Social Media Business Ideas To Start Now And Make Money

Social media was originally designed for people to catch fun, make new friends, and keep up with old ones. But today, social media has gone way beyond that. It has grown to become a wide global market such that anyone with great social media skills is a potential millionaire. Over the years, many social media business ideas have emerged and many individuals have plugged into them.

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In Nigeria, unemployment is no longer an excuse as internet business has become the new normal. If you are considering a social media business idea, it’s a great leap that can help you achieve your entrepreneurship dream.

In this article, we expounded eight social media business ideas you can begin and start making money. The beauty of these businesses is that you don’t need huge startup capital. With your phone or an internet-enabled laptop and basic social media knowledge, you are already in business. It’s that simple.

Watch the full video on the different social media business ideas to start and how to start them here. Also, subscribe to our channel to get more business insights and ideas.

Eight Social Media Business Ideas You Can Start Now

1. Social Media Manager

You may have a full-time job or just climbing your career ladder and you realized your current job isn’t all you dreamed it would be. And you know you are good at using social media. Why don’t you consider doing social media professionally?

Well, the good news is, you can be a professional social media manager. Basically, a social media manager is responsible for planning, implementing, managing, and monitoring a company’s social media strategy in order to increase brand awareness and increase sales. As a social media manager, you can work independently with different clients or on a full-time basis with a reputable company.

Another interesting fact is that many businesses are always on the lookout for a good social media manager, so acquiring customers or getting hired is almost like a walk in the park.

The question then is: how good are you with social media accounts and how can you go from being an amateur social media lover to a paid social media manager?

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Here are a few tips to get you started:

i. Consider A Writing And Social Media Course

First and foremost, learn the fundamentals of writing and marketing. Learn as much as you can, then put what you learnt into practice by building a social media platform for yourself.

Subsequently, work with other people for free or charge a low fee so you can get some real experience to show off. Usually, a good social media course should cover writing, marketing, and how to manoeuvre your way around different social media platforms.

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ii. Get Familiar With Social Media Tools And Tech

There’s a science to social media outside of the creative and community engagement aspects. You also need to be familiar with the analytics side of things and use the insights and data you glean to reach a larger audience.

One way to be versed in this area is to stay up-to-date with social media management/marketing platforms. They include but are not limited to Buffer, Later, Hootsuite, Placeit, Planoly, Sprout Social, MeetEdgar, and CoSchedule.

iii. Find Brands You Admire And Follow Them

Make a list of companies and brands doing well on social media and follow them. Study how they craft their captions and organise their posts.

In addition, list out the brands you’ll like to work for, observe what their social media handles lack, come up with a solution that will help, and offer it to them. These brands may not necessarily be huge, established corporations, they may just be brands that need your expertise but don’t know until you approach them.

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iv. Learn The Art Of Storytelling

If there is one attribute you should master as a social media manager, it is the ability to tell brand stories in a way that resonates with their target audience. I’m sure you’ve heard this before – STORY SELLS.

If you can train yourself in this art, it’ll be one of your selling points that will drive customers your way. You can offer this service for free at first so that you can gain experience to reference when fishing for more customers.

2. Social Media Influencer

Social media influencer marketing is top of mind for many businesses today. Brands are beginning to leverage them now more than ever. This social media business idea is lucrative and it’s one business you should consider.

So, who is a social media influencer? Social media influencers are people who have built a reputation for their knowledge and expertise on a specific topic. Some influencers are popular on a single social media platform. For instance, Ntrepreneursng, Triciabiz, Naijabrandchick, and Hustlersquare are influential on Instagram in the area of business. Money Africa and Accounting Hub are also influential on Instagram in the area of accounting.

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To become a social media influencer, do the following:

i. Select A Niche

Before you begin your influencer business, you must first select a niche you are knowledgeable or passionate about and can consistently create content on. More importantly, you should have some level of expertise in the field to be able to establish yourself as an influencer. Your niche could be Entrepreneurship, Cooking, DIY crafts, Fashion, Inspiration, etc.

ii. Select Your Preffered Social Media Platforms

Like I said earlier, most influencers are more popular on only one platform. So, it is advisable to focus on one or two social media channels, learn everything about the platform, and optimise your social media profile.

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iii. Switch To Business Account

There’s little you can do with a personal social media account. It’s best to switch to a business account as that gives you the opportunity to use some advanced functions and to also run adverts. Platforms like Twitter, Instagram, Facebook have the option to create a business account in the profile settings.

iv. Make Your Bio Engaging

When people visit your profile, the first thing they see is your bio and it’s very important to make a good first impression. Thereafter, put up your profile and cover photo as both contributes to your brand identity.

v. Study And Understand Your Audience

Social media influencers are called influencers because they have a strong connection with their audience. They understand that they don’t cater to everyone, so they tailor their content to resonate with their audience.

To become an influencer, know who your target audience is and then gradually build your follower base. In your analytics, you will get the age, sex, and country of people following you. You can use such information to set up your long term strategy.

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vi. Post Engaging Content Consistently

Becoming an influencer is real hard work. Some of the influencers you know today started building their name five years before people started noticing them. For a start, you may have to get another source of income that’ll cater to your daily expenses.

Most social media platforms’ algorithm gives preference to accounts that post regularly. This is especially true for Instagram, which requires a regular posting for increased visibility. You can decide to post weekly or several times daily as you deem fit.

Practically, there are certain days and times of the week when you get maximum engagement on your post. If you take out time to study your audience, you will discover the best time to post your content.

Additionally, you must have a deep quest for knowledge. Keep improving your knowledge in the niche you choose as this will be one of the ways to show yourself as an authority.

Ensure that anyone that visits your platform learns something new and they’ll keep coming back. Once you gain huge followership, other business owners will begin to contact you to help advertise their brand if your target audience is the same as theirs. Some companies can also approach you to be their ambassador, and you can also make money by organising offline training.

See Also: 10 Ways To Improve Customer Engagement And Increase Your Revenue

3. Social Media Advertising Specialist

This is also one of the social media business ideas you can invest in. Summarily, Social Media Advertising is a form of digital advertising where paid ad campaigns are run on social media platforms such as Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. This is a lucrative business because 2.7million plus businesses use Facebook for advertising. Now imagine adding other social media platforms to your service offering.

See Also: DIY: A Practical Guide To Running Instagram Ads.

Actually, many business owners want to run ads on social media but don’t know how to go about it. So, if you can learn the modalities and costs involved in running social media adverts, then you can offer the service to businesses in need of it. There are different types of ads you need to be familiar with. They include stories ads, photo ads, video ads, carousel ads, and collection ads.

See Also: How To Start An Advertising Agency In Nigeria

Here are tips you need to be a successful social media advertising specialist:

i. Experiment on Organic Content First

Before running sponsored ads for your customers, experiment with them organically. If it works well organically, you can assume that it will work well with paid ads too as the target audience is fairly the same.

ii. Get Specific With Audience Targeting

One of the advantages of social media advertising is that it gives you targeting capabilities. You can target people based on their age, location, country, interests, and so on. Since paid adverts are goal-oriented, you can maximise results by getting really specific when choosing your audience.

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iii. Design Captivating Creatives

Don’t forget that there are millions of posts on social media and many social media users are passive scrollers. They continue scrolling through their news feed until a particular post catches their attention.

Let your post be that which make them stop to learn more. In other words, it is an added advantage if you can create great visuals yourself. However, if you are not a professional graphic designer, ensure you are in partnership with a good one. You can play around with colors, fonts, or images to grab their attention. In like manner, create attention-grabbing but relevant captions that would accompany the graphics.

If you successfully handle a brand’s sponsored ad and they get results, you can use that as a stepping stone to attract other prospective customers.

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4. YouTuber

This is also one of the highly recommended social media business ideas you can start. A YouTuber also called a YouTube Content Creator is a type of videographer that produces videos and share them on YouTube. Many say that YouTube is now saturated and it’s difficult to get yourself noticed unlike before.

As believable as that sounds, many YouTube influencers keeps emerging and you can be one too. First and foremost, create a youtube channel, find your niche, develop your channel’s goals and content, and ensure your channel page is welcoming.

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In addition, YouTube is a very sophisticated search engine, and people use it a lot to discover new content. This means that you need to choose the right keywords and optimise your channel for SEO.

If there are highly watched videos similar to the one you are looking to create, study the keywords they used, and replicate them. Also, you must devise a way to engage with your community once you start gaining followership. A great way to engage with your community is to host a live stream.

To get your YouTube channel out there, always announce newly released videos across your other social media platforms, and encourage people to subscribe. Additionally, create a blog to keep your community engaged. Also send out newsletters using email marketing to promote your weekly blog, announcements, and updates.

So, how do you make money on YouTube?

i. Be A Merchandiser

Sell your own merchandise or advertise for other brands on your YouTube channel

ii. Become A YouTube Partner

To become a YouTube partner, you must make your channel successful enough that it meets the YouTube Partner Program requirements. Basically, to join the program, you must have a minimum of 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours in the previous 12 months.

So, you can see it’s a lot of hard work but it’s worth the effort at the end of the day. If you pass this stage, you can then set up an AdSense account. In addition, you must be at least 18 years old and must create content that is advertiser-friendly.

Here is how the payment works; if a YouTube premium member watches your video, you will get a portion of their subscription fee.

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iii. Create Sponsored Content

This is one of the popular ways to make money on YouTube. If you’ve built yourself as an influencer, you can negotiate with brands to run a sponsored ad for them. The beauty of this is that you don’t have to give YouTube a cut of your earnings.

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5. Social Media Merchant

This is one of the simplest social media business ideas you can consider. There are many businesses whose office is on social media. They take orders on their social media platforms and deliver to their client’s preferred location.

Do you have a product you want to sell? You can put it up on social media and engage with your customers there. As a matter of fact, social media is now an office for many and you can join the trend. Produce your products, take a good picture of them, post on your social media platforms, advertise them and you are already in business.

All you need to do is to partner with a reliable delivery company that can help you convey your products to your clients. In addition, you need a good payment gateway that customers can pay into. Also, remember to add good customer service to your business because this type of business can only thrive on great customer relationships.

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6. Social Media Community Manager

Here is also one of the profitable social media business ideas to start. A Social Media Community Manager is responsible for advocating a brand and managing its community on social networks. You can offer your services on a freelance basis to companies with strong online communities, who need someone to help them manage their community, website, and social media.

Facebook, for instance, has a community feature and some brand takes advantage of it. So, if you have what it takes to manage online communities, this may be the best social media business idea for you.

Importantly, every social media community have a goal they are pursuing and the result they want to accomplish. Therefore, you’ll need to integrate yourself with the brand’s goals and objectives before you can function efficiently in this business.

A lot of people confuse the role of a social media manager with that of a community manager. Actually, they are not the same, and here is why: a social media manager acts as the voice of a brand providing social media strategy and branded content. A Community manager, on the other hand, uses his/her own voice to engage with users and build a relationship with the community members.

See Also: How To Optimise Your Customer Experience Using Social Media And Boost Revenue

7. Social Media Copywriter

Are you a writer who knows how to use words? If this sounds like you, copywriting may just be the best idea for you. Some people take courses to become a social media copywriter and you may need to do the same.

They write content such as jingles or dialogue used in commercials. In addition, they meet with clients to determine their promotional needs and then develop content for the marketing campaign.

To run this business, you need to have a clear understanding of the message that your clients want to convey, their intended audience, and the best tone for the content you are creating. To get started, check out what other copywriters’ are offering and devise a means to stand out.

In summary, here are things to do to become a social media copywriter:

• Get online, create social media accounts on several platforms for free
• Develop social media skills including how to write witty social media content capable of going viral
• Reach out to potential clients. You can start by offering freebies or discounts to gain access to them.

See Also: How To Make Money From Freelance Writing And All You Need To Start Writing

8. Podcaster

If you have a good voice for radio or love telling stories, podcasting is a great business idea for you to explore. Are you passionate or knowledgeable about a particular subject, you can start a daily or weekly podcast around it and build it as a social media business.

The interesting part of podcasting is that there are several platforms that help you post your podcast on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and the likes. Gone are the days where you cannot post audio on social media.

See Also: Podcast Making: Step-By-Step Guide On How To Start A Successful Podcast

Steps To Take When Starting Your Social Media Business

Step One: Register Your Business With CAC

The first step to structuring your business in Nigeria is to get it registered with CAC. Most times, unregistered businesses find it difficult to build trust with prospective clients. One of the challenges you may face with clients is the refusal to pay into your personal account. And, you cannot open a corporate account without your registration certificate.

You can either register your business yourself or pay an expert to do it for you. One of the trusted firms that can help with your registration is ReDahlia. Regardless of your location, your business will be registered and delivered to you.

See Also: Benefits of registering your business with CAC

Step Two: Draft A Business Plan For Your Social Media Business

The next step is to draft a business plan that highlights the goals and objectives of the business and how to achieve them. You may ask, is it important to draft a business plan for a social media business?

The truth is, every business needs a business plan and it’s important you treat your social media business the same way you treat other big businesses.

Typically, a good business plan should contain the following:

a. Executive Summary
b. Business Description
c. Product or Service Description
d. Industry Analysis
e. SWOT Analysis
f. Market Research
g. Financial Projections
h. Appendix

A good business plan can help you secure funding from angel investors and venture capitalists.

See Also: How To Write A Business Plan Step By Step For Your Business

Step Three – Market Your Social Media Business

The next step to take is to put your business idea out there because, if you don’t, nobody will know about your offering. Since you are into a social media business, the best marketing tool you have is social media.

Project yourself in a way that attracts your prospective clients, reach out to them, and strike a deal. Another way to promote your business is to run a sponsored ad. Don’t also forget the power of word of mouth advertising when you do good work.

See Also: How To Get More Visibility On Social Media

In conclusion, social media business ideas are easy to start because you can begin almost with little or no capital, unlike other business ideas. So, there’s no excuse not to start immediately.

There you have it. Feel free to add other social media business ideas you think we missed in the comments. More importantly, share this content with your audience if you found it useful.

Dear entrepreneur, gone are the days where social media is enough to push your brand. Today, you need a reputable site to mention and put you on the world map. This is what we offer you at entrepreneurs.ng. Reach out
to us, today to tell your story.

Best of luck!

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