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Social Media Agencies

Social Media Agencies near you

A social media agency plans, makes and publishes the content on your business accounts, replies to the people who respond to it, and usually runs the influencer and creator partnerships that sit alongside it. Some also buy paid social. The work looks casual from outside and is not: it is a production line with a publishing schedule, an approval process and a record of who said what on your behalf.

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The rules that catch Australian businesses here are about disclosure. Under the AANA Code of Ethics, advertising must be clearly distinguishable as advertising, which Ad Standards applies directly to social posts where paid content sits next to organic content. Separately, the Australian Consumer Law makes undisclosed commercial relationships a misleading conduct problem, and the ACCC has run sweeps on exactly this.

The other Australian wrinkle is what happens under the post. A business account is a space your business operates, and Australian law has treated the operator of a public page as a publisher of what other people write on it. That makes moderation policy a business decision, not a junior task. Anyone you hire should be able to tell you who watches the comments, how fast, and what gets hidden or reported.

What social media agencies in Australia are hired to do

  • Content production and scheduling: the monthly calendar, the shoots, the captions and the publishing.
  • Community management: replying to comments and messages, routing complaints, and escalating anything that could become a problem.
  • Creator and influencer programs: finding partners, negotiating terms, briefing them and checking their disclosure.
  • Paid social buying, which is a distinct skill and often sits with a different team or agency.
  • Employer brand and recruitment content, increasingly its own workstream for Australian businesses that struggle to hire.
  • Crisis and issues monitoring, where the agency watches for the post that is about to become a phone call.

Disclosing paid partnerships the way Australian rules require

Section 2.7 of the AANA Code of Ethics says advertising shall be clearly distinguishable as such. Ad Standards applies that to social media, and its published position is that ads should never be disguised as news, independent reviews, private blogs or user-generated content. It is not only about money changing hands: free products or services indicate a relationship that should be disclosed.

Ad Standards lists acceptable ways to disclose, including a clearly visible hashtag such as one reading ad, paid promotion, sponsored or commercial partnership; saying it plainly in the caption; saying it out loud in video, ideally with written disclosure as well since many viewers watch without sound; and using a platform's own paid partnership label. What it rejects is a disclosure that is buried, hidden or abbreviated past the point of clarity.

The ACCC ran a sweep of 118 social media influencers across seven sectors and reported on 7 December 2023 that 81 percent were making posts that raised concerns under the Australian Consumer Law. The most common problem was inadequate disclosure where the influencer appeared to be receiving payment, gifts or other incentives, with unclear abbreviations such as sp and spon called out specifically.

Giveaways, competitions and incentivised posts

  • A promotion decided by chance is a trade promotion lottery, which is regulated by state and territory gaming regulators; permit requirements differ between jurisdictions, so check the rules for every state you are promoting into before the post goes live.
  • A promotion decided by skill, such as the best caption, is generally treated differently from a draw, but the judging criteria have to be genuine and stated.
  • Terms and conditions should be published and linked, and should say who can enter, when it closes, how winners are chosen and notified, and who the promoter is.
  • Do not offer an incentive only for a positive review; the ACCC accepts incentives only where they apply regardless of whether the review is positive or negative and the incentive is clearly disclosed.
  • Reviews written by family, employees or anyone paid by the business, without disclosing the connection, are treated as fake or misleading.
  • If entry collects personal information, you need a lawful basis to use it later and a privacy notice that matches what you actually do with it.

Comments, moderation and reputation risk

The comment section under a business post is part of the business's published presence in Australia, and operators of public pages have been found to carry responsibility for what appears there. A defamatory comment about a competitor or a named individual is a real exposure, not a nuisance.

Agree a moderation policy in writing: what gets hidden, what gets deleted, what gets reported to the platform, what gets escalated to the business owner the same day, and how quickly comments are checked outside business hours. Deleting genuine negative feedback is its own risk, since the ACCC warns that removing genuine negative reviews may itself mislead consumers.

Customer complaints that arrive by direct message are still complaints. If they never reach anyone who can resolve them, the business learns about the problem when it becomes a public post.

Content planning, approvals and the publishing rhythm

Most engagements run on a monthly cycle: a calendar drafted and approved, assets produced, posts scheduled, then a review of what performed. The approval step is where legal risk is caught, so it should be a named person on the client side, not a general inbox.

Ask how content is produced. A monthly shoot day at your premises produces different material from stock imagery and templates, and the difference is obvious to your audience. For trades and service businesses, the material usually has to come from the job site, which means someone on your team taking photos.

Agree what happens when something needs to go out immediately, and who can publish without the usual approval. Most reputational incidents on Australian business accounts involve an out-of-hours post that skipped a step.

Accounts, access and the content you paid for

  • Your organisation should hold the pages and the business manager profile, granting the agency access rather than the reverse.
  • Two-factor authentication should be tied to a person who will still be at your business next year, not to the agency's phone.
  • The original photographs, video files and editable design files should be delivered to you, not only the exported posts.
  • Copyright in commissioned content should be assigned to your business in writing; an invoice alone does not transfer it.
  • Customer-created content you want to reuse needs permission from the person who made it, and a comment saying yes is thin evidence.
  • Get an export of the content calendar and the performance history at handover, since platform history is hard to reconstruct later.

Social Media Agencies: frequently asked questions

Do influencers we pay have to say the post is an ad?

Yes, and the obligation reaches you as well as them. Under the AANA Code of Ethics advertising must be clearly distinguishable as advertising, and Ad Standards applies that to social posts. Disclosure is required whenever there is a commercial arrangement, including free products or services, not only cash. Make disclosure a written requirement in the brief, specify the wording and placement, and check the post after it goes live rather than trusting that it happened.

Is a hashtag enough, or do we need something more obvious?

A hashtag can be enough if it is clearly visible and unambiguous. Ad Standards accepts hashtags reading ad, paid promotion, sponsored or commercial partnership, but warns against burying or hiding them, and the ACCC specifically criticised abbreviations such as sp and spon. Safer approaches are stating the partnership in the caption, using the platform's paid partnership label, and adding written disclosure to video content as well as spoken.

Can we delete negative comments on our page?

You can moderate abuse, spam and unlawful content, and you should have a written policy saying so. Removing genuine negative feedback is different: the ACCC warns that deleting genuine negative reviews may mislead consumers, and that a business needs an adequate basis to conclude a review is likely to be fake before removing it. A visible reply that resolves the problem usually serves the business better than a deletion anyone can screenshot.

What happens if someone complains about one of our ads?

Any member of the public can complain to Ad Standards about any ad in any medium, and one complaint is enough to raise a case. Ad Standards assesses whether the issue falls under the codes it administers, notifies the advertiser and asks for a response, and the Community Panel decides by simple majority. If a breach is found, the advertiser is expected to modify or remove the ad and must respond within five business days.

Who owns the photos and videos the agency produced for us?

Not automatically your business. In Australia copyright generally starts with the person who created the work, and paying an invoice does not transfer it by itself. Put an assignment of copyright in the agreement, in writing, and ask for delivery of the original files rather than only the published exports. If the agency has licensed stock, music or fonts, ask what the licence covers and whether it survives the end of the engagement.

Sources

  1. Ad Standards — Distinguishable advertising (AANA Code of Ethics section 2.7)
  2. Ad Standards — Influencer marketing: a guide to disclosing ad content
  3. Ad Standards — The advertising complaints process
  4. ACCC — Scrutiny of influencers and businesses for misleading advertising and online reviews continues (7 December 2023)
  5. ACCC — Online reviews for products and services
  6. ACCC — Social media promotions
  7. Copyright Act 1968 (Federal Register of Legislation)

Written by the LokalMatch editorial team. Last reviewed 22 September 2026. How we write and check our guides

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What affects the fees social media agencies charge

Fees depend on the work involved and how the professional bills. We only publish fee ranges when they’re backed by real LokalMatch data or reliable sources. Until then, here’s what usually changes the fee:

  • Scope and complexity of the work
  • How the firm bills: hourly, per project or on a monthly retainer
  • Experience of the team
  • Timeline and how urgent the work is
  • Ongoing support after the work is delivered

How to compare social media agencies before you hire

  • Ask for examples of similar work for clients like you.
  • Read reviews and ask for references you can contact.
  • Make sure the scope, deliverables and timeline are written down before work starts.
  • Ask who will do the work: an in-house team, freelancers or subcontractors.
  • Compare two or three proposals before you decide.

Questions to ask social media agencies before you hire

  • Have you done work like this before, and can I see examples?
  • Who will work on this, and who is my main contact?
  • How do you charge: hourly, per project or monthly?
  • What is included, and what costs extra?
  • How long is the contract, and how can either side end it?
  • How will you report on progress?
  • Who owns the work, files and accounts you set up for me?

Licences and registration

This kind of work is often limited to licensed or registered professionals, and the rules depend on where you are. Ask which body they’re registered with, and check their status on that body’s public register before you hire.

Guides about social media marketing

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