12 Best Social Media Marketing Courses to Take in 2022

If you are searching for an up-to-date list of courses on marketing for Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter, and TikTok, you’ve come to the right place. I present to you the best courses built from Class Central’s catalog with over 800 Social Media Marketing courses, and selected according to a proven methodology that you can check below.

But if you’re in a hurry, here are my top picks. Click on one to skip to the course details:

What is Social Media Marketing?

Social Media Marketing is one of the most relevant branches of Digital Marketing applied for creating campaigns, ads, and content to engage your audience and persuade them to take action. Even though the terms e-marketing and digital marketing are still a trend, social media marketing is gaining popularity among researchers and practitioners.

The professional applying those frameworks and creating campaigns can be a small business owner, a marketer, a freelancer, or independent professionals looking for a way to build their online presence and find the right positioning for their business.

The steps to make a successful social media marketing campaign starts by determining your niche and target audience to select the appropriate platform you will advertise. Then, you can get familiar with that media by taking a course and learning the specifics. To achieve even better results, you will need to learn the fundamentals of marketing, copywriting, creative writing, content writing, and SEO optimization.

To conclude, social media marketing is a set of tools and techniques that can be learned, practiced, and developed with the help of courses, software, and other professionals. This is indeed a valuable asset for any business and professionals. According to Oberlo, more than half of the world population use social media with a 9.9% increase per year. Eastern Asia has more than 1 billion people using social media and North America has over 300 million people connected.

Course Ranking Methodology

I built this ranking following the now tried-and-tested methodology used in previous rankings. It involves a three-step process:

First,  I’m part of Class Central, the leading search engine for online courses. We have a database of more than 50K online courses and hundreds of thousands of crowdsourced reviews. So it seemed like the natural starting point.

I started by leveraging the database to make a preliminary selection of Social Media Marketing courses, looking at things like ratings, reviews, and course bookmarks. So this was a purely data-driven step, relying on hard metrics to create an initial ranking that we could then iterate upon and expand.

Using this approach, some of the top picks rapidly became apparent, since the best courses tend to have rave reviews. But I didn’t stop there. Ratings and reviews rarely tell the whole story. So the next step was to bring my personal knowledge of online education into the mix.

Second, I used my experience as an online learner to evaluate each of the preliminary picks.

I took part in a couple of in-person digital marketing bootcamps back in 2018 and 2019. Since then, there’s been a big shift in the market. New player, TikTok, has changed the way most of us used to do business on such platforms; Instagram is now a video sharing platform. I’ve been following the current trends and can confidently say that the courses in the list will help you deliver great results, even though they cost a fraction of a traditional workshop.

Third, during my research, I came across courses that felt well-made but weren’t well-known. If I adopted a purely data-centric approach, I would have to leave those courses out of the ranking, if only because they had fewer enrollments.

Instead, I favored a holistic approach. I’ve included more personal picks that hopefully surprise those of you who have already seen or taken the more popular social media marketing courses and are looking for something a bit different. You can also clearly see courses aimed at specific expertise as in YouTube guides and build your personal branding.

After going through this process — combining Class Central data, my experience as a lifelong learner, and a lot of editing — we arrived at our final ranking. So far, I’ve spent more than 20 hours building this ranking, and I intend to continue updating it in the future.

As I mentioned before, social media marketing can be used by anyone. I tried to keep this list as diverse as possible with content for novice marketers, 100% inexperienced beginners, small business owners, and other professionals interested in learning a new skill.

Course Ranking Statistics

Here are some aggregate stats about the ranking:

• Together, they account for 564,449 enrollments plus thousands of YouTube views.
• The single most popular course in the ranking has nearly 200k enrollments.
• 7 courses are free or free-to-audit, five courses are paid.

Without further ado, let’s go through the top picks.

This course lays the foundation of social media marketing strategy. Aimed for beginners or small-businesses starting their digital marketing strategy into the most popular channels. It focuses primarily on Facebook and Instagram since this course was developed in conjunction with Meta, formerly known as Facebook. However, you will learn the basics of Youtube, WhatsApp, WeChat, LinkedIn, TikTok, Snapchat, Twitter, and Pinterest.

As the instructor, Anke Audenaert, puts it: “whether you’re looking to start a career in social media marketing, whether you work for a Fortune 500 company, a tiny little mom and pop shop, or are simply interested in marketing your own brand and story on social media then this is the course for you. You don’t need any experience to get started, we’ll start from the very beginning.”

If you want a more in-depth experience, you may also consider taking the next courses in this specialization. In total, there are 5 courses and a capstone project. This is the first course in the Facebook Social Media Marketing professional certificate. You can watch (audit) all courses for free. However, you won’t have access to the graded assignments and certificates. Upon successful completion of the full program, you will earn both the Coursera and the Facebook Digital Marketing Associate Certification, proving your skills in social media marketing and in the use of Facebook Ads Manager.

What You’ll Learn

• Understand the landscape of traditional, digital, and social media marketing
• Create SMART goals, identify KPIs, and define your target audience and their customer journey
• Understand the major social media platforms, how they function, and what role they play in marketing
• Choose the right social media platforms and learn how to create social media policies

How You’ll Learn

In this 5-week long course, you will have free access to all lectures, readings, and practice activities. Click here to learn more about how to sign up for Coursera courses for free.

For paying learners, you will also have graded quizzes and peer-graded assignments, which means you have to submit your own hands-on project. For example, in week 3, the peer-graded assignment is to develop a SMART Goal and appropriate KPIs for a business. Then you have to follow the criteria and you need to grade three other submissions from your peers. In order to receive a certificate, you need to pass the quizzes and be approved by your peers.

Institution
Meta

Provider
Coursera

Instructor(s)
Anke Audenaert

Level
Beginner

Workload
15 hours

Enrollments
185,524

Rating
4.9 (6,629 ratings)

Certificate
Available

Fun Facts

• The course has 323 bookmarks on Class Central.
• Anke Audenaert is the CEO and Co-Founder of Aptly, an online education production company. Anke founded and led the School of Business at Udacity, where she developed their business focused programs and grew the school to over 17K paying students. Anke is also an Adjunct Professor of Marketing at UCLA Anderson School of Management. Previously Anke led the Market Research Team at Yahoo! and founded Jump-Time (now OpenX).
• This course is also available in Arabic, Portuguese, and Spanish.

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.

This is the most straightforward course you will ever find. Let’s say you have a meeting tomorrow morning and you have an hour to understand the basics of social media marketing. You just need to click on this course, login to your LinkedIn account, and you’re ready to learn the basics in the most clear and concise way for free. It’s also a great course to help clarify what you’ve already studied if you are still a beginner but need more confidence for your next steps.

What You’ll Learn

In this course, you can learn the basics of social media marketing. Instructor Brian Honigman explains why making an investment in social media can benefit your business. He shows how to define your audience and craft a social media strategy focused on your organization’s goals. He also teaches you how to communicate effectively on leading social networks such as Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat; drive results with paid ads; and measure your success.

Some topics covered are: Developing a social media strategy, Defining your audience, Choosing the right channels, Publishing best practices, Building and maintaining a community, Selling on social media, Measuring activity, and Innovating with social media marketing.

How You’ll Learn

RED : WhatToMine – Crypto coins mining profit calculator compared to Ethereum

This course is divided into 7 modules, each ending with a quiz. You can take the quizzes as many times as you need to complete the course. LinkedIn Learning also provides a built-in Q&A tab to discuss the content with your peers.

Upon completion, you can get your certificate and upload it to your profile.

Provider
LinkedIn Learning

Instructor(s)
Brian Honigman

Level
Beginner

Workload
1 hour

Enrollments
199,398

Rating
4.7 (5,610 ratings)

Certificate
Available

Fun Facts

• Marketing consultant Brian Honigman helps NGOs, media brands, and tech companies succeed with marketing. Brian is an adjunct professor at the New York University School of Professional Studies and a contributor to the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and the Next Web.
• Brian Honigman has an intermediate course called “Social Media Marketing Trends” available on LinkedIn Learning as well.

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.

HubSpot is a software company that develops tools and integrations for marketing, sales, content management, and customer service. Hubspot Academy is their official learning resource which provides a variety of free courses with certificates on marketing and sales.

“HubSpot Academy’s mission is to transform the way people and companies grow by offering free online trainings for the digital age. From quick, practical courses to comprehensive certifications, you’ll learn everything you need to know about cutting edge business topics.“ 

Their courses are well produced and up-to-date as they go hand in hand with their software, they are frequently updated.

In this course, they will help you shape some basic foundations of your marketing strategy and brand positioning. Building an effective social media strategy will expand all of your other inbound marketing efforts. Learn everything from creating an effective social media strategy, to listening and monitoring, developing close relationships through engagement, setting up social listening and moderation, extending your reach, creating social content, social advertising, measuring ROI, and more.

What You’ll Learn

Learn how to build an effective social media strategy, extend your reach, excel in digital advertising, measure ROI, and more.

• Develop an engaging and effective social media strategy for your business.
• Build an inbound social media strategy that delights your customers and grows your bottom line.
• Leverage the power of social media to transform your business and your career

How You’ll Learn

This course is divided into 8 modules and 39 videos. It includes study guides, practical exercises and 29 mini-quizzes to test your knowledge. After completing all lessons, you can then take the final exam to test what you’ve learned. If you pass, you will receive a certification which can be added to your LinkedIn profile.

Institution
Hubspot Academy

Provider
Hubspot Academy

Instructor(s)
Crystal King, Dayne Topkin, Corey Braccialini

Level
Beginner

Workload
4-5 hours

Certificate
Available

Fun Facts

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.

This course was recently launched and it is one the most recent courses in this list. This is an introductory course in Instagram marketing which makes good use of visuals and introduces us to networking with other Instagram users. It is a great start for beginners with the platform on how to understand its features and develop your marketing strategy. By the end of the course, you will have a general knowledge of the platform.

This course can be accessed for free including quizzes and forums for 2 weeks. However, if you want to have the certificate, you will have to pay a subscription fee.

What You’ll Learn

Some topics covered in this course: Benefits of Instagram, Understanding the Algorithms, Algorithm Template, Situational Action Plan, Create Great Content, Insta-grids, Instagram Videos, Tools of Trade, Building your Connections, Sparking an Emotional Reaction, and much more.

How You’ll Learn

This course is divided into two weeks. In week one, there are 3 modules consisting of videos, discussions, articles, and activities. In week two, there is one module and one final quiz. The course is well developed and challenging enough to keep you engaged throughout the process. Participation in the discussion is optional, but it’s recommended that you take part in that to enhance your learning experience.

Institution
Social Media College

Provider
FutureLearn

Instructor(s)
Jonathan Tanner

Level
Beginner

Workload
8 hours

Enrollments
2,623

Rating
4.8 (11 reviews)

Certificate
Available

Fun Facts

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.

This is an intermediate course with actionable and useful tips and tricks with valuable tools for novice marketers and small business owners. Neil Patel is a young entrepreneur with international recognition. He is a great communicator who is pleasant to listen to while giving precious tips for your business. Some of them might be common sense for some  more experienced social media users, but overall it’s worth watching his videos. In this list, you have free access to over 100 videos, each with thousands of views and likes which reflects that this instructor is indeed delivering great content for free.

If you are just starting to learn about social media or you have little experience with social media marketing, this is a great starting point.

What You’ll Learn

In this course, you will learn some techniques on social media marketing tips and tricks for different platforms. Some of the topics covered are:

• 3 Ways to Promote Your Website
• 7 Untapped Traffic Sources For Marketing Your Website
• Facebook Ads vs Google Ads: Which Paid Advertising Should You Use
• How to Increase Your Facebook Ad CTR and Pay WAY Less Per Click
• 3 LinkedIn Marketing Tips That Will Generate New Customers and Boost Engagement
• 3 Ways to Use Facebook Live To Generate Sales
• Reddit Marketing 101: 5 Steps Ways to Drive a Ton of Free Traffic from Reddit
• Creating the Perfect LinkedIn Profile
• How to Get 7 Times More Twitter Traffic | Twitter Marketing Tips.
• And much more.

How You’ll Learn

In this list, you have 107 bite-sized videos, 5 minutes long on average. You can watch it in your own time and refer back to any video when you are putting any concept in practice. Most of the videos are tips and tricks with actionable tools to use right away. I recommend you watch a few of them every day and pick the topics that are more relevant to you and on the platform you’re focusing on.

If you need to find a specific platform, open the “find in page” in your browser and type what you’re looking for. Most topics are grouped together in this course, so it’s a breeze after you find your desired spot.

Provider
YouTube

Instructor(s)
Neil Patel

Level
Beginner

Workload
10 hours

Enrollments
+100k views per video on average

Rating
+2.5k likes per video on average

Certificate
Not Available

Fun Facts

• Neil Patel has other playlists on his channel focused on different platforms, digital marketing, content marketing, SEO optimization, etc.
• Neil Patel is a New York Times best selling author. The Wall Street Journal calls him a top influencer on the web, Forbes says he is one of the top 10 marketers, and Entrepreneur Magazine says he created one of the 100 most brilliant companies.

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.

This course focuses on 3 platforms: Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. It revolves around study cases and ends with a hands-on project to put in practice the provided frameworks and best practices. It’s a great course for beginners wanting to get started with real life practice in a simple and structured way.

“The Professor Chris J Vargo is clearly very passionate about the subject and teaches with enthusiasm! The topics are relevant and very practical for digital advertising. Case studies are also very useful and the quizzes are easy enough. Loved doing the peer-graded assignment!” – Shravya K (learner)

What You’ll Learn

• Identify social media advertising types that are likely to succeed
• Implement effective social media targeting parameters to match desired audiences
• Understand the different types of social media ads
• Execute social media advertising campaigns

How You’ll Learn

This course is divided into 5 weeks, in each week there are videos, reading, reflection (participation is optional), and it ends with a quiz (only for paying students). Click here to learn more about how to sign up for Coursera courses for free.

For paying learners, you will have all graded assignments such as quizzes and peer-graded assignments, which means you have to submit your own hands-on project.

The last assignment, which is peer-graded, is to submit a PDF report of 5 assignments, one for each module, using the best practices taught in the lectures and readings. The modules are:

• Module #1 – Conceptual Strategy Practice
• Module #2 – Targeting Parameters
• Module #3 – Instagram Case Study
• Module #4 – Twitter Case Study
• Module #5 – Lookalike Audiences

Institution
University of Colorado Boulder

Provider
Coursera

Instructor(s)
Chris J. Vargo

Level
Beginner

Workload
11 hours

Enrollments
28,340

Rating
4.6 (274 ratings)

Certificate
Available

Fun Facts

• The course has 1.3K bookmarks on Class Central.
• This course is part of the Digital Advertising Strategy specialization which comprises 4 courses in total.
• Dr. Chris J. Vargo is an assistant professor specializing in data analytics and digital advertising. Chris employs the use of computer science methods to investigate social media data using theories from communication, psychology and political science.

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.

From the best seller instructor Dot Lung, you will learn a proven method to generate brand awareness and build a relationship with your audience. This course is aimed for freelancers, coaches, consultants, and small business owners. If you have fewer than 10k followers, this course is for you. It can also be applied to personal branding.

“Really good course!! Simple explanations, clear powerpoint and clear resume, the course is not too long but with importants details and all the basics, and all in english!! I think that’s the best course about Instagram strategy” – Arya (learner)

What You’ll Learn

RED : The Rival Company – Company Profile, Information, Business Description, History, Background Information on The Rival Company

In this course you will learn to use the Dragon Framework which consists of a method developed by the instructor to create engagement. Some points discussed in this course are: Dialogue, Relatability, Authenticity, Giving value, Niche clarity, Scale, Content Strategies to Give Real Value, Creating Post (carousel and image post), Measuring Results, and more.

How You’ll Learn

This is a self paced course with 21 lessons and 17 additional resources. By the end of this course you will deliver a project on “creating a month-long calendar full of engaging social media posts for your business”. Upon completion of the course, you can download your certificate.

You can check on other students’ projects on the course main page. Once you finish your projects, you can receive comments and feedback from other students as well.

Provider
Domestika

Instructor(s)
Dot Lung

Level
Beginner

Workload
1-2 hours

Enrollments
111,843

Rating
96% positive (3.6k reviews)

Certificate
Available

Fun Facts

• Dot has worked on Instagram launches and strategies for clients like Facebook, Wix, Motionographer, Digital Design Days, FITC, OFFF, Ladies Wine and Design Barcelona, Sonar+D, OCB and Nipple Magazine.
• She was born and raised in Los Angeles, and now resides along the Mediterranean coast in between sunny Tel Aviv and Barcelona. Her dream was to travel the world and make a living while doing so, and using social media was what made her dreams come true.

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.

Learn to plan and launch a successful social media marketing campaign with the Institute of Coding and the University of Leeds with a leading expert as your instructor, Meg Pickard. This is a great introduction to creating your first social media marketing campaign, with very high level information and what main aspects to take into consideration for your metrics and components. So, if you are not familiar with marketing or social media, this is the course for you.

What You’ll Learn

• Describe a social media strategy and its components
• Identify a target audience and how to reach them
• Describe the difference between paid and organic reach
• Evaluate appropriate metrics for a successful campaign
• Explain the role of timelines in a social media marketing campaign
• Produce a strategy and sample content for a social media marketing campaign

How You’ll Learn

Self-paced course. On every step you can meet other learners, share your ideas and join in with active discussions in the comments.

Institution
University of Leeds and Institute of Coding

Provider
FutureLearn

Instructor(s)
Meg Pickard

Level
Beginner

Workload
6 hours

Enrollments
75,070

Rating
4.8 (462 ratings)

Certificate
Available

Fun Facts

• The course has 439 bookmarks on Class Central.
• Meg Pickard is a digital content/community/transformation consultant, facilitator and trainer with 23+ years of industry experience. Also passionate about neurodiversity and ethical business. Drinks a lot of tea.
• This course is the last one of the ExpertTrack: Digital Marketing: Coding, UX, and Creating Digital Content.

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.

In this course comprising 22 videos, you will learn from a TikTok expert how to use this channel for your business. This YouTube channel is still small but it creates high-quality content for TikTok creators and small businesses. I believe it is a matter of time until it gets the attention it deserves.

The content is perfect for small businesses, content creators starting their journey on the platform, and marketers.

“I want to empower you to grow your business online using TikTok! I know, it’s crazy, but TikTok has tripled my business over the last 2 years and I want to show you exactly how we did it and how we’re using TikTok for business with all of our clients!” – Austin Armstrong, CEO of Socialty Pro. 

What You’ll Learn

Learn how you can use TikTok for different types of businesses with actionable tips and tricks. Some of the topics covered are: How To Get Your TikTok On Google! TikTok SEO Guide, How To Duet On TikTok, How You Can Go Live On TikTok, TikTok Strategies To Become An Industry Leader In Your Field, My Secret TikTok Sales Hack, 7 Ways To Monetize your TikTok, and more.

How You’ll Learn

This series of bite-sized videos will get you through the latest trends and tricks you can use on your account.

Provider
YouTube

Instructor(s)
Austin Armstrong

Level
Beginner

Workload
1-2 hours

Enrollments
1k views per video

Rating
Not Available

Certificate
Not Available

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.

Learn everything you need to promote your local business using Facebook Ads. The instructor of this course is very enthusiastic and will provide detailed information with clarity for beginners who have no idea about SEO and Facebook.

What You’ll Learn

• Local SEO & Facebook Ads Made as Project & Fun! Animated Videos, Screen Recordings, 116 Quiz Questions & 24 Assignments!
• Follow My Success Blueprints – Proven Examples and Case Studies You Can Follow to Boost Your Facebook Ads & Facebook Marketing Performance!
• Get My Complete Guide to Mastering Google My Business Using Google Maps. Setup Tripadvisor for Owners. Fast!
• Discover How to Use Powerful Local Search Engine Optimisation Strategies for Greatly Improved SEO Performance. Fun!
• New Facebook Layout – Explained – Learn the Facebook Business Manager, Business Page, Creator Studio, – and the 2021 Facebook Pixel and Setup for Ios 14.
• Hot New Facebook Lead Generation Ads Techniques – Start Getting a Constant Stream of Leads & Sign Ups Right Away.
• Get Pro 23 Copywriting Templates you Can Customize – and Quickly Create High Converting Email Marketing, Blogs, Sales Letters, Facebook Ads, and More…
• Get Social & Content Influencers to Promote your Business for Free – with Persuasive Influencer and Blogger Outreach Templates!!!

How You’ll Learn

This course is project oriented. It contains: quizzes, assignments, animated videos, walk-through process and explanations, and an engaged community of learners.

Provider
Udemy

Instructor(s)
Ing. Tomas Moravek

Level
Beginner

Workload
12 hours

Enrollments
38,641 students

Rating
4.7 (77 ratings)

Certificate
Available

Fun Facts

• Since 2018 Ing. Tomas Moravek has helped 600,000+ Udemy students to learn Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger Ads, as well as modern digital marketing skills.

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.

I decided to pick an unusual course as we get closer to the end of the ranking. This course is for creating a personal brand. It’s a short course aimed for influencers, content creators, and small business owners who want to connect in a more personal way with their audience. In the end, that’s what most users are looking for on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, to connect with real people. So, in that way, you can become the spokesperson of your brand.

“This class was way better than I anticipated. Usually when people speak about personal branding it tends to lean more into introspection and not as much into how you can engage the community around you. And I really valued the thoughts around meaningful content. This was a very well balanced class! “ – Carson Irvine (learner)

What You’ll Learn

In this 65-minute class, Kate Arends explores the evolution of her blog to explain why an authentic personal brand is important — and how to optimize yours for what you want, who you are, and what success means to you. Each short lesson is filled with data and experience as well as specific strategies and examples. A special focus on social media keeps everything tactical.

Some topics covered are: Defining your content, Creating engaging content, Defining your channels, Channel worksheet, and more.

How You’ll Learn

The class includes exclusive downloadable worksheets to help you put every lesson into action. These useful PDFs will help you identify what sets you apart, how to be strategic about what you share, and how to set goals for your work. They’re designed to use and reuse, giving you tools to rely on again and again.

By the end of this course, you can submit your own project to receive feedback from your peers.

Provider
Skillshare

Instructor(s)
Kate Arends

Level
Beginner

Workload
1-2 hours

Enrollments
39,331

Rating
100% recommend (1,162 ratings)

Certificate
Available

Fun Facts

• The instructor, Kate Arends, is the founder of the lifestyle website Wit & Delight, that has evolved into a brand celebrating a combination of veracious expression and simple elegance with an approachable, yet edited point of view. Above all, Wit & Delight is dedicated to the development of its readers, promoting self discovery, mental health advocacy, and wellness topics as the foundation of a life well lived.

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.

In this course, you will learn how to create a successful YouTube channel with authenticity. Creating content online is a great way to become relevant to your audience. YouTube has one of the highest engagement rates when it comes to time spent per visit. Being on camera is not an easy task though. In this class, you will learn how to be empowered and be your true self on camera, share authentic content with your followers/customers, and build a fan base.

“Sorelle kept it light, fun, engaging, and quirky (which made this video exceed my expectations!). Not only is she a great presenter and speaker, but she’s funny and keeps it real the whole time. Loved the class, thanks Sorelle!!!” – Matt April (learner) 

What You’ll Learn

• Figure out what you bring to the table online
• Find your topic niche—and evolve it over time
• Prioritize authenticity over beauty to gain truly connected followers
• Create a posting schedule to get the most eyes on your work

How You’ll Learn

This 55-minute course is divided into 9 lessons. By the end of the course, you can submit your own project to receive feedback from your peers.

Provider
Skillshare

Instructor(s)
Sorelle Amore

Level
Beginner

Workload
1 hour

Enrollments
51,835

Rating
99% recommend (1,942 ratings)

Certificate
Available

Fun Facts

• Sorelle Amore is a well-known photographer, filmmaker, influencer, and savvy businesswoman who inspires her millions of followers around the globe on how to maximize the human experience and live a life of wonder.

If you’re interested in this course, you can find more information about the course and how to enroll here.