With the emergence of strong social media in the internet marketing world, every single Tom, Dick and Harry has come out saying they are social media experts. They feed on the wishes of entrepreneurs who have not had the chance to dedicate themselves to developing their social media presence effectively. If you don’t ask the right questions, you may end up spending thousands of dollars and getting no results. That’s why I created this guide to help you choose the best social media consultant for your company.

Questions You Should Ask Before You Hire Your Next Social Media Consultant

1. When engaging in social media marketing will you remember your targeted audience?

Most social media companies will focus on making connections. They don’t care what kind of relationship it is. What’s great is having thousands of connections if they aren’t a prospect, new client, referral source or possibly a JV partner. When I help my LinkedIn clients, I focus on their target audience. I researched each individual’s potential connection to see if they could be a future prospect, referral source or joint venture opportunity. I focus on connection quality, not quantity because my clients don’t care how many people they connect with. They care more about how much money they make from LinkedIn and their social media efforts.

2. Did you set up a system for online conversation offline?

Many consultants don’t take the most important step of every online social media connection – They fail to take online conversations offline. If you thought you would sell high-end products and services simply by having a social media presence, then I have the Brooklyn Bridge to sell you. You need to have a system that consistently gets your website and information in front of your prospects. You need to be involved with them on many levels. And you need to find a way for them to take the next step in your relationship – and have a phone conversation with you.

3. How involved are you in social media conversations?

Anyone can post content to a group – even five year olds can do it if you show them how. If your social media consultant doesn’t understand direct response copywriting techniques that drive conversation, then it’s time to move on. If your social media consultant doesn’t regularly monitor the conversations that take place online every day, then move on. The people you choose to handle your social media with need to know how to rate conversations and find ways you can contribute. I spend time every day scanning LinkedIn Q&A boards. A and various groups belonging to my clients. I am looking for opportunities my clients can add. I’m looking for ways to spark a healthy debate. That’s what effective social media marketing is all about.

4. When focusing on social media profiles did you focus strictly on optimizing keywords and were found first for your niche?

If you go to LinkedIn and do a search on internet marketing, you will see that person number one only has 145 connections and person number 2 has 154 connections. Now internet marketing is a popular key phrase. In fact, the search returned 487,100 results for that phrase. So imagine how many people are checking their profile. One has to wonder why they are getting so few connections. The reason is, the person handling their profile forgets, if you want to make a connection, you must have a focused copy of the prospect in the profile. You can’t just have it filled in with keywords. Your profile should show me why I want to connect with or do business with you.