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I’m a big fan of interns having both been an intern when I first got out of college and having recently had the pleasure of managing one while working for a local ad agency. However, I don’t believe that interns should be managing a company’s social media as per my reply to Rayanne Langdon on Twitter. You can check out the picture to the left for the rest of our conversation.
Interns don’t have the business experience nor do they have communication experience to be running the social media of a company large or small. More importantly an intern isn’t going to have a strong understanding of the company’s branding, business objectives and goals that they are looking achieve over the long term that need to be taken into consideration when working on strategy planning for social media. There are a few other reason that interns don’t make the best choice for getting into social media:
Time
What happens when you don’t hire the intern on after their 4 months? Do you guys just stop doing social media or try and get another intern after that trial run. Or worse yet, what if the intern isn’t in the office everyday. Who is going to be managing your social media on those off days. Not all internships are full-time Monday to Friday and not getting back to a customer for a few days could be a missed opportunity or come across as you don’t listen.
Personality
If you do hire an intern for 4 months and then don’t hire them on afterwards. You are going to create a social media brand with a split personality. As much as we all try, anyone who does social media is going to inject personality into the brands of the company’s they are managing social media for. It would be not only what they say but also how they say and write back when replying to good and bad comments and opportunities related to your brand. If you keep on changing in and out interns every 4 months. The personality behind your brand is going to change with it and make it that much harder for some people to connect with your brand.
Knowledge Base
When that intern leaves or doesn’t get hired on because you wanted to take the cheap way out of getting into social media. Something else goes with them as well…. the intern is taking with them all the knowledge and past experience with all the connections they made. Even if you try and get them to train the new intern before they leave, they are going to miss something. It happens in any situation when you try and train your replacement. Also the relationships that the intern build may be in jeopardy as well once they leave.
This doesn’t even go into the transparency issue of switching in interns every 3 or 4 months. Are you going to let your community know that you didn’t think it was important enought to hire someone fulltime to help manage your social media. What does it say about your company if you don’t tell them? What does if say if you do? As we know getting into social media isn’t free (post 1 & post 2) and you’ve to pay for the technology and the people along with their time required to get started. Using an intern to get into social media isn’t going to return the kind of results that you want or have seen from other company’s who have been in the space for the last few years.
I think interns are great and can be a very valuable asset for any company looking to tap the knowledge of the next generation growing up. However, I wouldn’t recommend that you hire one to manage your social media.
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10 Comments
Twitter Comment
No. Interns are for fetching coffee! (I kid of course!) RT @duanebrown: Should interns manage your social media? [link to post]
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I hear what you’re saying, but I think too many people undervalue the capabilities of an intern. No experience or business savvy, you say? How do you know? So many students have been running their own businesses for years while juggling the books and part time jobs!
I’m not sure if I agree that an intern should be “running” social media for a company. I’m of the belief that a company should have many hands in social (both on and offline) pools. But if a company is lost and sees the potential, yet hasn’t the money to hire a FT SM so-called big shot, I think an intern could be a good place to start.
I mean, really — why make it so serious to begin with? Companies just starting in the area should have fun with it!
And with regards to not knowing the company, biz values, etc., that’s the case with most new employees! What’s the difference with an intern? A lot of interns are more eager and try to put more of themselves into making sure they do and learn every, single, little thing they can so they can make a good impression and have the possibility of staying with the company once their internships are over.
What happens at the end of four months? What happens when anyone leaves a company?! There’s a ton of learning going on in that four months. Hopefully after then, others in the company are as excited about being in the SM front lines as the intern was! As long as a company is upfront and honest about this from start to finish, there should never be a problem. People are aware folks come and go and are generally cool with that.
There’s as much to learn from a “kid” helping a company discover new things as bringing anyone else on as part of the team. Perhaps it’s more of a case-by-case basis.
There are those that undervalue interns for sure. I was one once, and even managed an intern while at an ad agency. If a student has been running their own business/working at a job and doing school, which is a lot to do. They’ve a great work ethic but that doesn’t mean they can translate that into being the social media person for a company.
A lot of people (interns, CEOs, management) and others I worked with in the past or freelance for now are saying we should be on Facebook or Twitter or Flickr. But when asked why… I get a lot of blank stares. Being able to link how those tools are going to achieve company objectives & goals and can be measurable at the same time is hard. I find a lot of people are struggling with the last part there. I’m sure there are some interns, right out of school, who could make sure these tools are going to achieve company objectives & goals and can be measurable…. but I know from experience a lot can’t.
You are right about the intern being the same as a new employee but a new employee who brings past experience to the table in marketing, PR, advertising…ect is going to pick up everything a lot faster and can hit the ground running in this case. I was like that when I interned at a video game company. I was in early and stayed late and wanted to soak up anything and everything from everyone in the company. It made me a better employee but not one who should be doing social media. Sure I may leave but only hiring an intern for 4 months is a lot different then when you hire and employee. There is a good chance (especially in this economy) that the employee is going to be here a lot longer then 4 months.
We both know it takes time to get into social media and hiring an intern, who is going to be here for 4 months, is less then ideal. You want someone who is going to be here for the long term, so they can build and keep the momentum going. Swapping in and out interns means you’ll lose a bit of momentum each time. Interns are great and fun is fun but a lot of people are going to ask if investing the resources into that person (intern or full-time employee) is paying off at some point. I’ve friends at different agencies and it’s hard to help change a culture in the 4 months an intern is there. Some agencies (maybe the smaller ones) are better then others but the vast majority need more then 4 months to get a shift in culture.
Twitter Comment
Take time and do it yourself; Why you should not let an “intern” manage your social media [link to post] via @GoaskMarti
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Twitter Comment
Take time and do it yourself; Why you should not let an “intern” manage your social media [link to post]
– Posted using Chat Catcher
I think the biggest draw to using interns in social media is because they are more likely to “get it” than others, but it’s certainly not an excuse. You are spot on about thinking of the long-term affects on the business.
If/when that intern leaves, what is the plan for the company’s presence following that absence? These are the types of things companies HAVE to be thinking about as they enter this space. Just as you wouldn’t have an intern going it alone on media relations, they should not be “turned loose” in social media either.
However, all that being said, I do think it is ok to get interns involved in this process as long as they have the guidance of someone else. They may not know the business to begin with, but they can spend that time learning from someone else and have a better understanding of marketing communications overall by the time they are done.
Short answer: No. Interns should not be managing social media without oversight and strategic guidance from marketing staff.
Hey Mike
Thank you for the comment. I agree that interns could be used for tactics, which I could have expanded on more at the end there. Depending on what “get it” is… interns can be helpful for sure. Of course that’s a going to be done on a case by case check of each intern as we hire and bring them into the company. However, even if they do get the space and where we are all heading…. I would still only have them at a tactical level at best.
Twitter Comment
@goaskmarti @MyCricketOregon Thanks for the RTs on the article: Should you have interns managing your social media? [link to post]
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Twitter Comment
Anyone else have thoughts about handing social media over to the interns? @duanebrown makes some good points here: [link to post]
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Twitter Comment
What do you think? Should interns be managing a brand’s social media presence? See @duanebrown’s article: [link to post]
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