How can B2B marketers strengthen their social media marketing strategy and hone existing skills while learning new ones?
B2B marketers in 2022 are fortunate to have access to perhaps the greatest wealth of virtual learning opportunities the world has ever seen, as more business is now done online than ever in an increasingly digital-first B2B marketing landscape.
With more than 70 percent of companies recognizing online learning as essential to long-term strategy (Digital Marketing Institute), this is a fantastic time to explore the vast array of online social media marketing courses available to B2B marketers from leading social platforms.
No matter how much we already know, in 2022’s there’s always more to learn, especially when it comes to the swiftly-changing world of social media strategy.
Whether it’s by following industry experts such as those featured in our recent “Spotlight on Talent: 20 B2B Influencer Marketing Experts to Follow in 2022 and Beyond,” or through virtual courses, savvy B2B marketers constantly strive to make learning a lifelong pursuit.
Online courses are an excellent way to enhance your career by offering a work-at-your-own-pace cadence, where it’s easy to fit in as much or as little instruction as your time allows, whenever and wherever you want.
“Learning Hubs for Leads – While not exactly new, the attraction to cross-train and advance skills is greater than ever. To meet that need, B2B brands are increasingly investing in learning hubs where audiences can exchange their contact information for access to rich educational resources. Examples include HubSpot Academy, Semrush and many more,” our CEO Lee Odden has observed.
Let’s take a look at seven social media training opportunities from top social platforms, each offering a wide variety of online courses and webinars for boosting your social media marketing skills — each either free, available as a free trial to try out content, or for purchase.
1 — Meltwater Academy
Meltwater Academy from media monitoring and social listening platform Meltwater offers a variety of free and on-demand learning courses and webinars relating to social media marketing and other topics relevant to digital marketing.
“Meltwater Academy offers a wide range of social media marketing and PR courses, and we’re adding new topics all the time,” Lance Concannon, content marketing director for linkfluence at Meltwater explained.
“It’s a great resource for any marketer who wants to expand their skills,” Concannon added.
With curriculum topics ranging from “Running a Smart Social Media Audit” and “How to Foster an Engaged Community on Social Media” to courses specific to influencer marketing, Meltwater Academy’s offerings provide B2B marketers with plenty of opportunity when it comes to continuing education, and it also has an active presence on LinkedIn.
2 — Sprinklr University Learning Services
Sprinklr University Learning Services offers its own online training sessions and on-demand learning courses, primarily tailored for Sprinklr users but also featuring classes that apply to all areas of social media marketing.
The Sprinklr University Learning Services offers free certification events, along with private training classes that can be conducted via virtual sessions, and provides a free trial period.
Training centered around Sprinklr’s unified customer experience management (Unified-CXM) offering is also available, and many courses are presented as self-paced experiences, making it easy to work training sessions into whatever time B2B marketers may have available.
3 — LinkedIn Learning
Microsoft-owned LinkedIn* has long been a top social platform for B2B marketing professionals, and through its popular LinkedIn Learning online video courses, a variety of on-demand classes about social media marketing are available.
LinkedIn has just published its rundown of the most-used learning courses offered through its LinkedIn Learning arm, in “The 20 Most Popular LinkedIn Learning Courses of the Year,” featuring sessions including “Strategic Thinking” led by Dorie Clark, executive education faculty at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, and a featured member of our “50 Influential Women in B2B Marketing Who Rocked in 2020.”
LinkedIn also took the time to share a selection of its top LinkedIn Learning courses for marketers, as Connie Chen, insights program manager, thought leadership and narratives at LinkedIn, explored in “Solidify Your Skill Set: The Top 10 Learning Courses for Marketers.”
Whether looking for entry-level knowledge all the way through to expert-intensity education, more B2B marketers than ever who are looking to advance their social media strategy have turned to LinkedIn Learning’s vast collection of courses and other online learning resources.
4 — Brandwatch Guides
With its Brandwatch Guides digital learning series, Cision-owned social media suite Brandwatch provides a robust array of guides centered around social media marketing and other digital marketing topics.
From analytics-focused guides such as “How to Measure your Social Media ROI” and “How to Effectively Measure the ROI of Sponsorships” to specialized offerings including “Five Ways Private Equity Firms Can Leverage Social Listening” and “The No-Sweat Guide to Social Content Marketing,” Brandwatch Guides provide B2B marketers a wealth of social media learning opportunities.
5 — Agorapulse Academy
Social media management specialist Agorapulse has a history of providing helpful resources online, which has grown continually since the launch of its Agorapulse Academy skill-building programs and certification courses.
“The Agorapulse Academy is a masterclass in professional social media management, giving best in class strategies and tactics for social media marketing, housed within the framework of the #1 rated social media management solution, Agorapulse,” Mike Allton, head of strategic partnerships at Agorapulse, explained.
“Students learn the in’s and out’s of effective publishing, listening, monitoring and reporting, and are able to obtain complete certification at the conclusion of the course,” Allton added.
Agorapulse’s robust certification course offers a five-part learning curriculum that includes multi-lesson looks at:
- Social Publishing Tools
- Managing social conversations
- Social media reporting
- Listening for social conversations
- Social ROI
Additionally, Agorapulse provides a series of helpful video tutorials for those looking to dig deeper into the firm’s resources.
6 — Digimind Academy
Global social media monitoring and competitive intelligence firm Digimind has been providing marketers helpful learning resources for much of its nearly 25-year history, and with its Digimind Academy self-paced online marketing education courses, that tradition continues in full force.
Courses are offered focusing on several audiences including business users, editors, and end-users — all with a social media marketing element — and Digimind Academy also provides course certification upon completion of many of its courses.
7 — Sprout Social Courses
With its Sprout Social Courses online learning center, Sprout Social offers a wide variety of webinars and courses centered around social media marketing.
B2B marketers looking to bolster their social media skills can take advantage of courses including “Tagging: Your Key to Success on Social,” “Accelerate Your Business Impact by Capturing Social Insights,” and webinars such as “Live Training: How to Use Analytics & Reporting to Measure Your Social Efforts” and “Go Deeper With Your Social Data.”
Social listening has taken on increased important since the pandemic, as Kristin Johnson, vice president of content and communications at Sprout Social shared with our own influencer marketing manager Debbie Friez in “Active Social Media Listening: Tips for a New Era of COVID-19,”
Ongoing Social Media Education Builds Unforgettable Content
B2B marketers who take the time to focus on making learning a perpetual and lifelong endeavor gain key advantages that help future-proof the work we’re doing today and inspire what is coming down the pike.
By growing our skills and widening our social media marketing repertoire with new knowledge, whether we’re a CMO or just beginning in the industry, we’re bound to achieve new levels of success through continuing online learning.
We hope the insight you gain from taking any or all of these online social media course offerings — or others offered by these organizations — will help in your own B2B marketing efforts.
Finally, to learn even more online, be sure to check out some of the additional online learning options for B2B marketers we’ve explored, including :
Supercharge Your B2B Marketing With High-Octane Online Courses, featuring:
- MarketingProfs Everybody Writes
- MIT OpenCourseWare
- Coursera
- Canvas
- WordStream’s Growth Academy
- Alison
5 Free Online Courses to Sharpen Your B2B Marketing Skills, featuring:
- Harvard University
- edX
- BerkeleyX
- University of Pennsylvania
- University of Colorado
10 Free Online Courses to Optimize Your Marketing Skills, featuring:
- Stukent
- BuzzSumo Academy
- HubSpot Academy
- Google Analytics Academy
- SEMrush Academy
- Traackr Academy of Influencer Marketing
- Hootsuite Academy
- Jeff Sauer’s PPC Mastery Course
- Lynda.com
- Udemy
Creating award-winning B2B video marketing that elevates, gives voice to talent, and humanizes with authenticity takes considerable time and effort, which is why an increasing number of firms are choosing to work with a top digital marketing agency such as TopRank Marketing. Contact us to learn how we can help, as we’ve done for over 20 years for businesses ranging from LinkedIn, Dell and 3M to Adobe, Oracle, monday.com and others.
* LinkedIn is a TopRank Marketing client.