What to charge a local shop to run its social media

Quick answer: Charge a flat monthly fee built from the hours you'll actually spend, and sell a written list of deliverables. Never sell "growth." Three clients at $400 a month is $1,200 for roughly 25 hours of work, if you have three local businesses that care enough to pay.

Those figures are worked arithmetic, not market data. Your town sets the real number. The method is what travels.

Start with your hours, not their budget

Most beginners ask what the owner can afford. Wrong question. The owner of a barbershop will happily say $100 a month, and you'll spend $400 worth of time earning it.

Work it backward. A single client usually costs you about this much each month:

• Two hours on a visit to shoot photos and video
• Two hours editing
• Two hours writing captions and scheduling
• One to two hours replying to comments and messages
• An hour on a short monthly summary

That's about eight hours. Decide what an hour of your time is worth. Say $40. That's $320. Add 20 percent for the owner who texts you on a Sunday, and you're at roughly $400. That's your floor, not your opening bid.

If a prospect can only pay $150, don't discount. Offer a smaller package: fewer posts, no shoot visit, and a clear note that it's a smaller job. Or walk away politely.

Sell a list, not a promise

Don't charge per post. It rewards volume, and volume isn't what a plumber needs. Don't promise followers either. You don't control the algorithm, and the first month it misses, you've got an angry client.

Put this in writing instead:

• Twelve posts a month, plus stories if you'll do them
• One shoot visit a month
• Replies to comments and messages within one business day
• A one-page summary on the first of the month: what went up, what got the most response, what you'll do next

The client can see whether you did it. That's the whole point. A deliverable you can check is a fee you can defend.

Getting the first client

Walk in. Pick a business you already spend money at, like the diner, the tire shop or the bakery. You'll know what they sell, which beats a cold email every time.

Look at their page before you go. Find three fixes: a profile photo that's blurry, hours that are wrong, a last post from March. Show them on your phone, in two minutes, without a pitch deck.

Then offer a 30-day trial at your full monthly fee. Don't offer free work. Free work trains people to value you at zero. One sample post to show them what you mean is fine. A month of free posts is a gift you'll resent.

Expect most to say no. The ones who say yes tend to be owners who know they should be posting and hate doing it.

How to deliver without it eating your week

Batch everything. The shoot visit is the engine. Spend an hour at the business in daylight with the phone you already own. Shoot the work, the product, the people, the counter. Get more than you need. Shoot vertical for video. A cheap tripod helps. A gimbal doesn't matter.

That one visit feeds a month of posts. Edit in one sitting, write captions in another, schedule all of it in a third.

The tools can cost nothing. Meta's Business Suite schedules posts for Facebook and Instagram for free. Canva has a free tier that covers simple graphics. Pay for something only when a free tool is costing you real time.

Three rules on access:

• The client owns the accounts. Always. If they don't have a business page yet, set it up in their name.
• Get added as an admin or partner through the platform's own business settings. Never ask for their personal password.
• If you part ways, you hand everything back the same day. That's how you keep a good reputation in a small town.

Get a clear okay before you post identifiable customers or employees, and be extra careful with kids' faces. On music, use what the platform's business library allows. Trending audio on a business account can create trouble you don't want.

Leave the place better than you found it. If you moved a chair for a shot, put it back. If you made a mess shooting flour on a counter, wipe it down. Owners remember that, and they tell the shop next door.

Startup cost, taxes and insurance

Startup cost is low if you already own a recent smartphone. Add a tripod and maybe a small light. Budget a modest amount and stop there. Don't buy a camera until clients are paying you.

Taxes are where beginners get hurt. As a self-employed person, you generally owe self-employment tax of 15.3 percent on your net earnings, on top of regular income tax. Nobody withholds it for you. Put a portion of every payment into a separate savings account the day it lands. Our piece on what to set aside for taxes on side income from dollar one walks through the habit. A tax preparer can tell you the exact number for your situation.

Insurance is the boring part people skip. Call an independent insurance agent and ask two things. First, whether your homeowner's or renter's policy covers business activity, because many exclude it. Second, whether you need general liability or professional liability coverage for client work. You're making public posts under someone else's name, and a mistake there can cost them. An agent can tell you what fits and what it costs.

Get a one-page agreement too. Month to month, 30 days' notice to cancel, payment in advance on the first. Have a local attorney review a template once. That's general education, not legal advice. A small fee now beats a long argument later.

When it isn't worth it

Skip a client who wants a guarantee of customers or followers. Skip one who pays less than your hours need and says it'll "lead to more." Skip a business that's struggling because of things posting can't fix: bad hours, a dirty dining room, a rude counter. A better Instagram won't save that.

Also skip it if you hate being on call. Comments and messages don't wait for your schedule, and clients will test your boundaries. Set a rule early: you reply during business hours, and a real emergency gets a phone call. Say it kindly, once, then stick to it.

The ceiling is real. Four to six clients at eight hours each is a part-time job on top of your job, and it'll squeeze your evenings and your family. When you hit that, raise your prices for new clients or stop adding. If you're wondering whether it should become something bigger, read when a side hustle should become a business and when it shouldn't before you quit anything.

Do the work you said you'd do, on the day you said you'd do it. In most towns, that alone puts you ahead of half the competition.