Lately, there has been a significant rush on social media marketing books for beginners. No wonder, as we’ve jumped into the era of digital consumerism and experienced a boom in social commerce.
In 2021, social media had more than 4 billion users globally. In 2022, this number grew by roughly 11%, while in 2027, it’s predicted to reach 6 billion.
Not to mention that a whopping 98% of consumers planned social shopping in 2022.
That’s why it’s crucial for marketers and brand owners not only to get into social media marketing (SMM) but also establish a firm footing in it, becoming well-informed, armed, and highly perceptive to its changes, that is, SMM-savvy.
How can books on SMM for beginners help you achieve that? Read on.
SMM Savviness: Why Bother and How Social Media Marketing Books Can Help You Achieve One
Social Media Marketing is Everything to Business
Social media marketing is undeniably a locomotive that carries companies and solopreneurs to success. For this sentence not to sound unfounded and baseless, look at the following stats:
- 76% of consumers tend to purchase goods they spot in social media posts.
- Video ads shared on social platforms helped 93% of brands get new customers.
- According to 77% of marketers, social media strategies were highly effective for business and promoted noticeable growth.
- As many as 90% of businesses confirm that their marketing efforts on social media enhanced their brand exposure, while 75% of them saw a boost of site traffic.
Whether you pursue social media marketing as a blogger, marketer, or company leader, who wants to master it from A to Z, that’s when good literature becomes handy.
Your Book-Reading Path to Professionalism in SMM
The ten greatest SMM books for beginners listed in the next paragraphs will help you do the following:
- Get first-hand examples
- Peer into the mechanisms of different platforms
- See what works and what doesn’t
- Wake up your creative genius
- Think like an SMM manager
- Adhere to proactive and strategic planning
- Make better, result-oriented decisions, and more
In short, the best social media marketing books will help you frame a winning social media strategy and build a high-converting marketing funnel.
Grab those below.
Top 10 Books on Social Media Marketing for Beginners
Here’s a list of the top ten books for a beginner in SMM. Each of them has been picked as #1 read by successful leaders and marketers.
The Art of Social Media: Power Tips for Power Users by Guy Kawasaki and Peg Fitzpatrick
Author(s) and key ideas
Former chief evangelist of Apple and current one of Canva, Guy Kawasaki is an expert in social media who used those successfully to help Steve Jobs develop and maintain the Macintosh cult. He collaborated with Peg Fitzpatrick, an SMM strategist, to offer a bottom-up approach for creating a targeted, comprehensive, and appealing presence on well-known social media platforms.
Would you like to rock social media? Who wouldn’t!
That’s the main purpose of the book – to teach you how to do that, as stated by its authors. This powerful guide on SMM consists of 12 how-to chapters that provide instructions on creating and delivering engaging social media content to your audience, perfecting your posts, replying to comments, etc.
At the end of the book, you’ll find a list of 50+ social media tools for scheduling, monitoring, analytics, engagement, and so on.
How it’s helpful: hands-on reading experience
“This book includes more than 100 useful pieces of advice, insights, and hacks for both experienced SMM specialists looking to up their game and newbies overwhelmed by everything at once,” notes Steve Pogson, Founder of First Pier.
“The authors demonstrate how to lay the groundwork and gather your digital assets. Under their guidance, we have enhanced the social media presence of our eCommerce development agency, drew in more followers, and combined blogging with networking. We’re now testing the share buttons for blog posts and moving from short-form to long-form content on the social pages,” Steve shares.
The Definitive Guide to TikTok Advertising: How to Access 1 Billion People in 10 Minutes! by Perry Marshall & Dennis Yu
Author(s) and key ideas
Perry Marshall and Dennis Yu are both veteran marketers and business strategists with over 25 years of experience.
In The Definitive Guide to TikTok Advertising, they did an excellent job in explaining how brands and marketers can create and execute the best advertising campaigns on TikTok step by step using the 80-20 rule, aka the Pareto principle. Aspiring digital marketing professionals, agency owners, and influencers can benefit from reading this beginner’s guidebook to TikTok advertising.
How it’s helpful: hands-on reading experience
CEO and Co-Founder of Ling App, Simon Bacher has already applied the book’s tactics in his TikTok marketing campaign:
“This book is technical but easy to understand and the tips and techniques are interesting to apply. It inspired me to accelerate my brand TikTok ad campaigns and seamlessly walked me through from video creation to marketing tricks. Here’s one of them: I repurposed my YouTube videos and cut them down to 15-second clips that indeed worked as the greatest hits for my TikTok audience. And, as expected, I saw my website traffic nearly doubling.”
Social Media Marketing Workbook: How to Use Social Media for Business by Jason McDonald
Author(s) and key ideas
A workbook.
What else could you expect from a Professor of SEO and Social Media Marketing?
Jason McDonald, a PhD, AdWords certified SEO and social media consultant, and Founder of JM Internet Group, throws the key message of his book at you right at the very start rather metaphorically:
Social media marketing = throwing a party online.
The first chapter explains what it means. In the next ones, the author teaches you how to go in for content marketing and become a great party-thrower diving deep into the realms of:
How it’s helpful: hands-on reading experience
“Dipping your toes into the world of SMM can seem overwhelming. At any rate, it had seemed so to me, until I discovered this workbook,” confesses Jerry Han, CMO at PrizeRebel.
“It’s virtually a toolbook with worksheets. But to say that it gives you practical wisdom is to say nothing at all. I used its to-do-list to upgrade our Facebook Business Page and nourish it with targeted FB posts. I divided them into three major groups: limited-time survey bonuses, congrats-posts for our contest winners, and Happy World […] Day promos,” Jerry enumerates.
Social Media Marketing 2022: The Ultimate, Powerful And Exhaustive Guide That Will Make You Become A Wanted Digital Marketing Professional by Michael Media
Author(s) and key ideas
This SMM mastery book consists of 24 chapters with instructions and case studies that can guide complete noobs on their path to advertise on social media and measure success.
It describes how to navigate influencer marketing methods, as influencers are fantastic at promoting brands. Additionally, there are clear guidelines on how to level up your marketing with a podcast, what promotional strategies to use for it, and how to address monetization.
A separate chapter is dedicated to Snapchat and its peculiarities.
How it’s helpful: hands-on reading experience
This book on SMM has been recommended by Amy Bos, Co-Founder & COO of MediumChat, who said that “If you own or run a small business, this book should be on your list of compulsory reading material. It’s aimed at companies that are not yet ready to employ an SMM specialist.
The writer shows you how to promote your business online and grow your customer base on social media. I had no trouble following the author whose approach is friendly and easy to understand. Overall, I’d say I learned a lot and also gained the confidence to expand our social media efforts.”
The End of Marketing: Humanizing Your Brand in the Age of Social Media and AI by Carlos Gil
Author(s) and key ideas
In his book, Carlos Gil, startup founder and Brand Marketing Executive, is launching a revolution in traditional digital marketing. He has effectively outlined the best marketing approaches on such platforms as Facebook and LinkedIn, including outstanding practices in social media in general.
The author offers his own formula of success that consists of the 5Ps:
- Passion
- Persistence
- Persuasion
- Perseverance
- Personality
What makes his SMM book stand out is the fundamental principle of customer engagement: less promotion, more interaction.
Besides, Carlos Gil shows how AI and predictive analytics can help you swim well in the digital ocean.
How it’s helpful: hands-on reading experience
In fact, Nunzio Ross, Founder and CEO of Majesty Coffee, believes that “It’s a must-read book on social media marketing in the modern age. The End of Marketing emphasizes that social networks are valuable in humanizing brands. It revolves around authenticity and meaningful interactions with the audience, making it a great book for beginners diving deeper into social media marketing.
We started engaging more with customers, and our coffee conversations have transformed from promotional to personal now via Facebook group talks and polls. We discuss coffee rituals, coffeeholism, and everything that makes both our customers and us passionate about this drink.”
YouTube: Social Media Marketing and Secrets to Build Your Brand, Business and Following, Make Passive Income in 2019 by Dale Strong
Author(s) and key ideas
A bestselling writer of how-to-make-money books, Dale Strong nails YouTube from top to bottom.
His book is packed with little-known YouTube secrets and money making schemes on YouTube. Dale promises that if you stick to his tactics, in just 90 days, you’ll earn as much as $10,000 on a monthly basis.
Of course, for getting your videos to the top, you can’t do without YouTube SEO which is explained thoroughly in this SMM book for a YouTube beginner.
How it’s helpful: hands-on reading experience
“Most business leaders, managers, and marketers underestimate YouTube. Dale Strong shows how wrong they are by giving preference to only Facebook or Instagram instead,” says Michael Nemeroff, CEO & Co-Founder of Rush Order Tees.
“Inspired by Dale’s book, we’ve switched to YouTube marketing recently and YouTube shorts, in particular. For example, our marketers have come up with an idea of Blindfold Screen Print Challenge to follow the take-up-the-challenge trend and interact with our customers in a more emotional way via YouTube,” Michael mentions.
Likeable Social Media: How To Delight Your Customers, Create an Irresistible Brand, & Be Generally Amazing On All Social Networks That Matter by Dave Kerpen
Author(s) and key ideas
Does everything boil down to be likeable?
It’s not that simple. And Dave Kerpen, Co-Founder of Likeable Media and Founder of Likeable Local (a tool for small businesses), proves it in his book on SMM for beginners.
After you get started on social media and establish a consistent brand voice, Dave teaches you how to do the following:
- Think and act like your customer
- Listen and never stop listening
- Share stories and inspire others to continue the sharing chain
- Be transparent, honest, and authentic
- Respond to good and bad comments
- Provide valuable and compelling content
- Surprise and even wow your customers, and more
How it’s helpful: hands-on reading experience
Nat Miletic, Owner and CEO of Clio Websites, calls this book “An outstanding crash course for social media marketing noobs. Its list of case studies is exceptional in demonstrating the growing popularity of social media platforms and their role in marketing. These examples are a great starting point for beginners to navigate this ever-growing marketing field.
Dave Kerpen’s guide was everything I needed to go personal and authentic on Twitter and other networks.”
500 Social Media Marketing Tips: Essential Advice, Hints and Strategy for Business by Andrew Macarthy
Author(s) and key ideas
500 Social Media Marketing Tips is an Amazon best-selling book authored by Andrew Macarthy, a blogger and marketing expert.
The book emphasizes that with good preparation and practice, anyone can develop top class SMM skills. It contains comprehensive material, with each chapter focusing on each platform: Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, LinkedIn, etc. It also uncovers how to embrace storytelling through the text-image-video trio to stand out on social media.
How it’s helpful: hands-on reading experience
According to Ryan Stewart, Founder of WEBRIS, “The book is geared toward small businesses and entrepreneurs. It helps grasp the power of content that can touch people on a personal and emotional level.
To connect with our audience emotionally, we show our brand’s reaction to specific events, holidays, and breaking news, following Macarthy’s tips and using reactive ads in our SMM campaigns.
In addition, this book helped us approach FB group management differently, enriching the strategy with: live streaming –1x/week, promotional post – 2x/month, organic post – 1x/week.”
Social Media Marketing for Beginners 2020 (4-book set) by Jeremy Preace
Author(s) and key ideas
What a bundle!
It’s a collection of four SMM books for beginners written by Jeremy Preace, a Marketing teacher.
Here’s what each of those is focused on:
Book #1. SMM from scratch: how to dominate social media and work with different types of influencers to increase your income.
Book #2. Instagram for business: how to grow the audience and sales funnel.
Book #3. Facebook advertising: a 10-step guide on how to boost Facebook sales.
Book #4. Google AdWords and local SEO: how to optimize conversion rates.
After reading Book #2 and Book #3, you’ll be able to compare Facebook ads vs Instagram ads and choose a proper strategy depending on your budgeting.
How it’s helpful: hands-on reading experience
“This book-quartet on SMM for newbies is an indispensable assistant in catching the waves of marketing and advertising on social networks,” believes Kyle Zien, Director of Growth Marketing at Felix.
“As COVID-19 started, we had to shift to a new model of SMM for healthcare business promotion. That’s when Jeremy Preace’s books became handy. These guides helped us prioritize our ad campaigns on Facebook and gain over 10,000 followers on Instagram,” Kyle continues.
Social Media Marketing All-in-One For Dummies by Michelle Krasniak
Author(s) and key ideas
Without any doubt, this all-in-one book by Michelle Krasniak, a marketer and author at SocialMediaExaminer, is a go-to reference guide for a beginner in SMM. It draws a comprehensive picture of making your marketing debut, analyzing content-sharing metrics, determining social media ROI, measuring, and calculating it.
These nine mini-books in one can help both B2C and B2B marketers on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and other social media sites.
How it’s helpful: hands-on reading experience
As Jesse Galanis, Content Manager at Switching2Mac, puts it, “Michelle Krasniak squeezed all the essentials into one book for a first-timer in SMM. Her pieces of advice are invaluable for anyone who wants to learn how to promote customer engagement on social media, track metrics, and create viable strategies to move business forward.
Among other things, her book gave me a full understanding of Twitter marketing. For instance, the secrets of using TweetDeck and replying to tweets to enhance our collaboration with the top ranked Apple influencers on Twitter (which is vital for our blog content).”
SMM Beginner, Here’s Your Wrap-up of the Best Social Media Marketing Books
So, here’s your list of the top SMM books to start with, if you’re a fresher in marketing and social media:
- The Art of Social Media […] by Guy Kawasaki & Peg Fitzpatrick
- The Definitive Guide to TikTok Advertising […] by Perry Marshall & Dennis Yu
- Social Media Marketing Workbook […] by Jason McDonald
- Social Media Marketing 2022 […] by Michael Media
- The End of Marketing […] by Carlos Gil
- You Tube: Social Media Marketing […] by Dale Strong
- Likeable Social Media […] by Dave Kerpen
- 500 Social Media Marketing Tips […] by Andrew Macarthy
- Social Media Marketing for Beginners 2020 […] by Jeremy Preace
- Social Media Marketing All-in-One For Dummies by Michelle Krasniak
Let those help you begin a successful journey in SMM and employ the most powerful marketing initiatives.
Good luck!