The very best social media marketing courses for all levels

If you’re looking to level up your social media skills, or you’re new to the game, courses can be a great route. 

Want to learn how to use the power of social media and social networks to connect with your customers and transform your brand visibility? 

If your answer is yes, then you want to learn the ins, the outs, and the upsides of social media marketing.

Best social media marketing courses

While this post digs into free, paid, certified and exceptional social media marketing courses, if you’re short of time, here’s our top seven:

1. Oxford Home Study Centre 
2. Hubspot Academy
3. SkillShare – Introduction to Social Media Strategy 
4. The Meta Social Media Marketing Professional Certificate
5. The Strategy of Content Marketing
6. Hootsuite Academy’s The Social Media Marketing Certification Course
7. Digital Marketing Institute’s The Social Media Marketing Course

What training do you need for social media marketing?

Social media trends and platforms are always changing and evolving. This means your social media skills also need to change and evolve. 

It’s a skillset that requires constant refreshing, as social media platforms are always discovering new ways of doing things. To stay ahead, you’ll need to keep up-to-date with trends, platforms, technologies, and ever-changing market needs and demographics. You’ll always be learning and discovering new things with this career.

There are two routes you can take to expand your social media marketing skills – self-taught and formal training. In most cases, you’ll combine elements of both routes. 

Self-taught social media marketing allows you to explore different courses and approaches and can be done almost entirely for free. You don’t need to spend money to learn this skill, you just need to be hungry for information and happy to spend a lot of time researching trends and developments. 

Formal social media marketing training will cost you, but it can give you a really solid boost if you’re looking to expand your career with certifications. There are several courses available, all offering a slightly different take on training, so make sure you choose one that fits your needs and that has a good reputation.

Most importantly, whether you’re self-taught or learning through an institution, remember that social media marketing is an evolving beast. So you need to stay on top of the news, trends, and changes to stay ahead of the pack.

Are social media marketing courses worth it?

Is a social media marketing course worth it? This is a very subjective question because the value you get from the course will depend entirely on your goals. You can use a course to step into the world of social media marketing, to expand your existing skills, or to simply refresh your skills so you can innovate and try new things. 

You need to know what you want from your course before you pay for it and, if you’re thinking of doing a course to get a job with a company or to become accredited for a career boost, make sure that you choose one that has a sterling reputation. 

It’s important that the time you put into the course is reflected in the quality of your qualification. 

If you opt for free social media training courses that don’t come with a qualification, the value lies in how well they’re designed and the new skills they teach you. 

Are you learning new things? Are you discovering fresh ways of approaching your social media marketing? If the answer is yes, then the course is worth your time.

How long is a social media marketing course?

The amount of time you spend learning social media marketing will depend entirely on where you go to study, what type of course you choose, and how much time you have to dedicate to studying it. 

Some courses take as little as six weeks, while others can be up to six months. Many courses allow you to structure your studying around your schedule.

The amount of time you have available to study will play a big part in determining what type of course you choose and how long it takes to complete.

How can I learn social media marketing for free?

If you’ve opted for the self-taught route, you can find plenty of resources designed to help you build your skills without spending a penny. There are some amazing courses available for you to choose from, and they all come from trusted organisations and education institutions.

The best free social media marketing courses

This is not the most exhaustive list of free social media marketing courses, but it’s certainly a fantastic place for you to start with trusted universities, academies, and social media giants (you’ll also find more free lessons in our online courses section below).

1. Udemy – while some Udemy courses cost money, they regularly have special offers or sales that discount their courses to zero. Some of the discounts are so good that the courses may as well be free…
2. Coursera – this beginner course about social media from Northwestern University is completely free. You can find more free courses and hidden gems in this Coursera list of social media marketing courses 
3. Oxford Home Study Centre – this platform offers you certification and free courses, which makes it a great place to start if you want to flesh out your skillset. Their Social Media Marketing course is short, comes with certification, and earns you CPD points 
4. Constant Contact – Social Media 101 is exactly that, a quick and easy course that gets you right into the depths of social media so you can explore your goals
5. SkillShare – this platform has a tonne of free courses amidst the paid-for ones, and it has an excellent starter course entitled Introduction to Social Media Strategy 
6. EdEx – here you will find plenty of free social media marketing courses mixed among the paid-for varieties
7. eMarketing Institute – this platform has a variety of paid-for social media marketing courses available, but this one is free and comes with certification 
8. Hubspot Academy – on this well-known platform, you’ll find several courses designed to help you boost your skills. This particular course will certify you and give you a fantastic level of insight into social media marketing 

The best online social media marketing courses

If you’re not ready to do courses in person, or you simply prefer the freedom of being able to study a course from anywhere in the world, then you’re in luck. There are some phenomenal online social media marketing courses available, and they all bring something special to the table.

These are the ten best free and paid online social media marketing courses right now:

1. The Meta Social Media Marketing Professional Certificate. This course is available to try for free for seven days, runs for seven months, and is available in multiple languages. You can earn credits towards a Bachelor of Applied Arts and Sciences
2. The Strategy of Content Marketing. This course costs $49 to purchase and earn a certificate or free if you don’t want the certificate. You can start when you want and it takes around 21 hours to complete
3. Social Media Marketing – Content Marketing Masterclass. This course is often on sale so the price varies and covers the basics as well as offering interesting facts and insights
4. Social Media Marketing Foundations. This forms part of the LinkedIn Learning platform, so anyone on Premium will be able to access it for free. It offers you plenty of skills development along with a shareable certificate at the end
5. Digital Marketing 101. This course includes beginner to advanced topics and comes with training videos, real-world scenarios, and quite a few extra bits of bonus content. You can access it with a free trial, but after that you have to pay 
6. Social Media Marketing. This course covers 35 lessons across multiple platforms and can be accessed for free
7. Online Advertising and Social Media. Another free course that helps you to develop online advertising ecosystems and that spans four weeks of lessons designed by the University System of Maryland
8. Social Media Marketing Specialisation. This course is accessible for free on a seven-day trial and was developed by Northwestern University
9. Fundamentals of Digital Marketing. This course is direct from the Google Digital Garage and spans 26 modules that are completely free to access
10. Social Media Marketing Course: Get Certified in Social Media Strategy. Here you can find the HubSpot Academy course that includes plenty of insights and information from a superb resource 

The best accredited and certified social media marketing courses

While many of the courses we’ve listed above are accredited, others aren’t. So, we’ve created this easy access list of accredited social media marketing courses for you to choose from. Here are the absolute best in the business:

1. Hootsuite Academy. The Social Media Marketing Certification Course costs $199 and covers the basics and the key skills required for this role in an intense six-hour training course
2. UCLA Extension. Social Media Marketing costs $475 and runs for five weeks in both a hybrid and online format 
3. Digital Marketing Institute. The Social Media Marketing Course offers professional certification at a cost of $1955. It runs across 10 modules and is entirely online 
4. eCornell. Social Media Marketing Cornell Certificate Program runs for two weeks, is entirely online and is instructor-led 
5. Coursera. Here you will find a variety of certified and accredited social media marketing courses from companies like Google, Meta, and the University of California
6. London College of Communication. Social Media Marketing Online Short Course brings you a tonne of insight in a fast six-week course that costs £360

Most social media marketing courses include certificates that you can put on your social and professional profiles, and that add credibility to your growing skillset as a social media marketing expert. 

And now, with Vamp

Whether you’re planning on studying through a university or learning your skills through research and practice, Vamp has a variety of tools designed to help you succeed. 

Our guides have been developed for people like you – people who want to get the most from their social media and their channels and who want to constantly learn new skills.

Our Vamp Social Media Analytics guide is the ultimate guide to what social media analytics are and what tools to use, and is a handy place to start if you want to expand your social media marketing repertoire. 

We’ve also created a social media strategy guide with a list of cool free tools and templates to help you build a fail-safe social media strategy, and an exhaustive list of social media management tools that can help you market more effectively. 

We update our resources regularly, so keep checking back to learn more about social media marketing.