7 Special Protections Every Social Media Management Contract Template Must Have
Are you a social media manager? I'm telling you precisely which distinct protections you need in your social media management contract template to protect your business, money and energy.
Being hired to manage others' social media accounts is a dream business, but if you're anything like me, you want to ensure you, your business, your money and your energy are protected. As a lawyer myself who contracts for social media managers like you, I am giving you all the critical protections you need in your social media management contract template.
You will learn about the key protections you must include in your social media management contract template that you must have included in your media management contract template word for word, whether you use my template (which includes all of them) or another social media agreement for clients.
After learning all about the important provisions you need in your social media management contract template, your business, money, and energy will be fully protected so you can pursue your dream business without worry!
This post is all about the major protections every social media management contract template must include for professional social media managers.
Crucial Social Media Management Contract Template
Key protections to include in your social media management contract template word for word
1. Include disclaimers on outcomes and results (NO KPIs!)
Your social media management contract template must include disclaimers on outcomes and results. Especially as a social media manager, it's crucial that you make clear to your client that you cannot give the client any guarantees about the following:
Mistakes in the content you create or your services: Everyone makes mistakes, no matter how hard we try to be good at our work. However, you do not want the client to ask for any compensation because one of your posts contains a minor mistake only one follower might notice (and not even care about).
The effectiveness of the content you create for the client: You may have a great strategy for your client's social media based on your experience with other social media accounts and your research. But you can not predict how effective that content will be. So, you may present a strategy to your client based on what you think will work for your client's audience, but maybe your client's audience will have a different response to that content than you expected. You do not want your client to pin you on that, either.
Any results in relation to or outcomes from your content: The client may have high hopes that after one month of working with you, the client's following will double. But regardless of your client's (unrealistic) expectations, you can not control the number of followers, and that is not in your hands. It depends on many factors, like the algorithm and what your client does (or does not do). Also, as you know, more followers are not necessarily better if they do not intend to buy any of the products or services from your client.
Any decisions made by the client based on the content: Your client may believe that due to your social media strategy, somehow, the client will get way more customers begging for more of the client's products. For that reason, the client may make a huge order for extra products to resell to its future customers. But, if the sales do not increase, you do not want your client asking you for compensation because of the client's bad business decision.
These are things you need to include disclaimers for in your social media management contract template.
2. Exclude consequences for missed deadlines
You want to set timeframes so that both you and your client are on the same page when it comes to the process of creating the content and your response time to comments and DMs.
However, you do not want your client to expect any compensation or hold you liable if you do not do those things within said timeframes.
Therefore, you should include the following protections in your social media management contract template:
Broad timeframes that you can easily meet: If you deliver way faster than those deadlines you set 99% of the time, that is awesome, especially when you exceed your client's expectations. However, there may come a time when you get busier, and you won't be as fast as you normally are. Therefore, you want to add extra time as a sort of safety net.
Exclusion of liability: You need to specifically state that (1) you are not in breach of the contract if you miss deadlines (those deadlines are simply an indication of how long it may take) and (2) the clients can not hold you liable for missing those deadlines.
3. Always get paid in advance
To ensure you always get paid by your clients, you need to have them pay you in advance. Especially in the social media management industry, some clients may be reluctant to pay you (on time) when their social media accounts are not performing as well as they want or (wrongfully) expect.
You want to prevent your clients from not paying you for all the sweat and tears you have put into their social media accounts.
Therefore, your social media management contract template should include:
payment terms that have your clients pay you monthly in advance, and
the right to suspend your service or, in other words, stop creating and posting content for your client if your client does not pay you (on time).
That way, you never have to worry about not getting paid for your work.
4. Portfolio usage
As a social media manager, your best asset is your portfolio to attract new clients.
However, for your portfolio, you need to have the right to use your client's intellectual property rights, such as their:
name,
logo,
profile picture, and
content you posted on their accounts.
For that reason, you need to include in your social media management contract template the right to use all that for the purpose of promoting yourself (thus, your portfolio). That is how you protect your portfolio.
5. Ensure you can use your style for other clients (IP rights)
Since you are posting content on your client's social media account, it only makes sense that by contract, you would transfer your intellectual property rights to the posted content to your client. It would be unacceptable for your client if you could take that all away from your client because you own what is on your client's account.
However, you do want to protect your work and prevent your client from:
repurposing drafts you created, or
blocking you from using your unique methods, designs and styles for other clients.
Therefore, you may assign intellectual property rights to the final post but not the drafts, materials and unique methods you used to create that content because you want to use that for other clients. This should all be covered in your social media management contract template.
6. Protection for sponsored content
Some of the content you may post for your client might be sponsored content. Your client must then comply with certain (influencer) marketing laws.
However, you should not become responsible for complying with those laws when it comes to your clients' accounts. If a client gets fined for a breach of any applicable laws related to the content posted, your client should not try to demand compensation from you. It's your client's account, not your account. Your client gets the opportunity to review all content that gets posted, and your client ultimately has full control of what gets posted. Therefore, your client should have full responsibility and take ownership of anything that does not comply with marketing laws.
Therefore, your social media management contract template should include an indemnity stating that your client carries that burden and will compensate you if you get penalised.
7. Indemnities for claims from third parties (who you engaged with)
As a social media manager, your job also includes responding to and interacting with comments and DMS. And you are fully capable of engaging in the correct manner and creating a strong community.
However, several things can go wrong:
There may be a bad apple following the client's account that is looking for any reason to hurt the client, and that client may use something you said in a comment against the client.
You may say something that is (unknowingly) untrue about the client or the client's products or services in the comments or a DM.
You may say something in a comment that a reader might find offensive or simply take your comment the wrong way.
In all these cases, the client might receive a claim from a third party regarding something you have said in the comments or DMs.
You do not want the client to hold you responsible and liable for any claims the client receives.
To protect yourself, your social media management contract template should include an indemnity stating that your client will hold you harmless for any claims the client receives from third parties.
Key scoping mechanisms any social media agreement for clients must have
To be completely protected, you need to have a very clear scope in your social media agreement for clients. You must specify things like:
what types of content you create for your clients,
what the specific accounts are that you manage,
what social media metrics you use for your reporting, and
many more details of what you exactly do.
Want to know exactly what you need to cover in your scope and what you need to include in your social media management contract template? Read this blog post on the 10 Key Scoping Terms Every Social Media Management Agreement Template Must Have.
Do you want a social media management contract template free of fluff?
Do you want a social media management contract template free of vague terms your clients and you don't understand? Are you sick of using a social media contract that is full of legal jargon and overcomplicates things? Want a template that includes all the critical protections you need (as set out in this blog post)?
My social media management contract template includes all the crucial protections you need when contracting with new clients!
So, if you are still looking for an understandable yet comprehensive social media management contract template free of fluff, check out my social media management contract template on this page of my contract shop!
Are you using a different social media agreement for clients?
Maybe you already have a social media agreement for clients. Or, perhaps you do not have the budget yet to purchase a social media management contract template and prefer to use a free template you found on Google.
In that case, you can use this blog post as a checklist to ensure your social media management contract template includes all the key protections you need to be fully protected!
This post was all about the key protections every social media management contract template must have to protect your business, money and energy.
You can find my social media management contract template (including all the key terms for your scope) on this page of my contract shop!
