Social Media Manager

Let's Write Africa's Story Together!

Old Mutual is a firm believer in the African opportunity and our diverse talent reflects this.

Job Description

The Social Media Manager is the custodian of Old Mutual's Group social media strategy and enterprise social media ecosystem, responsible for building a strong, trusted and distinctive social presence across the social platforms and pages owned and governed by Group Marketing.

The role is responsible for developing and implementing a social media strategy that creates, nurtures and grows communities, strengthens brand relevance and trust, increases engagement, and contributes to positive net sentiment towards Old Mutual.

The Social Media Manager translates Group and business priorities into an integrated social media strategy, content approach and enterprise social calendar, ensuring that social activity across the organisation is coordinated, strategically aligned and executed to a consistently high standard.
The role also owns social media governance, platform management, policy development and risk management, ensuring Old Mutual's social presence operates within appropriate brand, regulatory, legal and reputational guardrails.
A key component of the role is to use social listening, audience insights, content performance and sentiment data to continuously improve Old Mutual's social presence and identify opportunities to strengthen trust, relevance and engagement.

Community management is explicitly excluded from this role and is owned by the Community Management team within Group Communications. The Social Media Manager remains responsible for the strategic relationship between social content, audience sentiment, reputation and the broader social ecosystem.

1. Key Result Areas / Outputs

1.1 Develop and Lead the Group Social Media Strategy

• Develop and maintain the Group-wide social media strategy aligned to Old Mutual's overall brand, marketing and business strategy.

• Establish clear strategic objectives for social media across:

• Brand awareness

• Brand trust

• Audience growth

• Engagement

• Product and proposition awareness

• Thought leadership

• Consideration

• Reputation

• Positive net sentiment

• Define the role of each social platform within the overall Old Mutual ecosystem.

• Establish clear principles for when Old Mutual should:

  • Build organically

  • Amplify content through paid media

  • Use influencers or creators

  • Leverage employee advocacy

  • Partner with external communities

• Ensure social media contributes meaningfully to the broader full-funnel digital marketing strategy.

• Develop strategic recommendations for evolving Old Mutual's social presence as audience behaviours and platforms change.

1.2. Social Media Channel Strategy

Own the strategic role and purpose of Old Mutual's social platforms, including relevant platforms such as:

• Facebook

• Instagram

• LinkedIn

• TikTok

• YouTube

• X

• Other emerging platforms where strategically relevant

Responsibilities include:

• Define the role and objectives of each platform.

• Establish audience strategies by platform.

• Define appropriate content formats, themes and publishing approaches.

• Establish platform-specific content principles rather than applying a one-size-fits-all approach.

• Identify opportunities to consolidate, rationalise or develop social pages where appropriate.

• Ensure Old Mutual maintains a coherent ecosystem across Group-owned social properties.

1.3 Enterprise Social Media Calendar & Content Planning

The Social Media Manager is the custodian of the enterprise-wide social media calendar.

Responsibilities include:

• Develop and maintain the Group social media editorial calendar.

• Establish annual and quarterly social media themes aligned to:

  • Brand priorities

  • Business priorities

  • Campaign priorities

  • Financial calendar

  • Corporate events

  • Cultural moments

  • Relevant external events

• Coordinate social content requirements from Business Units and Group Functions.

• Ensure stakeholders understand upcoming themes, priorities and publishing opportunities.

• Identify conflicts, duplication and gaps across the enterprise social calendar.

• Create greater opportunities for content to be repurposed and amplified across the organisation.

• Establish appropriate briefing deadlines and publishing processes.

• Ensure reactive content is managed within agreed governance frameworks.

1.4. Social Content Strategy & Development

• Develop the Group social content strategy in collaboration with Brand, Communications, Creative and Business Unit stakeholders.

• Define content pillars and thematic territories that build:

  • Brand relevance

  • Trust

  • Financial education

  • Thought leadership

  • Product understanding

  • Customer value

  • Corporate reputation

• Partner with creative and social agencies to develop compelling, platform-native content.

• Ensure content is designed for the specific behaviour and expectations of each platform.

• Encourage greater use of:

  • Video

  • Short-form content

  • Creator-led formats

  • Educational content

  • Executive thought leadership

  • Data-led storytelling

  • Customer-centric storytelling

• Establish content testing principles to determine what formats, messages and creative approaches perform best.

1.5. Net Sentiment, Brand Trust & Social Reputation

The role plays a critical role in building and protecting Old Mutual's social reputation.

Responsibilities include:

• Develop and maintain a social media net sentiment measurement framework.

• Monitor trends in:

  • Positive sentiment

  • Neutral sentiment

  • Negative sentiment

  • Brand trust

  • Key reputation themes

• Identify the key drivers of positive and negative sentiment.

• Use social insights to inform content and campaign strategies.

• Develop proactive social campaigns designed to improve positive sentiment and strengthen trust.

• Identify reputational risks and escalate relevant issues to Group Communications and appropriate stakeholders.

• Partner with Brand, Communications and Insights teams to ensure social intelligence contributes to broader reputation management.

• Develop regular recommendations for improving Old Mutual's social brand health.

Important boundary: The role does not own day-to-day community management or customer response. Those responsibilities remain with Group Communications' Community Management team.

1.6. Social Media Governance & Risk Management

Own and maintain the Group social media governance framework.

Responsibilities include:

• Develop and maintain social media governance standards and operating principles.

• Establish minimum standards for all Group-owned social platforms and pages.

• Define governance requirements covering:

  • Account ownership

  • Access management

  • Publishing rights

  • Approval processes

  • Content standards

  • Platform usage

  • Risk escalation

  • Crisis scenarios

  • Third-party access

• Maintain an accurate inventory of Old Mutual social media accounts and administrators.

• Conduct periodic reviews of account security and access permissions.

• Ensure appropriate controls exist for the creation of new social accounts.

• Establish governance standards for Business Units operating social properties.

• Partner with Legal, Compliance, Risk and Communications to ensure appropriate controls for regulated financial services content.

1.7 Social Media & Influencer Marketing Policies

Own the development, implementation and ongoing review of:

Social Media Policy

Applicable to employees and relevant internal stakeholders, covering:

• Responsible social media usage

• Brand representation

• Confidentiality

• Disclosure requirements

• Appropriate use of company information

• Personal vs professional social media activity

• Escalation of reputational risks

Influencer / Creator Marketing Policy

Develop governance standards covering:

• Influencer selection

• Due diligence

• Brand suitability

• Financial services regulatory requirements

• Disclosure and transparency

• Content approval

• Contractual requirements

• Monitoring and reporting

• Risk escalation

Financial Adviser Social Media Guidelines

Support the development of appropriate guidelines for financial advisers and distribution teams using social media to represent themselves or Old Mutual.

1.8. Employee Advocacy & Executive Social Enablement

Develop and support appropriate programmes that enable employees and leaders to become credible advocates for Old Mutual.

This may include:

• Employee advocacy frameworks

• Executive social media enablement

• Leadership content programmes

• Executive thought leadership

• Social media training

• Content toolkits

• Campaign amplification programmes

Ensure advocacy programmes are governed appropriately and remain authentic rather than becoming purely promotional.

1.9 Influencer & Creator Strategy

Develop and manage the strategic framework for influencer and creator partnerships.

Responsibilities include:

• Identify opportunities for creator-led storytelling.

• Define appropriate influencer categories and audience segments.

• Develop selection and evaluation criteria.

• Ensure influencer partnerships align with:

  • Brand values

  • Audience relevance

  • Trust

  • Financial services regulatory requirements

• Measure influencer effectiveness beyond reach, including:

  • Engagement quality

  • Sentiment

  • Brand impact

  • Audience relevance

  • Consideration where measurable

1.10 Social Media Campaign Strategy

• Develop social media strategies for major Group campaigns.

• Translate campaign objectives into social-first strategies.

• Define:

  • Audience

  • Social role

  • Content architecture

  • Channel mix

  • Paid amplification requirements

  • Influencer/creator opportunities

  • Measurement framework

• Work closely with the Digital Marketing, Performance Marketing, Brand and Campaign Management teams to ensure integration across paid, owned and earned activity.

• Ensure social is incorporated early into campaign planning rather than being treated as a distribution channel at the end of the process.

11. Social Media Insights & Analytics

Develop a robust social measurement framework covering:

Audience

• Audience growth

• Audience composition

• Audience relevance

Content

• Reach

• Engagement

• Video consumption

• Content effectiveness

• Format performance

Brand

• Brand sentiment

• Net sentiment

• Trust

• Brand conversation

Business

• Campaign contribution

• Website traffic where applicable

• Content engagement

• Product consideration indicators

Use these insights to provide actionable recommendations, rather than simply reporting social media statistics.

1.12. Agency Management

Manage social media agency partners to ensure they deliver against agreed strategic and operational requirements.

Responsibilities include:

• Develop clear agency scopes of work.

• Establish performance expectations and KPIs.

• Manage agency deliverables and quality.

• Provide strategic direction to agencies.

• Ensure agencies operate within Old Mutual's governance framework.

• Conduct regular performance reviews.

• Identify opportunities to improve agency efficiency and value.

• Ensure Old Mutual retains ownership of strategic knowledge, data and platform assets.

1.13. Stakeholder Management

Build strong relationships with:

• Group Marketing

• Business Unit Marketing teams

• Brand

• Group Communications

• Human Capital

• Product teams

• Corporate Affairs

• Customer Experience

• Legal and Compliance

• Risk

• Digital Marketing

• Performance Marketing

• Insights and Analytics

The role must be able to balance competing stakeholder requirements while maintaining the integrity of the Group social strategy and editorial priorities.

1.14. Social Platform & Asset Management

Act as the custodian of Group-owned social media assets.

Responsibilities include:

• Maintain an enterprise inventory of social accounts and pages.

• Ensure appropriate ownership and administrator access.

• Maintain platform security standards.

• Manage account verification where relevant.

• Ensure appropriate naming, descriptions, branding and profile information.

• Establish processes for onboarding and offboarding administrators.

• Monitor platform changes and ensure appropriate migration or configuration requirements are addressed.

• Ensure the organisation is protected against account loss, unauthorised access and inappropriate use.

1.15. Governance of Business Unit Social Media

While the role may not directly manage every BU social page, it should establish Group standards and guardrails.

Responsibilities include:

• Define minimum standards for BU social media operations.

• Establish social media governance principles.

• Provide strategic guidance to BU social teams.

• Conduct periodic capability and compliance assessments.

• Identify opportunities for greater consistency and collaboration.

• Encourage appropriate sharing and amplification of Group content.

• Identify opportunities to consolidate fragmented social presences where this improves audience experience and brand effectiveness.

1.16. Innovation & Future Readiness

The Social Media Manager should actively identify and test emerging opportunities across the evolving social ecosystem.

Key areas include:

• Short-form video

• Creator economy

• Social commerce where relevant

• Employee advocacy

• Executive influence

• New platform formats

• Social search and discoverability

• Automated content workflows

• Content personalisation

• Social intelligence

• AI-enabled content production and optimisation, subject to appropriate governance

• Emerging audience behaviours and platforms

The emphasis should be on practical experimentation and measurable value, rather than adopting technology simply because it is new.

The role should be measured across a balanced set of growth, brand, engagement, governance and effectiveness metrics.

Audience & Growth

• Quality of audience growth

• Relevant audience reach

• Follower growth where appropriate

Engagement

• Engagement rate

• Video completion / consumption

• Content interaction

• Quality of engagement

Brand & Reputation

• Net sentiment

• Positive sentiment

• Brand trust indicators

• Share of relevant conversation

Content Effectiveness

• Performance by content pillar

• Performance by format

• Creative effectiveness

• Organic reach and engagement

Governance

• Compliance with Group social standards

• Account security

• Policy adoption

• Governance audit outcomes

Business Contribution

• Contribution to campaign objectives

• Traffic and engagement with owned properties where relevant

• Contribution to product awareness and consideration

• Employee advocacy participation

Stakeholder & Agency Effectiveness

• Stakeholder satisfaction

• Agency performance

• Timeliness and quality of content delivery

​2. Qualifications, Skills and Experience:

2.1 Minimum Educational Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Marketing, Communications, Digital Marketing, Journalism or related discipline.

• Relevant social media or digital marketing certifications advantageous.

2.2. Experience

Required

• 3–6+ years' experience in social media, digital marketing, content strategy or related disciplines.

• Demonstrated experience managing social media for a large corporate or complex organisation.

• Experience developing and implementing enterprise social media strategies.

• Experience managing multiple social platforms and audiences.

• Experience working with creative, media and social agencies.

• Experience developing social media governance frameworks and policies.

• Experience managing senior stakeholders.

• Experience working in a regulated environment would be highly advantageous.

Advantageous

• Financial services experience across banking, insurance, investments or wealth management.

• Experience with influencer/creator programmes.

• Experience with corporate reputation and social listening.

• Experience with employee advocacy and executive social programmes.

2.3 Technical & Professional Competencies

The successful candidate should demonstrate strong capability across:

• Social media strategy

• Social content strategy

• Social analytics

• Social listening

• Sentiment analysis

• Paid and organic social understanding

• Platform management

• Influencer/creator marketing

• Social governance

• Content planning

• Campaign management

• Agency management

• Digital marketing measurement

• Audience insights

• Reputation management principles

• Social media risk and compliance

2.4. Behavioural Competencies

• Strategic thinker

• Strong communicator

• Excellent stakeholder manager

• Commercially minded

• Audience-centric

• Strong judgement

• High attention to detail

• Comfortable operating in ambiguity

• Influential without relying solely on authority

• Curious and digitally progressive

• Strong risk and governance mindset

• Collaborative

• Results oriented

2.5. Future-Focused Capability Requirements

The role should evolve beyond traditional social media management into social ecosystem leadership.

The successful candidate should increasingly be able to:

Build communities, not audiences

• Move beyond follower growth towards meaningful relationships, trust and advocacy.

Build social intelligence

• Use social listening and audience signals to inform broader marketing, brand and business decisions.

Connect social to brand outcomes

• Demonstrate how social contributes to awareness, consideration, trust and reputation.

Operate an enterprise social ecosystem

• Create consistency across Group and BU-owned platforms while allowing appropriate local flexibility.

Lead creator and advocacy ecosystems

• Build credible networks of employees, executives, advisers and external creators.

Use data to improve creative effectiveness

• Move from “what performed?” to “why did it perform, and what should we do differently?”

Embed social into integrated campaigns

• Ensure social is part of campaign strategy from the beginning rather than simply being a publishing channel.

 

Skills

Action Planning, Analytics Software, Business Intelligence (BI) Analysis, Computer Literacy, Data Analysis, Data Compilation, Data Controls, Data Interpretations, Evaluating Information, Executing Plans, Marketing Systems, Market Research Analysis, Media Management, Oral Communications, Social Media Management

Competencies

Business Insight

Communicates Effectively

Cultivates Innovation

Customer Focus

Interpersonal Savvy

Manages Ambiguity

Manages Complexity

Nimble Learning

Education

Bachelors Degree (B)

Closing Date

17 September 2026 , 23:59

The appointment will be made from the designated group in line with the Employment Equity Plan of Old Mutual South Africa and the specific business unit in question.

The Old Mutual Story!