Social Media is an inseparable aspect of nearly everyone’s lives today. Everyone uses these platforms differently and has different goals.
“A healthy balance between regular posting and paid ads is necessary,” says Sameer Ahmed Khan, Founder CEO Social Champ
Some people use these to build personal blogs for their satisfaction to others who use social media platforms to get jobs. Then some businesses and brands want to craft elegant social media posts to foster organic reach and audience for their products and services.
The many ways in which billions of people use the same platforms almost make it seem impossible that there could be a single tool to help all of them achieve their various goals more efficiently.
We, too, were surprised when we found out about this tool which is aptly named Social Champ. Find out more about Social Champ and its dynamic founder Sameer Khan by reading the insightful conversation with him, detailed below.
Q.1 I’m sure our readers would be psyched to know something about the life of someone who created Social Champ. Would you like to tell the readers something about your journey?
Honestly, my life has been nothing short of a rollercoaster ride with multiple ups, downs, and bumps along the way. However, I always believed that challenges and problems polish and prepare you for the other hardships in life.
Initially, I was all set to become a doctor, mainly due to peer pressure, but I moved to Pakistan when I was 15. After moving to Pakistan, I took computer science, which was one of my best decisions.
Moving to Pakistan was honestly not easy at all; it took a lot of willpower, and it took all of us some time to adjust to the new culture.
But now that I think of it, moving to Pakistan was a life-changing moment for me, and all that happened in my life contributed to who I am today. In hindsight, I would also have been a terrible doctor, as I cannot even stand the sight of blood!
One day, I plan on writing a book about my life and all the interesting people I have met throughout my life. I will get to it eventually, you know, once I am done perfecting my steak recipe!
Q.2 You were mostly engaged in different capacities as a developer before founding Social Champ and taking on a managerial role. Which is the role you would say you prefer?
For me, all phases of my life were pretty much connected; before getting into coding and then sticking to it, I explored multiple other development/design-related things.
I have experience with design, animations, ethical hacking, and even digital marketing. However, I have been coding for more than seven years. Then we started our startup journey, which required me to carry out some managerial roles as well. Soon after, I started speaking at different events and training people for digital marketing, which has opened quite a few doors for me.
Even though I am quite happy with my current role in the company, I still do enjoy coding, training, and even designing in my free time.
One thing that I have always noticed about myself is that I enjoy whatever I do, and I do it with my entire heart.
Q.3 Which are the sections you think can most benefit from using Social Champ?
Social Champ is for you, me, and all of us who love social media or are making a living out of it. Almost all verticals dealing with social media marketing/ management/ scheduling can benefit from the tool and save themselves a whole lot of time.
Industries, such as gaming, health, telecom, e-magazines, hotels, and all those who want to automate their social media will love Social Champ!
If we talk about personas, social media marketers or managers, startup CEOs, or any roles which require digital marketing are the perfect candidates for the tool. We even have plans for individuals, startups, bigger businesses, and agencies.
Also, since we are a pretty customer-centric tool, we are always adding new features requested by our customers so that our social media management tool can be as inclusive as possible.
Q.4 Do you agree that a downward trend towards advertising on Facebook has started and will continue?
Almost 80% of the posts intended for consumers are not seen by them, which means that organic reach has taken a hit on Facebook, and more and more people are now moving towards paid ads. This is because of the influx of advertisements on Facebook since almost all businesses use free marketing.
Considering the recent changes in the algorithm, marketers and social media managers should consider investing in paid ads. A healthy balance of both is the way forward! However, this certainly does not mean that you should stop posting otherwise.
We have quite a comprehensive blog on Facebook reach on our website!
Q.5 What are social media marketers’ major struggles today, and how can Social Champ help get around them?
I love this question since we have an in-house marketing team, and I see what they all struggle with daily. Before we had a team to manage all the digital marketing processes, I ran the entire marketing department myself. So I have quite an insight into what goes on during the day.
One of the significant problems that Social Champ helps with is saving time and automating processes. We have designed and engineered most of our features in a way that helps save a whole lot of time.
Let’s take bulk upload; the entire foundation of this feature is laid upon time management. With the bulk upload feature, you can save tons of time by using a single CSV file and scheduling content for up to months at once.
The best part? All posts will show up on the Social Media Calendar once you upload them via the bulk uploader. Therefore, you can make tweaks, reschedule them, or even delete them directly. No need to delete the entire CSV file, make edits, and then reschedule them.
Coming to the automation part, features such as recycle, Auto RSS, and repeat are a few of the features that make your life super easy. If you are out of content to post or just want to test your page’s reach in general, use Auto RSS.
Additionally, agencies have a lot of workloads. So, to make their lives easier, we have recently launched a workspace feature, which enables them to group all similar profiles or accounts from the same client into a group.
Even while designing the product, we keep this exact thought process. To keep it short, we love saving time ourselves (I mean, who doesn’t, right?), so what we do is hold a poll.
We make at least two designs of the same screens and share them with our team. And then, we discuss and have a healthy argument over which screen is the easiest to navigate and use.
This is how we develop a super clean UI and an even shorter process to use all our features.
Q.6 What are the strategies which enable you to increase your client’s social media reach effectively?
Like I said above, we focus on struggles or issues that social media managers face and turn that into use cases for our features. For example, the Repeat feature allows you to retweet and repost on Twitter and Facebook, increasing the reach and engagement of those posts.
Similarly, other features such as Auto RSS allow users to test the best time to post by consistently posting on social accounts. This way, you don’t have to worry too much about creating content all the time. Instead, you can focus on creating quality content for prime time slots when your users are most active.
Most of our other features have a similar use case behind them as well.
Q.7 You are a poet, motivational speaker, among other things, while running a massive business. How do you manage your time to include such activities in your schedule?
Well, it is challenging since you only have a limited amount of hours each day. At times, I skip many other activities just to focus on Social Champ as it’s my top priority next to giving time to parents, friends, and religion.
One of the main reasons I can do it all is because I prefer spending time with family and doing other such things rather than watching movies and shows.
Just to put it in perspective, I haven’t watched any episodes of Game of Thrones, Money Heist, or any other such series. For entertainment, I like swimming, fishing or playing e-games!
Q.8 Before the success of Social Champ, you started three different companies, which did not garner much attention, and yet you persisted with entrepreneurship. Is it something you feel passionately about, and how does one deal with the struggles associated with it?
Oh well, I have never run a startup because the title “CEO” sounds cool or amazing and if that were the case, I would have miserably failed or stopped being persistent. Each of the startups that didn’t work out helped me make Social Champ a better entity and a more successful business.
A few of the lessons that my previous startups taught me included launching an MVP fast, seeking market validation, focusing more on user experience, and more.
There is no denying that when things go south, you need all the help and motivation from friends around you. Hence I always suggest solopreneurs have at least one co-founder so you can motivate and help each other.
I was lucky to have a great circle of friends (who co-founded Social Champ with me), family, and mentors who always advised me when things went south.
Q.9 What changes do you think the social media marketing field will undergo due to the growing public concern about data privacy?
The most important change would happen in how social media companies and platforms collect and process data. This change started with the Cambridge Analytica scandal, and it only intensified in the way users wanted these organizations to access and store their data.
User rights groups regularly blame the oversight of social media networks as an important reason behind the scams.
Data privacy concerns would grow and maybe consolidate into legal requirements. It will be interesting to see how these platforms would change their policies to accommodate these legal requirements.
Q.10 What would be your words of advice to someone entering the social media marketing sector?
Social media marketing is a highly competitive yet lucrative market. There is a place for everyone in that industry. And the best part? No matter how little experience you have.
I would suggest everyone check out different online courses, such as digital marketing ones from Google garage. I also ask my team to regularly take out time from their office hours to get these certifications.
When I started, I was honestly a newbie, with just a tool at my disposal. If I go way back, I was nobody on social media.
However, I learned how to navigate this field and make my mark with time and the right resources. You, too, can make a name for yourself in social media marketing by staying true to your profession, being consistent, and, most importantly, being true to yourself.
Q.11 You’re very young to have such a brilliant professional record. To what or whom would you attribute your success?
I wish I could name a single person, but fortunately, it takes a village. And I am super glad that it did because I met amazing people throughout the journey. Of course, God has helped and blessed me in more ways than one.
My family, parents, and siblings had complete faith in me. My parents prayed for me day and night, and my siblings took care of all the other chores while I worked all the time.
My university professors, especially Farhan Ahmed Siddiqui, Asim Ali, Muhammad Saeed, and Nadeem Mehmood, guided me throughout. Zia Khan, my professor who taught me coding.
My startup journey mentor, Jehan Ara, now runs Katalyst Labs, an accelerator in Pakistan. It was through her introductions that we were able to raise two rounds of investment for Social Champ.
And through Jehan, I found startup mentors; Jawwad Farid and Munir Usman. They regularly follow up on my progress and suggest ways for me to grow.
And lastly, my two amazing co-founders and university batch mates who believed in me, Zohaib Ahmed Shakir (CTO at Social Champ), Shakir Ghani (COO at Social Champ), and the entire Social Champ team, including the marketing and development departments who believe in our vision and help us grow.
It is because of the team that we are here!
Q.12 With over 6000 users using Social Champ to make over 50 million posts, what tools and strategies have helped Social Champ create such an impact?
We are quite proud of the fact that the entire growth of Social Champ is organic!
When we started, most of our clients came through referrals and our contacts. Then one day, Guy Kawasaki mentioned us in one of his videos! It was entirely out of the blue, and honestly felt super nice that our product can make such an impact that someone would feature it on their channel!
After which, we ventured into influencer marketing and built a strong community.
Q.13 How would you describe the role of BloggingEclipse in the field?
Websites like BloggingEclipse are highly useful in the field of digital marketing. They provide users with solid, research-backed articles that never go out of style. Such websites also help people find appropriate tools and software that enable them to make an informed decision!
Following the interesting story of Social Champ and the even more interesting story of its founder certainly made for a memorable conversation.
It is known that it is much harder to remain relevant on social media than to build an audience, and we were delighted to hear that their range of tools covers both sides of that spectrum.
We can only guess what the innovative people at Social Champ will come up with next, but if you want to be the first to know what new way they’re helping their users interact with their audience better, then head on over to Social Champ and become a member of a community of thousands of enriched social media professionals.
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