Social media client onboarding checklist

A good start pays off for years:

Before kickoff

Settle these in writing first.

• Scope: which platforms, how many posts a week, replies to comments and messages, ads, and what’s out of scope.
• Ownership: the client owns every account, page and business portfolio, and you get access. Put that in the contract.
• Who holds the keys today: who has admin rights on each account, and whose phone or email receives the login codes.
• Contacts: a main contact, an approver and a backup, and someone to call out of hours.

Ask the access questions early: clients often don’t know who set up an account or who still has admin rights. In a case study by Leadsie, which sells an access-request tool, a US agency owner said: “What should have taken under a week took more than a month or longer because clients were chasing former employees asking who had access and who didn’t.” (Leadsie, 2 October 2026)

Access, platform by platform

Never ask for a password: each platform lets the client give you access as yourself, which they can see and take back, so ask for the lowest role that does the job. Steps checked on each platform’s help pages on 22 October 2026; where we only link a page, follow it.

Facebook and Instagram (Meta)

The client gives you access through their business portfolio in Meta Business Suite: as a partner with access to business assets such as their Facebook Page and Instagram account, or by adding your people and assigning them those assets. Meta’s Business Help Center has the steps:

• Give a Partner Access to Business Assets in Your Business Portfolio
• Add People to a Business Portfolio and Assign a Business Asset
• Create a Business Portfolio in Meta Business Suite, if the client doesn’t have one yet; the client should create it, so they own it.

TikTok

TikTok Business Center can manage a client’s TikTok account without its password, in one of two ways:

1. Your Business Center links their account. A Business Center admin goes to Accounts, then TikTok accounts, then Add a TikTok account, chooses to link an existing account by QR code with Manage account as the permission level, and shares the code. Someone signed in to the client’s account scans it in the TikTok app and grants the permissions; a personal account is asked to switch to a business account (TikTok: link an existing TikTok account for account management).
2. Their Business Center shares the account with yours. The client adds your Business Center as a partner and shares the account, choosing what you may do; “Show through ads only” stops a partner from publishing directly on the profile (TikTok: share a TikTok account with partners).

LinkedIn

A super admin of the client’s LinkedIn Page adds you: in the Page’s super admin view, Settings, then Manage admins, then Add admin; they find your name, choose a role and click Save. A content admin creates and manages the Page’s content, including posts; a super admin can also add and remove admins (LinkedIn Help: add admins on your Page, Page admin roles).

LinkedIn only allows it if you meet its conditions, such as following the Page. Requesting admin access yourself needs a listed position with the organisation and a company email address, which suits employees more than agencies (LinkedIn Help: request admin access).

X

Ask the client to connect their X account to your publishing tool themselves, through X’s own authorisation screen, so nobody needs the password. For other ways to share access, check X’s Help Center.

YouTube

The client invites you with channel permissions: in YouTube Studio, Settings, then Permissions, then Invite; they enter your email address, choose a role such as Manager or Editor, and click Done. You work on the channel without access to their Google Account. Invitations expire after 30 days, and a channel on a Brand Account must switch to channel permissions first (YouTube Help: channel permissions).

Record what you were given, by whom and when; the guide to managing multiple social media accounts has an inventory you can use. Running many clients? See how Growfinch works for agencies: each client is its own business, with its own connected accounts.

Brand rules

Collect the rules before you write a word, and keep them where every writer and approver can see them.

• Voice: three words that describe it, three it should never sound like, and posts they love and hate.
• Do-not-say list: words, topics, competitors and claims to avoid.
• Claims and legal: what they can prove, regulated claims (health, finance, alcohol and the like), required disclaimers, and who signs them off.
• Visuals: logo files, colours, fonts, photo style, and what never to use.
• Hashtags and tags: branded hashtags, partners and locations to tag, and accounts never to tag.
• Customer content: whether you may reshare customers’ posts, and how to ask.
• Sensitive dates: quiet days, and who decides what to say in a crisis.

Approvers and turnaround

Agree how posts get approved before the first one is due.

• Names: the approver, a backup with the same authority, the hours they answer, and how to reach them when it’s urgent.
• Speed: how fast they answer for each kind of post, and what happens on silence: posts that need approval wait.
• Scope: every post, or only new campaigns?
• One place for feedback, attached to the version it’s about.

The guide to setting up a social media approval process covers each of these choices.

Goals and reporting

Agree what success looks like and when you’ll report on it, before the results come in.

• Goals in the client’s words, then in numbers: what would make the next three months a good quarter?
• What counts: reach, engagement, followers, clicks, leads or sales, and where each number comes from: the platform, their website analytics or their shop.
• A baseline: the numbers from before you start.
• The rhythm: the report date each month, the format, and who receives it.
• Failures: who notices when a scheduled post doesn’t go out, and who tells the client. The guide to failed scheduled posts lists the usual causes.

In a UK survey of 100 marketing managers by ASK BOSCO with OnePoll, the headline was “75% of marketers admitting to sacking their agencies over poor reporting” (ASK BOSCO, updated 23 January 2025).

Offboarding

Plan the end on day one: remove access on every platform the day the contract ends, and confirm in writing what was removed and when.

• Meta: the client removes your partner access, or your people, from their business portfolio.
• TikTok: the client revokes your partner access in its Business Center: Accounts, then TikTok accounts, View on the account, the Partners tab, then Remove and Confirm (TikTok: revoke account access from a partner).
• LinkedIn: a super admin removes your role: Settings, then Manage admins, the delete icon next to your name, then Remove. Every Page must keep at least one super admin, so hand that role back first (LinkedIn Help: remove a Page admin’s role).
• YouTube: in YouTube Studio, Settings, then Permissions; the client clicks the arrow under Role next to your name and chooses Remove access (YouTube Help: channel permissions).
• X and your own tools: disconnect your publishing tool from every client account, so nothing posts after you leave.
• Hand back the work: the content calendar, source files, drafts, reports and the account inventory.

Copy the social media client onboarding template

Send these questions before kickoff, or go through them together on the first call. Select the list, copy it, and paste it into a doc or a form.

1. What is the business called, and what is its website?
2. Which platforms are in scope, and which accounts (handles and links)?
3. Who owns each account, who holds admin rights, and whose phone or email receives the login codes?
4. Which tools and apps are connected to the accounts today?
5. Who on your side will give us access through each platform’s own tools, and by when?
6. What should we post, how often, and on which days?
7. Do we reply to comments and messages? Within what hours?
8. Are ads in scope? Who approves the budget?
9. Which three words describe your brand’s voice? Which three should it never be?
10. Which posts, yours or anyone else’s, do you love, and which do you dislike?
11. What must we never say, show or claim? Which competitors or topics should we avoid?
12. Which claims need legal or expert sign-off, and from whom?
13. Which hashtags and accounts should we use or tag, and which never?
14. Where are your logos, fonts, colours and photos?
15. May we reshare customers’ posts? How do we ask their permission?
16. Which dates should we avoid or mark: launches, holidays, sensitive days?
17. Who approves posts, and who approves when they’re away?
18. How quickly can approvers answer, and what should happen if they don’t?
19. What needs approval: every post, or only new campaigns?
20. What would make the next three months a success?
21. Which numbers matter most to you, and where do they come from?
22. When and how do you want reports, and who should receive them?
23. Who do we call if something goes wrong out of hours?
24. Did anything go wrong with a previous agency or tool that we should know about?