How to get hired
Nobody asks a social media or video candidate for their marks first. They ask: what have you made, and what happened when it went out?
For social media executive and manager roles
Show an account you grew, with numbers. It can be your own niche page, a college society's handle, or a local business you ran for free: followers before and after, reach and saves on your best posts, and what you changed. Screenshots of Meta Business Suite or Instagram insights carry more weight than a certificate.
The test is usually a two-week content calendar for their brand: post ideas, captions, one carousel draft and one Reel concept with the hook in the first two seconds. Some add a crisis question: "a customer posts a video of a bad order and it's trending: what do you do in the first hour?" Good answers involve replying in public quickly, moving to DMs, and telling your manager before anything is deleted.
Meta's Community Management certification on Meta's certification page is the one exam built for this role; useful, not required. Learn Canva well, and enough CapCut or Premiere to cut your own Reels, because small teams expect the social person to make content too.
For video editor roles
The test is an edit. You'll get raw footage (a podcast, an interview, a product shoot) and 24 to 48 hours to turn it into a short-form Reel and sometimes a longer YouTube cut. Editors are judged on the hook, pace, captions, sound clean-up and whether you followed the brand's style. Before you apply, have a showreel of 60 to 90 seconds and three full pieces: a talking-head YouTube edit with B-roll, a fast Reel with animated captions, and one ad or explainer.
Tools that come up in posts: Premiere Pro, After Effects, Final Cut Pro, DaVinci Resolve and CapCut. Learn one editor deeply and After Effects basics for motion text. Editors who can also do simple motion graphics and colour correction get paid more; the animation and VFX guide covers that path.
Working with creators and influencers
YouTube channels, creator-led brands and influencer marketing agencies hire editors, scriptwriters, thumbnail designers and campaign managers. Agency roles involve finding creators, negotiating deliverables and checking that every paid post is labelled. Indian rules require it: ASCI's influencer guidelines and the Consumer Affairs Department's Endorsement Know-hows ask for a clear label such as "ad" or "sponsored" that is hard to miss, not hidden in hashtags, and platform tools alone don't count.
If you want to be a creator yourself, treat it as a business: brand deals usually need a media kit, an invoice and a bank account in your name, and once income becomes regular you'll need a CA's advice on GST and income tax. YouTube's Partner Programme rules set the thresholds for ad revenue.
The ladder
Social: Social Media Executive, Social Media Specialist, Social Media Manager, Head of Social or Content Lead. Video: Junior or Assistant Editor, Video Editor, Senior Video Editor, Post-production Lead or Head of Video. Community Manager is a separate track at apps and gaming firms. Pay rises most when you move from making posts to owning a channel's growth and budget.
What the work is like
Social and video work doesn't respect office hours: trends move on weekends, launches happen at night, and a brand account needs checking on Sundays. Many roles are contract or freelance, paid per video or per month; agree on revisions (how many rounds are included) and payment dates in writing before you start. Be wary of "edit 10 videos as a trial" requests: a fair test is one short piece. Before you accept a remote offer from an unknown firm, run it through our job check.