The 5 Essentials of a Smooth Client Onboarding Process

If you’ve ever onboarded a new client, you know how important this time period is to the overall client/provider relationship. It's your chance to put your best foot forward, give them a preview of what it's like to work with an amazing social media manager like yourself, and assure them that their investment is well worth it! 

At Homemade Social, we’ve worked hard to continuously improve and refine our client onboarding process. It’s truly SO streamlined at this point that ANY member of our team could confidently take on the process solo and with ease. 

If you’re ready to unlock the exact onboarding process deemed by one of our clients as “the best [they’ve] experienced,” read on for five essentials you NEED and snag them all in our best-selling Onboard Like a Homie: Client Onboarding Bundle (available only through March 9, 2022).

A STRONG PROPOSAL

Before the onboarding process can begin, you’ll need to send your prospective client a strong social media proposal. The presentation and way you convey your value within the proposal will play a major role in whether or not the client will choose to book with you. 

At Homemade Social, we have a fully-customizable Social Media Proposal Template that we use religiously when communicating with leads. In each proposal, we tailor the details within the template to appeal to the brand’s needs and always make sure to highlight:

• About us

• Portfolio + testimonials

• Package options + add-on services

• Case study

• Next steps

Thanks to our 19-page pre-made Canva template, our days of spending HOURS creating new proposals for leads are over. It makes it super easy for us to plug and play all of this information, while still making the proposal feel specially curated for each client.

NEW CLIENT QUESTIONNAIRES 

Once the client has selected their package and signed the contract, we then send them a New Client Questionnaire to fill out. This questionnaire allows the brand to submit login credentials, branding and image assets, and answer key questions related to their goals, target audience, tone of voice, competitors, and more.

Our Client Onboarding Checklist includes four separate New Client Questionnaires, depending on our scope of work for the client:

• General for all clients

• Influencer Marketing

• Ads

• Email/SMS

Once complete, these checklists provide our internal team with everything we need to get started on their account and content!

CLIENT ONBOARDING CHECKLIST + EMAIL TEMPLATES

Once the contract has been signed, the first invoice has been paid, and the New Client Questionnaire(s) have been completed, our work begins!! Having a Client Onboarding Checklist provides a step-by-step roadmap that allows both ourselves and our clients to walk through the process with ease. This checklist not only streamlines the onboarding process but also ensures we don’t miss a thing!

If you’re ready to automate your process even further, it’s time to stop re-writing every email when onboarding a new client. In our Onboard Like a Homie: Client Onboarding Bundle (available only through March 9, 2022), we have an exclusive download with done-for-you email templates for:

• Turning down a lead

• Setting up a discovery call

• Sending the proposal and contract

• Sending the New Client Welcome Packet

• Sending the New Client Questionnaire

• Setting up a kick-off call

• Sending the first round of content for review

• And more!

NEW CLIENT WELCOME PACKET

In the midst of the client onboarding process, we also like to send our clients a New Client Welcome Packet (available exclusively in our Onboard Like a Homie: Client Onboarding Bundle, available only through March 9, 2022). This packet allows us to welcome the client to our family, outline the next steps, and re-state systems, processes, and policies from our signed contract that they should be aware of.

More specifically, we use this fully-customizable packet to:

• Introduce the team

• Share the project’s kick-off timeline

• Highlight key policies outlined in our contract, such as:

  • Posting and approval process

  • Content requests

  • Office hours + communication

  • Reporting

  • Client meetings + concierge

  • About their package + service add-ons

  • And more!

IMPLEMENTATION OF CLIENT BOUNDARIES

Social media might be on 24/7, but social media managers shouldn’t have to be. The client onboarding process is a CRITICAL time in your client relationship as it sets the stage for everything to come, so it’s important to have these boundaries in place from the start.

A few boundaries we recommend stating in both your contract and New Client Welcome Packet include:

• Office hours

• Content request due dates

• Approval deadlines

• Revision limits

Our 19-page How to Set Boundaries With Social Media Clients download not only outlines all of these boundaries and more but it also includes tips for enforcing and done-for-you email templates to gently remind your social media clients of these policies when needed. Trust us, this resource is a LIFESAVER!

We hope you found this blog post helpful in learning more about the makings of a successful and smooth client onboarding process! Unlock ALL of these essentials in our best-selling Onboard Like a Homie: Client Onboarding Bundle, available for only ONE week (March 1, 2022 - March 9, 2022) before it returns to the vault. Enjoy!

xx- The Homies