For the person who now owns it properly
Training for social media managers who are past the basics and now carrying the strategy, the budget and the reporting. Planning a quarter, defending decisions upwards, briefing others and measuring something a board will accept. Half day £1,200, full day £1,800 for up to six people, excluding VAT.
What does a social media manager actually need to learn?
Rarely the platforms. By the time somebody carries the title they know how the tools work. What they usually have not been taught is the management half of the job. Turning objectives into a plan somebody else could follow, deciding where a limited budget goes, briefing a designer or a freelancer properly, and explaining to a director why follower count is not the answer to their question.
That gap is why capable social media managers plateau. They are excellent at doing the work and were never given the language or the frameworks to defend it.
What does the day cover?
1. Strategy on one page
Objectives, audiences, channels and measures written so somebody else could pick it up. Most social strategies are a content calendar wearing a hat.
2. Planning a quarter
Campaigns, always on content and the space you need to leave for reacting to things.
3. Budget decisions
Where money goes between paid, creators, tools and production, and how to defend the split.
4. Briefing other people
Designers, videographers, freelancers and agencies. A bad brief costs more than a bad supplier.
5. Measurement that answers questions
Building a report that tells somebody what to do next rather than what happened. See measurement training.
6. Managing upwards
Saying no to the chief executive’s idea, and what to say instead. Practised, because it is a skill.
7. Experiments
Running a real test rather than changing three things at once and guessing which worked.
8. AI in the workflow
Where it saves a manager time and where it quietly flattens the output. See AI training.
Who is it for?
Social media managers
Doing the job well and now being asked strategic questions they were never trained for.
Marketing managers who inherited social
Competent marketers who own social without ever having run it day to day.
Small teams with a lead
Where one person coordinates two or three others and nobody agreed how that works.
Groups where a manager attends alongside the people they manage tend to get the most from it, because the decisions get made in the room rather than reported back afterwards.
What does the day look like?
| Time | Block | What comes out of it |
|---|---|---|
| 09:30 | Where you are, and what you are being asked for | The gap between your objectives and your current plan, named |
| 10:30 | Strategy on one page | Your strategy, written, in a form you can send upwards |
| 11:30 | Planning the quarter | A quarter mapped with campaigns, always on and space to react |
| 13:30 | Budget and briefing | A defensible budget split and a brief template you will reuse |
| 14:45 | Measurement and reporting | A report that answers a question rather than listing numbers |
| 15:45 | Managing upwards, practised | Language for the conversations you have been avoiding |
Do social media managers need a qualification?
Almost never, in our experience of hiring. Nobody has been turned down for a social media role in this agency for lack of a certificate, and plenty have been turned down despite holding several.
What does get people promoted is being able to explain a decision. Why this channel and not that one, why this much budget, what the number means and what you would do differently. If a certificate helps you build that, take it. If you are collecting them instead of building it, the certificate is not the problem.
Who runs the day?
I am Chris Norton and I run most of these sessions myself. I founded Prohibition, the PR, social and content agency behind this site, I have worked in public relations for more than twenty years, and I have been running training since 2009. I co-authored Share This Too, the social media handbook published by the Chartered Institute of Public Relations.
I have also hired, managed and occasionally failed social media managers, which is the part that matters for this particular day. The managing upwards block comes from being on both sides of that conversation.
Social media manager training questions
What is social media manager training?
Training for people who already run social media and now carry strategy, budget and reporting. It covers planning a quarter, defending budget decisions, briefing suppliers, measurement that answers questions, and managing upwards. It is not platform training.
How much does it cost?
Half day £1,200 and full day £1,800 for up to six people, excluding VAT, priced by the group. Around £200 to £300 a head.
Is this suitable for one person?
It works, though one to one coaching is usually better value for an individual and goes deeper on the things they are stuck on. See one to one coaching.
How is it different from your beginners course?
Entirely. Beginners covers channels, profiles and making content. This assumes all of that and works on strategy, budget, briefing and reporting. See beginners training.
Do you cover managing a team?
Yes, including briefing, review and the awkward part, giving feedback on creative work somebody is attached to.
What if our manager is not formally a manager?
Very common, and it does not change the day. Plenty of people carry the responsibility without the title, and often they need the language more, not less.
Will we build our actual strategy on the day?
Yes. You leave with a written one page strategy and a quarter planned, not a template to fill in later.
What comes after this?
Usually depth in one discipline rather than more general training. See advanced and expert training.
Tell us what your manager is being asked for
Half day £1,200, full day £1,800, up to six people, excluding VAT. Delivered UK wide or online.
One of the training levels we run, alongside every social media course. Last reviewed August 2026.
