Commercial property businesses looking to Facebook, Twitter and other social media – without even a hint of a social media policy – are discovering a disturbing truth: it only takes a few ill-placed tweets or posts to get your feathers plucked.
Just ask the top sportsmen and women who have criticised their referees and team mates, or celebrities airing views that have quickly been deleted.
But probably the most infamous misstep of this ilk, particularly for a company, was by US multinational insurance goliath Aflac. On the heels of a devastating earthquake in Japan, the former voice of Aflac’s wildly famous mascot – Gilbert Gottfried – tweeted what were considered horrendously off-colour jokes about the tragedy.
To Aflac’s horror, Gottfried’s jokes were re-tweeted endlessly across the web for days. And stories about the misstep continued to pop up in all forms of news media months after the event.
Aflac fired Gottfried and started a contest to find a new voice for its fowl. But the damage was done. For many Japanese, the image of the Aflac duck will always turn to thoughts of hunting season.
Fortunately, with a little forethought – and a social media policy – your business need not face the same fate.
To that end, here are the key elements you should have in a social media policy, based on insights from top experts in the medium:
• Spare the sledgehammer
While it is critical to have a social media policy, be sure it reads like a friendly guide and not a stern warning.
“Don’t write a huge document that strangles any hint of spontaneity from your team,” says Janet Fouts, author of The Social Media Coach (www.janetfouts.com). “Quite the opposite. A corporate policy lets them know what they need to know to communicate the company message effectively, and what they should and should not do.”
• Let it go
Once you agree to play in the social media space, realise you are agreeing to lose at least some control over your business’s image. Given all the interactivity and the tens of thousands of cacophonous voices, it is inevitable. Accept the ground rules, social media experts say, and instead focus on the medium’s benefits.
• Lose the filter
If you plan to run every post for Twitter or Facebook past your lawyers, save yourself the trouble and don’t do social media at all. “Social media doesn’t work like this,” Fouts says. “If your statements appear to be canned or professionally produced, it’s bound to fall flat. Let the team know the facts when a new product comes out, or you reach a noteworthy milestone, then let them put it into their own words.”
• Build a better wheel
Scores of top companies have already agonised over the drafting and creation of social media policies. Take a look at more than 100 of these policies at www.socialmediagovernance.com/policies.php .
• Define the rose
Like many things, social media is in the eye of the beholder. Some think of it as just Facebook and Twitter. Others include what’s posted on blogs, internal wikis and even what is on the company’s customer service Q&A database. “You need to spell that out so that everyone is operating under the same definition,” says Lisa Barone, co-founder of Outspoken Media (www.outspokenmedia.com).
“Once that’s squared away, provide an explanation of what social media means to your company,” she adds. “Why are you investing resources in participating? What do you hope to get out of it and how are these tools helping you? That company mantra or philosophy will be invaluable in quickly leading employees out of murky water.”
• Dress for success
Before your first tweet, decide if staff should post only using online personas that clearly identify themselves with the firm – such as @TINAwidgetcompany – or if they can use their after-work personas as well. The danger of being too free-and-easy? A fired or disgruntled employee can do great damage to a firm using an online persona not owned by the company, but which was used in the past to represent the company.
• Distinguish between personal and corporate views
In the casual world of social media, staff can be tempted to mix personal views with official company dogma. Guard against this, experts say. You don’t want to turn on the morning news to find that a key employee has dismissed the moon landing as just another conspiracy hoax – all under your company’s logo.
• Schedule a date for HR and legal
While social media offers human resources a new treasure trove for background checks, there are many social media activities HR should simply avoid – including reading opinions about politics and religion on Facebook and the like – when making hiring decisions. Here, guidance from lawyers really could save your firm untold headaches.
• Don’t forget about that other job
If Facebook and Twitter are considered work, many employees may conclude that staying glued to social networks all day is perfectly reasonable. Instruct otherwise. “As great a tool as social media is, it can also become a colossal time waster,” Barone says. “Let it be known that the company will be monitoring social media use – and actually do monitor it – and that abuse will be handled appropriately.”
• Post signs for “no-man’s land”
Even the best-intentioned employee can destroy a commercial property company with a single post that should have remained confidential. “Be proactive and make sure that they know what they can say, what they can’t, and what you would absolutely hang them from their toes for if they ever muttered,” Barone says.
• Don’t poke the crazy
Inevitably, staff are going to come across that odd character who will do everything in their power to provoke a flame war – a seemingly unending game of tit-for-tat that will leave your business looking amateurish at best. “Employees need to know where the line is, and how, exactly, they should react when someone they have never met, and who they were only trying to help, turns around to call them a huge moron,” Barone says.
• Consider spiking the punch
Some social media service providers will solicit positive testimonials from your customers to ensure your business puts the best face of things on the web. Genuosity (www.kudosworks.com) offers such services, as does Zuberance (www.zuberance.com).
• Have someone keep an ear out
Through no fault of its own, a commercial property business can still find its reputation being smeared on social media. Get a jump on what is being said by appointing someone to monitor what is being said about your company. Or you can subcontract for the service. Specific service providers you will want to evaluate for online reputation monitoring include Dow Jones Insight (www.dowjones.com/factiva); Nielsen (www.nielsen.com/us/en/measurement/online-measurement.html); BlogSquirrel (www.cyberalert.com/blogmonitoring.html) and WebClipping.com (www.webclipping.com).
Other tools include Alterian (www.alterian.com), Brandwatch (www.brandwatch.com), MutualMind (www.mutualmind.com), SalesForce.com’s Radian6 (www.radian6.com), Converseon (http://converseon.com), Cymfony (www.cymfony.com) and Sythesio (http://synthesio.com/corporate).
• Offer a clue
Once you have established a social media policy, hold a meeting to go over the major points, if necessary. You should also announce the new policy via a company-wide e-mail, and tuck a copy of the guide into each employee’s HR folder.
Joe Dysart is an internet speaker and business consultant based in Manhattan
