What Does a Social Media Coordinator Do? Skills, Salary, Tools, and a 90-Day Plan

This guide clarifies the real-world work of a social media coordinator and how the role connects to strategy, execution, and measurable impact. You’ll find daily workflows, core skills, tools, KPI frameworks, salary ranges, and career paths, plus interview prep, a 90-day plan, and reusable snippets. Use it as a practical reference to ship consistently, stay brand-safe, and report outcomes with confidence.

What Does a Social Media Coordinator Do?

A social media coordinator is the hands-on operator who turns strategy into scroll-stopping execution. Sitting within the broader marketing team—often within brand, communications, or demand generation—the coordinator owns day-to-day publishing, community interactions, and performance hygiene. The impact shows up in brand awareness (reach and share of voice), engagement (comments, saves, shares), and ultimately pipeline (traffic, trial signups, or assisted revenue via social-sourced journeys).

Think of the social media coordinator as the bridge between strategy and the feed. While managers and strategists set direction, the coordinator operationalizes it: creating calendars, shipping content, answering the community, and reporting what’s working back to stakeholders so the team can optimize.

A Day in the Life: What the Work Actually Looks Like

Content calendaring

• Build a monthly/weekly calendar aligned to campaigns, launches, tentpoles, and cultural moments.
• Balance content types: thought leadership, product education, customer stories, UGC, employer brand, and reactive posts.
• Slot assets and copy by platform (TikTok vs. LinkedIn vs. Instagram vs. X vs. YouTube Shorts).

Publishing workflows

• Draft short-form copy and CTAs that fit each channel’s norms and character limits.
• Attach visuals, alt text, captions, and accessibility considerations (e.g., subtitles).
• Schedule via a publishing tool; confirm time zones and dark hours.
• Tag UTMs for trackable links and update the status as posts move to “Approved,” “Scheduled,” “Live.”

Community management

• Monitor comments, DMs, and mentions; triage to support, sales, or PR when needed.
• Answer FAQs with brand-safe macros while preserving human voice.
• Surface delightful fan interactions to amplify or repurpose.

Social listening

• Set up saved searches for brand, product, exec names, competitors, and category keywords.
• Identify conversation themes, sentiment shifts, and opportunities to join relevant threads.

UGC sourcing

• Seek and secure permissions to repurpose user-generated posts.
• Maintain a simple intake form and track creator handles, usage rights, and expiration dates.

Basic crisis triage

• Apply severity labels (e.g., S1 data/security, S2 product outage, S3 customer complaint).
• Escalate within defined SLAs; pause unrelated posts if impact is high.
• Log incidents and learnings to update guardrails.

Core Skills and Competencies

• Platform fluency: Understand algorithms, formats, posting rhythms, and features across major networks.
• Short-form copywriting: Crisp hooks, clear value, and voice consistency in a few lines.
• Visual sensibility: Eye for framing, typography, and motion; basic editing to on-brand assets.
• Analytics literacy: Read dashboards, calculate engagement rate, and turn data into insights.
• Organization: Keep an editorial calendar, asset library, and approval flows tidy.
• Stakeholder communication: Partner with product marketing, PR, support, legal, and execs.
• Brand voice consistency: Translate brand personality into post-level choices and community replies.

Tools and Tech Stack

Map your tools to jobs-to-be-done rather than chasing shiny objects.

• Scheduling/publishing: Tools to schedule, tag UTMs, and coordinate approvals.
• Asset management: Central library for images, video, logos, templates, and usage rights.
• Lightweight design: Quick-cut video, templates, subtitle generation, and resizing.
• Analytics dashboards: Channel-native and consolidated views for performance trends.
• Social listening: Monitor mentions, sentiment, and competitor chatter.
• AI assistants (used safely): Draft variants, brainstorm hooks, generate alt text, and summarize threads.

Example tech stack mapping

Smart ways to use AI safely

• Brainstorm post angles, hooks, and content series; you decide the final wording.
• Generate alt text drafts; review for accuracy and inclusivity.
• Summarize long comment threads into themes; validate before reporting.
• Never paste confidential data, embargoed information, or PII into tools.
• Keep a brand voice brief handy and include it in prompts to maintain consistency.

KPIs That Matter (and How to Report Them)

You can’t improve what you don’t measure. Align KPIs to funnel stages—awareness, engagement, and conversion—while layering in operational metrics.

Setting targets

• Start with baselines from the last 3–6 months per channel.
• Choose 1–2 north-star KPIs per campaign; avoid vanity metrics.
• Calibrate targets to investment: more assets/budget should correlate with higher lift.
• Consider platform-specific norms (e.g., saves on Instagram, watch time on TikTok/YouTube).

Building weekly/monthly reports

• Executive summary: wins, risks, next actions.
• Highlights: top posts, why they worked, community insights.
• KPI snapshot vs. prior period and vs. target.
• Experiments: what you tested, results, decision for next cycle.

Sample outline

Report: Week 38
- Summary: +14% engagement, SoV up 1.2 pts driven by product tips thread
- Top Posts: TikTok “3 shortcuts” (ER 8.4%), LinkedIn carousel (CTR 2.1%)
- KPI Table: ER, Reach, CTR, Follower Growth
- Insights: Hooks with numbers outperform; Reels with captions watched +29% longer
- Next: Double-down on tips series; test weekend posting; retire low-ER promo format

Salary, Locations, and Career Path

Comp varies by geography, industry, and whether you’re in-house, agency, or freelance. Coordinators often start in execution-heavy roles and can grow into specialist or manager paths.

• In-house: Deeper brand immersion; broader collaboration; often better benefits.
• Agency: Faster pace, many brands; sharpens process and client communication.
• Freelance: Flexibility and niche specialization; requires pipeline-building.

Career path

• Social Media Coordinator → Social Media Specialist → Social Media Manager → Senior/Head of Social → Director of Brand/Comms.
• Or branch into content strategy, community, creator partnerships, or paid social.

How a Coordinator Differs from a Social Media Manager or Content Creator

Ownership scope

• Coordinator: Executes calendar, posts, community, and reporting hygiene.
• Manager: Sets strategy, goals, resourcing, and cross-functional alignment.
• Creator: Produces content assets; may be internal or external talent.

Strategic vs. execution balance

• Coordinator = 70–85% execution, 15–30% input to strategy through insights.
• Manager = 60–70% strategy, 30–40% oversight and enablement.
• Creator = 80% production craft, 20% concepting with brand.

Collaboration

• Brand/PR: Align on narratives and reactive moments.
• Paid media: Boost top performers; coordinate on targeting and pixels.
• Customer support: Triage tickets; maintain SLAs.
• Legal/compliance: Approvals, disclosures (#ad), and risk mitigation.

Portfolio and Resume Tips

Build compact case studies

• Context: goal, audience, channels.
• Your role: planning, copy, visual decisions, community actions.
• Results: KPIs, lifts vs. baseline, learning loops.

Spotlight metrics

• “Grew engagement rate from 3.1% to 5.4% in 90 days via hooks testing.”
• “Reduced average response time from 4h to 45m with macros and routing.”

Include content samples

• 3–5 posts per platform with rationale and alt text examples.
• Before/after revisions showing your editorial eye.

Structure STAR stories for impact

S: Situation — Low engagement on product updates
T: Task — Improve ER without increasing volume
A: Action — A/B tested hooks, swapped static for short video, added benefit-led CTA
R: Result — ER +74%, CTR +29%, 3 qualified demos sourced

Resume hygiene

• Use verbs tied to outcomes: “shipped,” “optimized,” “reduced,” “increased.”
• Quantify where possible; link to a portfolio site or drive folder with permissions.

Interview Prep for Social Media Coordinator Roles

Common questions

• Walk me through your content calendar process.
• How do you adapt copy across TikTok, LinkedIn, and Instagram?
• Describe a time you handled a negative comment that escalated.
• Which post of yours performed best and why?
• How do you decide when to jump on a trend?

Take-home assignments

• Create a 1-week calendar for two channels with copy, assets, and rationale.
• Write three post variants for a product feature and propose a test plan.
• Draft a short response plan for a hypothetical outage.

Presenting results

• Start with objectives and audience.
• Show your reasoning, not just artifacts.
• Tie creative choices to hypotheses and metrics.
• Flag risks and how you’d mitigate them.

Brand safety judgment

• Explain your escalation thresholds.
• Show you know disclosure rules (#ad, #gifted).
• Demonstrate sensitivity to cultural context, accessibility, and privacy.

Your First 90 Days: Plan, Prove, and Scale

Onboarding checklist (Weeks 1–2)

• Access: Channels, ad accounts, analytics, asset libraries, link shortener, listening tools.
• Docs: Brand voice, style guide, compliance rules, crisis playbook, previous reports.
• Intros: Product marketing, PR/Comms, Customer Support, Legal, Sales, HR/Employer brand.
• Audit: Content performance, community health, competitor landscape.

Channel audit template (quick-start)

Channel: LinkedIn
Audience: ICP: Mid-market IT leads; Secondary: Partners
Last 90d Summary: ER 3.8% (+0.6), CTR 1.9%, Follower growth +4.2%
Content Mix: 35% thought leadership, 25% product, 20% customer, 10% employer, 10% culture
Top Formats: Carousels (save rate 2.4%), short video (thumb-stop rate +22%)
Gaps: Limited UGC, inconsistent weekend posting, sparse alt text usage
Opportunities: Tips series, partner amplification, employee advocacy pilot
Risks: Approval bottlenecks; clarify who signs off on product claims
Next Moves: Calendar revamp, macro library, test plan v1

Content calendar template (CSV-friendly)

date,platform,theme,post_copy,asset,file_path,alt_text,cta,utm_campaign,owner,status,approval_due
2025-10-01,LinkedIn,Thought Leadership,"5 shortcuts to ship faster 🧠","carousel","/assets/oct/shortcuts.pdf","Slide 1: Keyboard shortcuts","Learn more","tips_q4","Alex","Draft","2025-09-28"
2025-10-02,Instagram,Product Tips,"2 ways to automate reports","reel","/assets/oct/reports.mp4","Captioned demo of dashboard","Try it","reports_q4","Alex","Scheduled",""
2025-10-03,TikTok,UGC,"Creator @devsam shows workflow","duet","/assets/oct/duet.mp4","Side-by-side demonstration","Follow","ugc_q4","Alex","Live",""

Measurement plan (make targets explicit)

goals:
  awareness:
    kpis: [reach, share_of_voice]
    targets:
      reach_mom_lift: 15%
      sov_qoq: +1.5 pts
  engagement:
    kpis: [engagement_rate, saves, shares]
    targets:
      er_min: 4.5%
      saves_lift: 20%
  conversion:
    kpis: [ctr, trials, demo_requests]
    targets:
      ctr_min: 1.8%
      trials_from_social: +25% vs last quarter
tracking:
  utm_medium: social
  utm_source: per_platform
  governance: "use link shortener; validate UTMs before scheduling"
reporting:
  weekly: "KPI snapshot, top posts, insights, next tests"
  monthly: "Deep dive, cohort trends, recommendations"

Risk/compliance guardrails

Disclosures

• Include #ad/#sponsored on paid partnerships.
• Use brand-safe claims; link to source for stats.

Legal and privacy

• Don’t share customer data or internal roadmap.
• Secure UGC rights in writing; track expiry.

Crisis triage mini-runbook

Severity S1 (Security/Privacy): Stop all posts; alert PR+Legal; respond within 15 min; route to official statement
Severity S2 (Service Outage): Pause promos; acknowledge issue; update hourly until resolved
Severity S3 (Product Complaint): Empathize; move to DM; provide support path; log ticket

Quick-win experiments (Weeks 3–8)

• Hooks: Test number-led hooks vs. question-led hooks.
• Format swaps: Replace static images with 10–15s vertical video for explainer posts.
• Posting windows: Test 2–3 time blocks per channel.
• CTA variants: “Save this” vs. “Try it now” vs. “Comment with X.”
• Employee advocacy: Pilot with 5 ambassadors and provide post packs.
• Boosting: Put small paid behind top 10% organic performers; compare lift.

Scale and refine (Weeks 9–12)

• Systematize what worked: templates, checklists, and a “what to do more/less of” doc.
• Present a quarterly readout: performance vs. targets, learnings, roadmap asks.
• Propose 1–2 bigger bets: creator collab, evergreen series, or community initiative.

Practical Snippets You Can Reuse

Social listening query (Boolean-style)

("YourBrand" OR "Your Brand" OR @yourhandle)
OR ("YourProduct" AND (bug OR issue OR broken OR "doesn't work"))
OR (competitor1 OR competitor2) AND (compare OR vs OR alternative)

Community response macro (personalize each time)

Hey [Name] — appreciate you flagging this. We’re on it and will update here as we have more info. In the meantime, could you DM us your order ID so our support team can take a closer look? Thanks for bearing with us.

UGC permission request

Love this post! May we share it on our channels with credit to you? Reply “Yes” to grant us permission. Full terms: [link]. Thank you!

Final Thoughts

A great social media coordinator blends craft, curiosity, and operational rigor. You’re the frontline voice of the brand, the pattern-spotter in the data, and the engine that keeps the content machine running. With a clear measurement plan, tight workflows, and a bias for testing, you’ll turn everyday posts into compounding brand and business results.

Summary

This reference outlines the coordinator’s day-to-day responsibilities, essential skills, tools, and KPIs, plus career guidance and onboarding plans. Apply the checklists and templates to execute reliably, protect brand safety, and demonstrate impact through consistent reporting.