like they have not even looked at their social media. We've been posting for them for years, two years, and it's clear that at least recently they have not even looked to see what we've been posting because they trust it so much.

And I feel like that says a lot. And that's exactly what we want for a client, is for them to fully trust us and to know like, you don't have to worry about a thing.

You're still growing, the money's still coming into your pocket. You're seeing those conversions, but you're not having to do the work behind all of it, which is a lot of work. Speaking of. Okay so I know that we've hit on lots of different things that like our team does when it comes to social media management. But one of the biggest myths, my cousin, I always think about my cousin, she's like, all you do is over there and you click-clack on your keyboard and you type and you, you're on your phone and you're posting and it's like, that's not all we do.

So that's definitely the fourth myth that I feel like social media managers get a lot is that all we do is sit on social media and all we do is post.

Ella Gunnell: Do we love social media? Yes, we do. But like for example, the other day we have a client. Um, I, you know, we're pretty involved in our clients' processes. We're trying to be experts on our clients because we want that to come through in our work. Um, so I listened to, you know, a whole podcast episode from him cutting clips out of that. Um, I was texting him, talking to him about a new video that I wanted from him and he sent it to me and we're texting back and forth. So there's just a lot of stuff that goes into it behind the scenes.

Um, that you might not expect, but it takes a lot for even just one piece of content to go out.

Laney Goff: Yeah, and I think that's the foundation of like the first thing that we do when it comes to bringing on a new client. It, it's not about posting. We literally dive so deep into the market research to fully. Like take on the brand and to understand their messaging, their tone, their voice, all of those things.

And so for us, like that's marketing, like it, it's not necessarily social media management. It doesn't have a piece of content to go along with it. What we're doing is we're, we're crafting the message so that we can relay it to their audience in a way that number one sounds like them, but also is gonna get people to convert from just viewing their content to being a follower to then clicking the link and then investing in the product or service.

Um, so that's, I think, like I think about that all the time. I'm like, tell me again, I'm not a marketer, and I'll show you all the work that goes into onboarding a new client and you'll think differently.

Ella Gunnell: I was gonna say, if people just saw our little onboarding sheet that we do with all of the, the questions and stuff that we ask, they would change their tune very fast. Because, I mean, we, we dive deep into these, people's brands and sometimes the clients, we ask questions, our clients don't know the answers, and so we kind of have to help them through that.

Okay. Like, what do you envision? What are your goals? And we help them with those branding questions. So like we help, we, we are helping with brand building before we're even posting any content. Like before we even have officially signed that contract, we're helping the client to kind of know what they wanna do and what their goals are and like to build out that roadmap for them.

Laney Goff: Yeah, definitely. So brand building's a huge one, and then it makes me think like educating, I feel like I'm a teacher half the time. I mean, I was just talking to a client today and she was like, you know. I don't really care. I mean, not to expose somebody, but they're, she said, I don't really care about the current audience.

How do we get a new audience? And it's like, well, you should be caring about the current audience because if they're not engaging with your stuff, it's not gonna get pushed out to new people. And so I'm having to educate her on an algorithm and, and what it takes to actually get more reach with your content.

And that is the majority of what I feel like we spend our time doing is educating.

Ella Gunnell: This is what we need. Well, why? Okay. Here's why.

Laney Goff: Every time. Every time. And it's, and they fight it. They fight it so much. They really do.

Ella Gunnell: To all our clients listening, we love you.

Laney Goff: We love you so much. And it's not just you, it's all of you.

Ella Gunnell: It's all of you.

Laney Goff: Literally, all of you. Um, but I also think that comes into, you know. I guess yes to this myth more than anything, it's something that we have to fight against a lot, or at least advocate for ourselves, is that we're not just executors, is that the word? I always say that. Sometimes I say executioners, but I mean executors.

Like we don't just like do the thing, we're strategists. Like there's so much more that goes into it. And even our current clients now, we still have to remind them of that, that like, we're not just like doing exactly what you told us we're we're strategists as well. And so that's a tough one. Sometimes being a social social media manager, and I think that if you are a social media manager, you really need to have that distinction for your clients.

Like are you just a doer or are you somebody who is doing all the work behind it? The strategy, the brand building, the educating that comes along with that.

Ella Gunnell: Very true, yeah. I mean, that, that goes into a law of, of what we do. Do you want someone that is just gonna post, you know, post and log out and be done? Because if you're going to, if you're gonna want results, then that's, that's not the way that you get them unfortunately.

Laney Goff: Or you better be willing to pick up the slack and start engaging and, and doing all the other things that, uh, a more comprehensive social media management company is gonna do. Like us.

Ella Gunnell: Like us.

Laney Goff: What we're saying is, hire us.

Ella Gunnell: This is our official resume.

Laney Goff: Yes. I think we nailed it, honestly.

But yeah, I mean, I think that, um, being here's a just like, maybe like an ending, sorry, also not in the notes of the outline for today, but I'm curious to know, because somebody was talking to me about this the other day, like what do you feel like the future of social media management is going to be? Like, somebody asked me, how long do you think that this is something that you are going to do?

Ella Gunnell: Me personally?

Laney Goff: Yeah, like, like their idea was like it was gonna go away. That like being a social media manager was not gonna be a thing after a period of time. I don't agree with that, but.

Ella Gunnell: I don't agree. I mean, I, I can understand some of the arguments for AI there. There's a lot of things that AI can do. There's not a lot of things that AI is good at, especially when it comes to a more creative part, which is a lot of social media, like how things look, how things sound, um, like video editing.

I don't know. I know AI can do all of that stuff. I just don't, I don't personally feel like the brands who get it and the brands who understand that, like social media is about human connection, um, they're not gonna be the ones that are gonna be using AI, right. So. I think social media is a forever thing, and I also think that it is honestly just gonna get bigger. I don't see it getting smaller anytime soon.

Laney Goff: Yeah. I just feel like we're, we're in a phase where TikTok's really been around for solidly for five years. Give it another five years. There'll be a brand new platform, and then there'll be another one that we have to learn and that everyone's flocking to for sure.

Ella Gunnell: But that's the other good thing about a social media manager is that you as the client don't have to worry about that because we've got it. Like if for some reason TikTok does go away and we get a new platform or what, whatever it is, right? It's all gonna look different in 10 years from now. You don't have to worry about that.

Laney Goff: Right.

Ella Gunnell: We got it. Like we've got that covered.

Laney Goff: We learn it immediately.

Ella Gunnell: Yes, we're immediate.

Laney Goff: That's, lemme just keep thinking of things. But yeah, that's something that we do too outside of just posting is I can't tell you how much, like every day I'm reading articles of what's going on with Blue Sky or with the TikTok ban or all of these things, and we're constantly having to stay up to date on like where people are, are at what type of content they're consuming.

It's so much. People don't realize it. So if you have, that's right. If you have a social media management company that you work with, I'm telling you like you've invested well and it's worth it if you're on the fence about it. Number one, we'd love to talk to you. Um, you can always book a discovery call with us, um, and we're happy to just have a free 20 minute call to talk about what issues are you having, what kind of goals are you looking at meeting, and how we can help you get there.

And, obviously we do customized plans, so it's not a one number for every type of brand. It's really dependent on your platforms that you wanna be on, their frequency, how often you wanna post things like that. Um, so yeah, appreciate your social media managers. Well, I'm so glad that I got to do the podcast with you.

Maybe we'll be together again in season three.

Ella Gunnell: Let's do it, that would be fun.

Laney Goff: Alright guys thanks for tuning in and we'll see you later.

Ella Gunnell: Bye.