1. Tell us which social media brand strategy has inspired you lately and why?
Talk about why the strategy inspired you but, more importantly, also detail how you would love to create an original strategy of the same caliber. Explain how you would do this and implement it in the context of the job you're interviewing for.
2. Tell me how do you measure the effectiveness of a social media campaigns?
Social media managers need to know how to define success for social media campaigns. Do you utilize social media campaign tools such as Klout? How do you use KPIs and analytics to prove the success of your campaigns? Need to add some tools to your kit? Check out this post.
3. Do you know what are our competitors doing on social media?
It's ok to praise the competitors here if they are genuinely doing something good. Don't go overboard and make it seem like you'd rather work for these competitors but don't be afraid to be honest if you think they have a strategy that the company you're interviewing for could learn from. Always be sure to explain why what they are doing is working (or not working). Mention specific social media campaigns if you can.
4. Tell me how would you improve our company's social media presence?
There's no one right answer to this. The best answer will come from doing your homework. Research your potential employer's current activities across all channels. Then, produce a plan, with action items and metrics for success.
5. Tell me which social media brand strategy has inspired you lately?
Show that you know about the social media efforts of major brands. Glamour Magazine, for instance, is taking advantage of Google Hangouts to engage their fans in ways that print cannot. This Hangout campaign by Glamour features staff, online personalities, and brands, while cleverly and subtly advertising products.
6. Explain what are your favorite social media blogs?
This is another question where there is no right answer. Be prepared to explain why you picked your sites though. If you don't follow any blogs, try browsing a few so you'll at least be prepared for this question.
7. Tell me how Would You Respond To A Social Media Crisis?
The social media world can be a very dynamic and opinionated place, meaning that there are plenty of opportunities for something to go wrong. Your potential boss wants to know that you can keep cool in these situations and deal with it accordingly.
Make sure you state that you would stay calm and inform the correct parties if necessary – they want to know that you wouldn't crumble under the pressure! So maybe bring up a previous occasion when something went wrong for you and how you resolved it – giving an example can be a brilliant way of proving you've got what it takes.
8. Explain me what are some of the best practices on Twitter?
Always use hashtags and mentions! Doing this will mean more people see your tweets and retweet. Some of these people might have big followings or clout that will benefit your company. Twitter is a great tool for conversing with customers so make sure to reply to their tweets as much as you can. Use hashtags to connect the conversation with other conversations in related topics.
9. Tell me do you have a blog?
If the expert answers ‘no', that may be OK. Follow up with something like ‘Oh, you're using Posterous instead?'. If they look at you blankly, end the meeting there. No sense wasting your time.
If the expert answers ‘yes', get the address and go look. If they've been blogging for less than 2-3 years, and there's no explanation like “I had to move my blog”, again, end the meeting.
Any social media expert has been somehow participating in the conversation for a long time.
10. Do you know facebook EdgeRank and how you would use it for our company?
Because EdgeRank is complicated, this question serves as a litmus test in social-media job interviews.
11. Explain me how do you measure social return on investment (ROI)?
Use tools like the Conversion Measurement tool on Facebook and Optimized CPM. Your website will also often have analytics used to measure social media ROI. Lastly, some of the platforms themselves such as LinkedIn have their own analytics. The fundamental measures are the same as in other areas of marketing: clicks, likes, shares, purchases, change in attitude, etc.
12. Tell us what Attracted To You A Job In Social Media?
This is probably one of the first questions many social media employers will ask – they want to know that you've got passion and commitment to the industry, and asking you what attracted you to social media can be a brilliant way of working it out.
A good answer would be to state that it's an up and coming industry with plenty of room to progress and enhance your skills. This shows that you're in it for the long haul and you're a candidate that thrives under pressure – they want someone who will actively seek out ways to improve themselves.
13. Do you know how does social media impact SEO?
“It doesn't”. Slap them and tell 'em that's from Ian.
“It builds links”. That's half the answer.
“It builds relationships that turn into links later”. HIRE THEM NOW.
14. Explain me how much SEO knowledge and experience do you have?
SEO is a desireable skill for social media marketers and marketers in general since companies always want their content to rank as high as possible on a Google search. Explain how social media helps make this happen by boosting Key Performance Indicators (KPIs…you should know what these are!), making content more share-worthy and perhaps even viral, stressing keywords, and by simply increasing the amount of content attached to a brand. Talk about how you always factor SEO into any social media strategy and detail exactly how you did it in the past.
15. Do you know how do you measure ROI?
“Oh, shut up”. Perfectly OK, especially if the expert turns purple for a moment first. They're just sick of hearing this question, which means they've been around the block a few times.
“It's complicated, but here's a high-level view…”. Nice!!!
“I track clicks from Twitter”. Nope, sorry.
16. Tell me what social networks do you specialize in? Why are these networks right for my business?
Every social network is not right for every industry. Just ask anyone in the pharmaceutical industry how they could possibly engage in drug marketing on Twitter. The reality is that most organizations can take full advantage of the networks out there, but if there are limitations, you want your social media professional to be aware of them.
17. Tell me how would you improve our company's current social media campaign?
The answer for this questions proves you have spent time researching the company's current social media campaigns, and have taken the time to find workable solutions for any problems with the current campaign.
18. Explain me what Social Media Campaigns Have You Been Part Of/Managed?
If you're applying for a social media job, then your prospective employer will probably want to see/hear about what you've done in the past. They'll want to see how you can use social media on a commercial level – so this is a brilliant chance for you to showcase your talents.
A great way to tackle this question would be to tell them about a project you've ran or assisted with and talk about the success of this. Remember to focus on stats in particular – if you increased the engagement of your social media platform, make sure you state by how much. You want to wow your potential employer by your past achievements, so make sure you've got some stats at the ready.
19. Do you know what are the benefits of a LinkedIn group vs. LinkedIn page?
Groups tend to have a better reach and are therefore a more worthy place for sharing content. They also offer an excellent space for engaging with customers and other businesses, stresing keywords, and increasing interest in your company. A LinkedIn Page is where people go when they are already interested in the company. Thus, it should be informative above all else. Pages also function as a feed for putting out content and have at least a bit of SEO value.
Every business and organization is not the same, so a one-size-fits-all social media strategy is generally a bad idea. If you're in non-profit, you might want to look for a social media professional with experience in that sector. If you operate in a regulated industry such as pharmaceutical, tobacco, alcohol, finance, insurance, or a host of others….it would be a good idea to find a professional who has significant experience in your industry and understands any limitations or restrictions.
21. Tell me how do you use Facebook EdgeRank to increase the success of a social media campaign?
Facebook EdgeRank is the algorithm Facebook uses to determine where posts show up in a user's newsfeed. It is important every Facebook post has the highest EdgeRank possible. How can you use affinity, user interactions, and timeliness to increase a post's EdgeRank?
22. Tell me how often do you write?
“I hate writing”. Cough.
“Oh, I try to but I don't have much time”. Cough. Cough.
“Every day”. A winner!
Social media engagement doesn't end when you publish your Facebook page or launch your Twitter account. Heck…creating those channel profiles is often the easiest part of the process. The community engagement/management process that follows is the more difficult (and more expensive) element. It's important that you know how your social media professional approaches community management and what strategies and tactics they will use to interact with the members of your community (a.k.a your customers, members, employees, etc…)
24. Fresh Social Media Executive Job Interview Questions:
☛ What are you passionate about?
☛ How would you add value to our social media department?
☛ Which social media experts or influencers do you follow?
☛ How would you handle a crisis on social media?
☛ What are some of best practices on social media?
☛ Which social media brand strategy has inspired you? Why?
☛ What innovative things are our competitors doing on social media?
25. Company Based Social Media Executive Job Interview Questions:
How will the candidate use social media for the company? Has the candidate reviewed the company's current social media presence and formed an opinion?
☛ For our business, would Twitter or Facebook be more effective?
☛ Why would we want to continue using MySpace?
☛ Why should we use social media?
☛ What would be the first thing you would do if hired for this position? What would your goal be for the first month? The first year?
☛ Would you use Facebook Like or Facebook Recommend on our site?
☛ What social sites should our company have a presence on?
☛ How would you integrate social media into our site? What buttons or widgets would you recommend?
☛ What percentage of our referral traffic would you think our site should get from social media sites?
☛ Give our company a grade on our current social media efforts.
☛ How would a social check in site benefit our business?
☛ What tabs should we have on our company Facebook page? Which one should be default?
☛ How do you define social media reach? What is the current social media reach our of our company?
☛ What are 5 things you would recommend to us to do immediately in the social space?
26. Industry Based Social Media Executive Job Interview Questions:
In this section of the interview, you will learn how involved the candidate is in the industry. Is he/she looking for a job or a career?
☛ What is Web 2.0?
☛ What does Web 3.0 look like?
☛ What's the “next big thing?”
☛ What is the difference between social media and social networking?
☛ What do you think of social media consultants?
☛ What's the scariest part of social media?
☛ What's the most exciting part of social media?
☛ What social media blogs do you read? What research do you follow?
☛ Who's your favorite social media expert?
27. Analytics & Marketing Based Social Media Executive Job Interview Questions:
A good portion of social media is marketing related. Does the candidate understand these marketing elements and the tactics necessary to apply them to social media?
☛ How do you measure success on social media?
☛ What metrics do you use to measure the effectiveness of social media?
☛ How would you tell that a social media campaign has failed?
☛ What key performance indicators would you recommend to report on social media efforts?
☛ Write down a table of contents for a social media strategy.
☛ What elements should go into a social media marketing plan?
☛ Why would we want to pay for social media advertising?
☛ What are the best types of things to advertise on a social networking site?
☛ What analytics software packages have you used?
☛ Describe the most successful social media campaign you have ever seen. What made it so successful? Could you duplicate that level of success?
☛ Describe a social media campaign you ran from start to finish.
☛ Provide an example of a social media campaign you are current running. Show me what channels it is in. Describe the next steps for your campaign.
☛ What are the elements that make a video go viral?
28. Trends Based Social Media Executive Job Interview Questions:
☛ How do you monitor trending topics?
☛ Who are the leading topic influencers in this industry?
☛ How do you stay current on all the shifts and innovations in social media?
☛ Are there any hot new social media platforms on the horizon we should be aware of?
29. Strategy Based Social Media Executive Job Interview Questions:
☛ What is your strategy for social media and content?
☛ What sites do you think the company should be on that we are not?
☛ How would you design an optimal social media experience for our customers/users?
☛ How do you use and leverage the benefits of both LinkedIn Groups and LinkedIn Pages?
☛ How do you measure the success of a social media strategy?
30. Technical Social Media Executive Job Interview Questions:
How much of the underlying social media technology does the candidate understand? These questions determine the level of technical knowledge of the candidate.
☛ Explain the difference between Facebook Like and Sharing on Facebook.
☛ If you're planning a vacation and will be out of touch and not able to get online for a week, what tools would you use to ensure social media updates are being posted?
☛ Write three headlines for news stories that you think will have tremendous success on social media. What makes the headline successful? Write a headline for a successful article about our company.
☛ How often should we update Twitter?
☛ How do you handle criticism of a company online?
☛ What would you do if someone started a parody account poking fun at our company?
☛ What is your policy for moderating comments?
☛ Would you pay a blogger to write favorably about our company?
☛ How would you show unique content only to fans on our Facebook page?
☛ Who in our organization should be blogging on behalf of the company?
☛ What is a “sneezer”?
☛ How would you perform competitive analysis in the social space?
☛ What do think about software applications that autofollow or try to get get large masses of friends on social network sites?
☛ What do the statistics look like for a healthy Facebook fan page?
☛ Explain what a retweet is.
☛ What is RSS? Why is it important?
☛ Have you ever gotten a piece of content onto the front page of Digg?
☛ How frequently do you update Facebook and Twitter?
31. Analytics Based Social Media Executive Job Interview Questions:
☛ How do you measure the ROI of a specific social media campaign?
☛ Do you have experience with Google Analytics?
☛ Does social media affect SEO? How?
☛ What social media monitoring, analytics and publishing tools do you use?
☛ What type of experience did you have at your previous job with analytics, trends, etc., and how did you improve website traffic?
32. Personal Social Media Executive Job Interview Questions:
☛ Which social media sites do you recommend for businesses? Why?
☛ What social sites do you use personally? Why?
☛ How does your personal social media presence impact your employer?
☛ What social media pages or profiles have you created and managed in the past?
☛ What conversation domains do you focus on?
☛ What is a limitation you experienced on a social media platform? How did you surpass it?
33. Community-related Social Media Executive Job Interview Questions:
☛ How do you energize the community?
☛ How would you handle user/customer complaints?
☛ How do you personalize a large scale social presence?
☛ What's the difference between targeted and large audiences? Which is better? Why?
☛ How do you monitor comments and brand mentions on social media sites?
☛ How do you identify brand advocates?
☛ How would you use Google+ communities?
☛ How do you define engagement?
34. General Social Media Executive Job Interview Questions:
These are general social media questions for you to determine a level of knowledge from the candidate regarding social media and social networking.
☛ What are some of the challenges explaining social media to non-technical executives? How do you overcome objections about social media?
☛ If you were working at a firm which blocked employee access to Facebook, Twitter, and other social sites, do you think this is a good policy? If not, how would you convince the executive team to open up access for employees?
☛ What is the difference between moderating something and facilitating something?
☛ What are your strengths in social media?
☛ What are your weaknesses in social media?
☛ Which social bookmarking sites do you use?
☛ What social media tools do you use?
☛ What is your biggest mistake you've made in social media? How did you fix it?
☛ Have you ever held a live event in the social space? How would you market a live online event? How would you structure the event?
☛ How do you manage an online reputation? If one of our executives had a bad online reputation (bad press, etc) and wanted to fix it, what would you recommend?
☛ If we had a business crisis, what social media channels would you use to communicate through? How would you manage the messaging?
☛ What areas of social media would you recommend outsourcing?
☛ What are the risks with becoming involved in social media?
☛ Which is the best social check-in site?
☛ Are you the mayor of any place?
☛ What do you do offline to increase your online knowledge?
You could just answer this by saying that you used a different platform to cover the shortcomings of the other. This isn't a bad answer. In fact, it can be part of a good answer. However, you should definitely know how to overcome or at least deal with limitations on social media platforms. For example, Facebook has severe limitations when it comes to organic (non-paid) reach. One way to overcome this without paying on Facebook is to use email marketing and subscription-based methods to gently guide people to the page with links and suggestions (a strategy recommended by Facebook Marketing Expert Mari Smith).4 If you have your own awesome anecdote already, that's even better!
