What Should a Social Media Manager Cost?

Ask ten people what a social media manager costs and you'll get ten answers, from free to five figures a month. They're all correct, because they're pricing ten different jobs.

So let's answer the question straight, then look at it from the other side of the desk: the realtor deciding what to pay.

How much can I charge as a social media manager?

Expert Market's 2025 guide found most freelance social media managers charge $50 to $85 an hour, with highly rated ones ranging up to $350. Monthly retainers for freelancers and agencies both span roughly $500 to $10,000, and most small businesses pay agencies $500 to $5,000. Scope, experience, and whether you create the content decide where you land.

What moves a social media manager's price up or down?

• Scope. Scheduling posts someone else made is a different job from planning, filming, editing, and posting them.
• Platforms. Each additional channel adds work, and some providers charge for it separately.
• Community management. Replying to comments and messages every day is ongoing labor, not a monthly task.
• Ads. Running paid campaigns is its own skill, and the ad spend itself is usually billed on top of the retainer.
• Proof. A manager who can show results for businesses like yours can charge more than one who can't.

A survey of marketing professionals by WebFX found 52% reported paying $100 to $5,000 a month for social media management. That's a wide band, and it should be, because it covers everything from a part timer posting graphics to a team running a full strategy.

If you're the manager setting a price, the lesson is simple. Price the deliverables and the outcome, not the hours, and be precise about what's included.

What should a realtor actually pay?

Now flip it around: you're an agent in Fort Collins, and you know you need to be on Instagram. The question isn't what the market charges. It's what you're actually buying.

Most agents end up choosing between two very different things that happen to share a job title.

Option one: the nephew who does the Instagram

Every brokerage has a version of this. A nephew, a niece, a friend's college kid who is great with apps and might post for you for not much money at all.

To be fair, sometimes that's the right call. If your goal is simply to stop your profile from looking abandoned, a cheap, reliable poster can do that.

But ask a few honest questions before you hand over the password:

• Can they make the content, or only post it? Most can schedule a graphic. Few can film and edit video that holds a stranger's attention.
• Do they know your market? A post about a Timnath listing should sound like someone who knows Timnath.
• Will it look like you? Your feed is the first impression for a seller deciding whether to trust you with their biggest asset.
• Will they be there in month six? Social media compounds. A plan that stops when the semester starts never gets to the good part.

Option two: a content team

A content team doesn't just post. It plans what to say, films it, edits it, and builds a feed designed to turn strangers into people who know you.

Think of a restaurant. A social media manager is the host who seats people and keeps the dining room running. A content team is the kitchen, and the best host in town can't fill a restaurant that isn't cooking anything.

A great host can't fill a restaurant with no kitchen.

What does Summit Visual Studios charge?

Here's our menu, plainly. We're not a cheap social media manager, and we don't pretend to be. We're a production team that makes the content worth posting.

• Kickstart: 4 videos a month for $1,650 a month, or $2,000 as a one time project.
• Momentum: 12 videos a month, plus the Core Three and a monthly Market Update video, for $4,500 a month, or $5,100 one time.
• Campaign: 30 videos plus 2 long form YouTube videos a month for $12,000 a month, or $12,900 one time.
• Teams: programs split across 4 to 18 agents, starting at $6,500 a month.

Monthly programs have a three month minimum. That's not a trap; it's how long it takes for content to start compounding and for the data to show what's working.

The Core Three, included in Momentum, are three videos pinned to the top of your profile: who you are, how working with you goes, and proof from past clients. They're what turns a profile visit into a conversation.

How do those prices compare?

Kickstart works out to about $412 a video. That sits above what a freelancer charges to post, because it's a different job: planning, filming, editing, and a team that understands how real estate content earns attention in Northern Colorado.

Is it worth it? That depends on what one new listing is worth to you. If a single extra closing a year is worth more than a few months of content, the math works.

How do you decide?

Start with the outcome, not the price. If you want a presence that isn't embarrassing, hire the nephew and pay him fairly.

If you want sellers in Loveland, Windsor, and Greeley to know your face before they ever need an agent, you need someone making content, not just posting it. Price that against what a listing is worth, and the math usually gets clear fast.