Are you a new freelance social media manager or social media strategist? We have put together this free social media management course that outlines the client journey—from discovery to monthly reporting. Providing you with the social media templates, content planners, and social media management tools you need to make your life as easy as possible!

Benefits of a Clear Process

We understand the demands of social media management can feel endless, and without a clear process, it’s easy to become overwhelmed. But by the end of this guide, we hope that you gain clarity and confidence.

Before we get into it, let’s explore some benefits of a clear social media management process:

• Save You Time: A clear process means fewer distractions and more efficiency, giving you back more time for strategic tasks that directly impact your clients’ success.

• Deliver Consistency & Quality: Ensure that every task—from onboarding to reporting—maintains a consistent level of quality, building reliability and trust with your clients.

• Improved Client Relationships: Clarity and professionalism in your processes provides clients with confidence, leading to an improved experience and stronger relationships.

• Supports Business Scalability: As your client base grows, so do the demands on your time. With a clear process, you can scale your business without sacrificing quality or efficiency.

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01 / Build Your Toolkit

Essential Templates

Having ready-to-go templates helps to ensure that you stay organised throughout the client journey. You can create these or save time by using professionally designed templates with prompts.

1. Portfolio Highlights your work, expertise, case studies, and testimonials to attract and impress potential clients. View Template Here →	2. Services & Pricing Ensure your packages are clear and easy to understand, making it simple for clients to choose. View Bundle Here →
3. Proposal Lay out strategies that align with your prospective client’s goals, outline timelines and payment terms. View Template Here →	4. Client Onboarding Organise the onboarding process with all of the details that set the tone for a smooth partnership. View Template Here →
5. Client Questionnaire Gathers information about client goals, preferences, and more, helping you to deliver impactful services. View Template Here →	6. Social Media Audit A framework to identify strengths, weaknesses, and improvements for their social media presence. View Bundle Here →
7. Social Media Strategy A framework to create goal-driven strategies that align with client objectives and deliver results View Template Here →	8. Social Media Report Present metrics, insights, and recommendations, ensuring your clients see the value you provide. View Template Here →

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Software Toolkit 

Each category of software serves a specific purpose and plays a role in your social media management tasks—improving efficiency and effectiveness.

→ Social Media Management

By using a social media management tool, you can efficiently plan and schedule posts, engage with your audience, and analyse performance metrics, all from a centralised platform.

Many social media platforms offer built-in scheduling features. While this is convenient, dedicated social media management tools often provide features and integrations to enhance your overall workflow.

For example: Buffer, Hootsuite, Sprout Social, Later, and Meta

→ Content Creation

Content creation tools are essential to produce visually appealing and engaging content. These tools help you design graphics, edit images and create videos.

For example: Canva, Adobe Creative Cloud, and Capcut

→ Communication

Communication tools are vital for efficient client interactions, including conducting discovery calls and maintaining ongoing conversation.

For example: Google Meet, Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Slack

→ File Sharing & Storage

File sharing and storage tools are essential for managing and accessing your digital assets, such as images, videos, brand documents, and storing client files.

For example: Google Drive, Dropbox, and WeTransfer

Project management tools help you to effectively collaborate with clients, share social media plans, organise tasks, and track deadlines.

For example: Notion, Asana, and Monday.com

Or View Planner Template Here →

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Content Planner

Designed by Social Media Managers, in partnership with a Google Sheets Expert, this content planner provides you with an all-in-one social media management solution—including all of these functions in one place:

• Easy Set-Up: Input your platforms, content formats, content pillars, posting frequency and times.

• Monthly Post Planners: Plan content for every day of the year & let your clients approve posts. 

• Social Media Strategy: Easily refer to your strategy when you are planning content to stay aligned. 

• Automatic Feed Preview: Plan and visualise your Instagram feed with automatic feed preview.

• Content Calendar: Stay up to date and plan content around key events, holidays, and seasons.

• Analytics Dashboard: Easily monitor and visualise your social media performance and trends.

Save £38 using the discount code: CPB40 →

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02 / Understand the Stages of Social Media Management

The Discovery Stage

The foundation of building strong client relationships begins at the Discovery Stage. Understanding this process provides clarity, making an impactful first impression.

→ Portfolio

A portfolio is essential for demonstrating your expertise and building trust with potential clients. It provides proof of your skills and past successes, allowing clients to visualise the value you bring and how you can solve their problems.

A strong portfolio should clearly communicate your expertise and approach. It should establish a personal connection, showcase your best work and results, add credibility with client feedback, and explain your process. Together, these elements build trust and effectively communicate your value.

View Template Here →

→ Services & Pricing Guide

Your services and pricing guide clearly outlines your social media management packages. It provides transparency about your services, helps clients understand the value they receive, and guides them in making informed decisions.

The guide should define the social media management service and highlight its benefits. It should provide information on your packages and processes, as well as, addressing common concerns to ensure clients feel informed and confident in their choices.

View in Bundle Here →

→ Discovery Call

The purpose of a discovery call is to understand a potential client’s needs, goals, and challenges and determine how your services can address their specific requirements. It is an opportunity to gather useful information, which enables you to provide a valuable proposal.

+ Use Communication Tool in your Software Toolkit

→ Proposal

A proposal aligns your offerings with the prospective clients' social media goals, demonstrating how your expertise can address their specific needs. It establishes value by highlighting your strategic approaches and the value you can provide.

You proposals should outline the clients’ social media goals and recommend an appropriate package tailored to their needs. It should detail your approach and execution steps as to how you will meet these goals. Additional information might include your and payment structure, how to get started, and testimonials to reinforce credibility.

View Template Here →

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The Onboarding Stage

The Onboarding Stage turns your initial meetings into a partnership. It’s important to welcome clients smoothly, and with transparency, to establish a mutual understanding.

→ Contract

The purpose of a contract is to formally ensure that both parties understand and agree to the scope of work and responsibilities. It provides legal protection by defining terms, payment procedures, intellectual property rights, and other aspects.

→ Invoice

The invoice outlines the services provided, the corresponding costs, and the payment terms agreed upon in the contract. You can use an automated invoicing software, like Quickbooks, or manually each month (our Bundle provides an invoice template to match all other presentations).

→ Client Onboarding Pack

A smooth client onboarding process is designed to successfully integrate new clients into your workflow, ensuring they feel supported and informed from the start. This helps to clarify roles, expectations, and processes.

Your client onboarding pack should outline service details and provide instructions for softwares you will be collaborating through. It should detail the onboarding process, including account access, file sharing, and payment. An onboarding checklist will guide clients through essential steps and FAQs should address common concerns.

View Template Here →

→ New Client Questionnaire

A detailed questionnaire is essential for gaining insights into your client’s business, preferences, and goals. This information helps to build your strategies, meet their goals, and ensure your approach aligns with their vision.

This questionnaire should collect comprehensive company details to understand their brand better. It should explore social media preferences, specific goals, business activities, target audience details, and competitor information. As well as, branding information such as values, visions, and visual details.

View Template Here →

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The Execution Stage

The execution stage is where strategy turns into action. With everything in place, you’re ready to implement social media solutions to drive results and deliver on the goals.

→ Social Media Audit

A social media audit evaluates the effectiveness of current strategies to identify areas of strength and areas for improvement. By comprehensively analysing performance across platforms, it provides actionable insights before you strategise.

An effective audit should provide a comprehensive metrics review. It should assess performance, including audience demographics, top-performing posts, and hashtag performance. A SWOT analysis and assessment scores provide a deeper understanding of strengths, opportunities, and the next steps.

View in Bundle Here →

→ Social Media Strategy

A social media strategy is crucial for creating a focused and effective social media presence. It aligns business goals with actionable plans, helping you engage the right audience, optimise content, and maximise your efforts.

A solid strategy should analyse the target audience, industry, and business objectives. It outlines clear goals, a posting plan, content pillars, engagement strategies, hashtag strategies, and platform specific adaptations. Finally, a style guide section ensures branding is consistent across all platforms.

View Template Here →

→ Content Planning & Creation

Content planning & content creation is you strategy coming into action. In your strategy, you will have defined your content pillars, formats, posting frequency (and more), which will guide your content. Utilising a content planner helps to stay organised and visualise your content across the month.

+ Use Content Creation Tools in Your Software Toolkit

View Planner Template Here →

→ Scheduling & Engagement

Scheduling allows you to stay on top of posting in a consistent and timely manner— typically, it’s ideal to schedule posts a month in advance. Slots for community engagement should also be allocated to ensure that you are actively nurturing and interacting with the audience.

+ Use Social Media Management Tools in Your Software Toolkit

→ Monthly Reporting

Regular reporting is essential for tracking your social media performance and providing insights into what’s working and what needs adjustment. It highlights progress towards your goals and guides strategic, data-driven decisions.

The report should outline organic performance metrics across platforms, as well as, providing a detailed overview of audience demographics, top-performing posts and hashtags. Drawing conclusions on insights helps to inform strategic adjustments going forward. If relevant, it should cover paid performance analysis.

View Template Here →

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03 / Social Media Management Bundles

Imagine being able to save time whilst improving your client experience—that’s exactly what these templates are designed to do! Access to all the tools you need, at the best value.

The Ultimate Bundle

Save £115 (55%) using discount the code: UBB55

Including all of the client journey templates & planners you need to simplify social media management, at the best value. 

View Here →

The Template Bundle

Save £50 (40%) using discount the code: TBB40

Designed to help you present with clarity and professionalism, upgrading your client experience.

View Here →

The Content Planner

Save £38 (40%) using discount the code: CPB40

A one-stop solution to planning your social media content and collaborating with clients.

View Here →

Recommendations from Social Media Managers Like You!

Download the full guide to get specific recommendations from Social Media Managers around the world, who have already implemented and loved our resources (p.17).

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04 / Assessment & Checklist

The support doesn't stop here! In our full guide we have included an interactive assessment (p.20) and checklist (p.21). 

You can evaluate the effectiveness of each part of your social media management process by rating statements and identifying areas for improvement. We have provided a full checklist and resources to get you started. 

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Free Download

Access the full guide for free, so you can keep all of the key information, steps, and resources at hand:

View Here →

By the end of this guide you will gain clarity, confidence, saved-time, and actionable steps. This is a big step towards a clear Social Media Management process, improved client experience, and taking back your time—and we’re happy to assist you on this journey.

If you’d like to get in touch, please use that chat feature on our site, or follow us to stay up-to-date with new resources, offers and more.