More and more companies are hiring social media professionals. And even though this trend is on the rise, there’s still very little comparative salary data for social media managers out there. So how do you know if you’re being paid market wages for your position?

Take the social media salary survey to find out. Our survey will break down salary ranges for social media professionals by location within the United States, by length of time in the workforce, by level of education achieved, and more.

Take the survey now, and watch this space, subscribe, or follow for the results when they’re released.

From Social Media Headhunter, here’s one professional opinion about salary ranges for different kinds of  social media professionals. Since the author is in the business of placing social media pros in new positions, I’d say there’s very little reason to doubt these figures.

Entry level – $30,000 (online writing background, at least 3 months consistent writing experience, familiarity with social media tools.

Community Manager – If you’re the sole CM, $60-80K in the Midwest. 5- 10 years in the industry you’re managing, minimum. Steady hand on the till.

Strategist – $80-$150K – based on past experience, and the interview has to be a roadmap of what is accomplished. Do NOT hire someone who has not shown experience in the field. They don’t have to work in your industry, but they better have some kind of track record in achieving business goals (traffic, advertising, conversions, sales).

Enterprise Architect – $120-$250K – This is a very rare find – it’s for companies looking to completely revamp their content management strategy and internal networks. This is the most exciting job in social media, and requires someone with broad experience in networks, multiple platforms, development, security, and political infighting. It could be the most important role in a company in the next 5 years.

Director of Social Media – $60-$90K – this is a manager who has a background in building teams, who really gets the promise and the purpose of social media. A great voice for the company. Should be wary of new technologies, but all over blogs, RSS, have Facebook and Twitter accounts, and know the difference between his or her employees playing and researching on MySpace and YouTube.

Forum One Networks just released their 2009 Online Community & Social Media Compensation study. Several key issues surfaced in the report:

• The gap between the average male and female salaries widened, with male respondents averaging $86,644 (up from $85,423 in ’08) and Females averaging $75,624 (down from $77,319 in ’08).
• The majority of respondents reported a salary increase in 2009, but the percentage compared to last year was down, as was a significant increase in the number of respondents who took a salary decrease in 2009 compared to 2008.
• Average overall job satisfaction was down by a fraction, from 4.2 (out of 5) in 2008 to 4.1 (out of 5) in 2009.
• Several respondents mentioned feeling like they were being inadequately compensated because of lack of data available regarding community and social media salaries, as well as lack of understanding of community and social media ROI relative to their organization’s activities.

The average salary of the research participants was $81k.

If you’re interested in reading more, you can purchase a copy of the report.

HotJobs.com has some data about salaries for social media managers and social media directors in a story about professions that didn’t exist a year ago. It does like this:

Social media is a specialty field of public relations that uses the growing social networking technologies, including RSS, Twitter, Facebook, and blogs. A few years ago, social media duties were performed by marketing managers or communications directors. Now there is a social media career track.An entry-level company blogger can earn less than $20 per hour (and many blogging jobs are part-time).

A director of social media, the top of the social media chain, can pull in $70,000 or more. In the middle, a social media manager, can expect to earn around $50,000. A bachelor’s degree is usually required, and job seekers should possess strong writing abilities and a keen understanding of online marketing, public relations, and new media.

Read more of Newest Professions, Growing Salaries at Yahoo!

You betcha. Here are links to some social media salary surveys we’ve found. Fair warning: some are better than others.

• Constantly updated: Simply Hired’s national average salary for social media jobs.
• September 2009: Wordstream’s Search Marketing and Social Media Salary Survey.
• October 2008: Read Write Web’s anecdotal salary survey of bloggers and social media pros.
• August 2008: Online Community Report’s compensation study.

Earning an advanced degree is a reliable way to increase your salary, no matter what field you work in. Recently, Colorado Technical University began offering two Doctoral programs focused on social media.

Doctor of Computer Science with a concentration in Emerging Media

This 3-year Doctoral program focuses on the strategies and tactics needed to use Web technologies for the development of virtual communities, social networks, grassroots broadcasting, games and simulations, Web 2.0 tools, virtual economies and to manage security risks, such as information accountability and web privacy strategies.

Doctor of Management with a concentration in Emerging Media

[D]esigned to encourage your professional development in management through mentoring, action research, and practical projects, enabling you to make key leadership contributions in this incredibly fast-moving field. Moving from research to content specialization to the ability to manage change, you’ll develop a leadership style that allows you to critically evaluate, analyze, and solve problems within emerging media.

Creative Commons License photo credit: Tommy Ellis

The economy is coming out of a recession. Social media continues to be a hot business strategy. For those who make their living in social media, how can you be sure you’re earning a salary that’s in line with the market?

SocialMediaSalarySurvey.com compiles salary statistics for social media pros. Subscribe to our RSS feed to participate in our first salary survey and get a free copy of the results.