Budgeting for Social Media Part Two

In a discussion with @alexbono about my last blog post, Budgeting for Social Media, I realized that I missed out on mentioning several important things to budget for, so I'd thought I'd add them here in this post.

When budgeting it's also important to recognize the skill level needed to set up and operate social media tools. While many social media tools seem fairly easy to create, if you want to add a personal touch, it will take certain skills. There are two main areas to examine:

Design
Most social media sites come with a typical design (or if it's a blog, a series of templates). If you want to modify them to include your logo and design, then you will need someone with graphic design/CSS abilities. A perfect example is this blog. While, currently I'm using a template, eventually I will be moving to a design of my choosing. As I don't have the skill for that, I'm relying on my business partner. If you have someone in your office who has the skills to make the changes, then that is great. If not, you will have to outsource. And of course, there are costs associated with that.


Content
Another important issue is content. As mentioned in Ten Things a Nonprofit Should Do Before Setting up Social Media, it's important to determine who's writing the content you put up before you start any social media tool. If this is something you can do internally, remember to weigh out the costs of that person taking the time to write it. Content also doesn't just mean the written word. If you have videos or photos, you need to assess who has the ability to create/post these and what the costs associated with them are.

Putting together a budget for social media will definitely save you some time in the long run and give you a better idea of whether social media tools are viable for your organization.