Five Core Competencies or Skill-sets All Solopreneurs Need

We may get to a point in our business's growth where we can hire a VA, intern, or team member to help us with social media marketing – but for most of us in earlier growth stages, we are own social media managers.

While we already wear lots of hats in our businesses (sales, marketing, customer care, all the money stuff), it help to know the core skills that are looked for in serious, talented social media managers. That way we know what to look for when hiring that VA, or what skills we need to brush up on while doing it ourselves.

Here's a post from Jennifer Warren at Noobreneur that briefly outlines 5 core social media skill areas:

• Visual skills – posts with compelling, engaging graphics perform better. You don't need to be a graphic designer, but do know some basics (and then use a tool like Canva (affiliate) or Stencil).
• Customer service skills – don't forget social media is, well, social! Listen, answer questions, and engage. Customers frequently turn to social for assistance, and to vent.
• Content skills – know what's seen as valuable by your audience and don't forget basic, good writing practices.
• Advertising skills – it's become a pay-to-play, or be seen, world.
• SEO skills – part of the point of social media is to drive targeted, qualified traffic back to our home bases – our websites. Social media management needs to understand the connection between traffic, social, and SEO influences.

And I agree wholeheartedly with this statement on what kind of content we need to be producing and sharing …

… brands really need to think hard in terms of coming up with great content that resonates with the users. Images of cats and dogs might work sometimes, not always. You need to experiment. Provide value. Content, in every sense, should inform, entertain, save money, inspire and more.

Yes it's a short list of skills, and seems pretty straightforward. I know from experience and working with other solopreneurs that these skills aren't so simple to put into practice. As solopreneurs we can't master all of these alone or when we're just starting out.

Which areas do you feel it would serve you and your marketing best to work on? Leave a comment and let me know! I want to work on being more proactive with client and customer care via social media.

I suggest you pick one area to work on strengthening this year, or pick a competency you will hire out for. And keep coming back here as we work together to make our marketing mightier!