Looking at over a thousand blogs we have posted since launching nearly 20 years ago along with a few that touch on the costs of social media marketing professionals/experts that have gotten a lot of traction over time, it’s interesting how companies today are looking for consultants that are both AI and social media experts – blending two worlds.
And digging into the reasoning behind that, consulting firms and marketing agencies at the top of their game in hubs across the world (LA, Miami, NYC, etc.) are focused on one thing which always pays off in the end when done right: Cutting through the white noise to make sense of everything in the moment then making the best, most informed decisions which eventually = $
There’s one classic analogy we have to mention that has floated around the Silicon Valley tech world for years: Old school systems a company’s operations rely on being powered by one computer then all of the sudden it goes down and all production halts. You are then forced to bring in an expert who taps the main computer which operates everything and with their magic wand all of the systems are back up and running within seconds.
On the other hand, certain people question why 5 minutes of work justifies a $100,000 bill yet on the flip side that solution actually made the company millions of dollars in the end by not having downtime. This is only an example, but also applies to real life scenarios today and solutions we’ve delivered in the past.
Looking internally at our capabilities/solutions and what we learned over the past 20 years with many times being wrong that led to the ability to be right, that’s why companies bring in consultants like us – regardless of the cost – because not only have we learned from our own mistakes, but also have the ability to strategically navigate those challenges in the future.
To answer the main question around what you should expect to pay for a social media consultant/expert that also knows AI, it’s really up in the air now because the field is so specialized while also all over the place.
We can say the market is showing (based on various studies) an hourly rate of around $250 per hour for a top social media consultant, though what’s the rate for someone or a company that blends AI with conventional social media consulting and has the expertise to fuse both modalities then deliver results?
Taking things one step further related to the costs of specialized consultants, like the expert witness testimony we provide in trials, the rates are much different and for testifying at both civil/criminal trials our Founder (Aaron Schoenberger) charges $1,500 per hour to testify at court.
That’s on the highest level of what social media experts charge, though it’s also based on a variety of factors: 20 years of experience guiding the biggest companies in the world, being featured in top publications, college textbooks, speaking at conferences, securing a utility patent on the use of AI to analyze social media data, and a variety of other endeavors before now.
The point is, the cost of social media experts that know AI is all over the place and it all depends on your goals – what you really want to achieve in the end – along with your budget. And if you’ve hit a wall and need innovative solutions let’s connect regardless of the price: We just want to do cool stuff.