6th April 2017
Social media guidelines make it clear to employees what is expected of their online social behaviour. Like it or not, social media is a central part of our lives. 30% of all time spent online is now spent on social media and as social platforms evolve, this will only increase.
For businesses, social media management is an important part of brand perception. To protect the credibility and presence of your brand online, you need to make sure that your employees are all singing from the same song sheet.
Why you need social media guidelines
It is important for organisations and companies to keep track of their social media footprint online. You should keep an eye on what their staff are tweeting and posting about, especially on issues that pertain to the workplace. This will invariably fall to the HR department. Even if your business itself has no online social presence, your employees may be creating one regardless. To protect your business’s reputation, make sure you set out clear standards of behaviour for when associating your business online.
How to monitor your business’s presence online
To monitor your business’s online presence, you can search the name of your company on social media. This will show you instances where people have talked about your brand. You should also explore hashtags pertaining to your business, such as #hr or #payroll.
Social media guidelines also allow you to clarify any questions your staff might have regarding use of social media during work hours and how to manage their conduct online. If your business encourages the use of social media to promote your business culture, your staff need clear guidance as to how to be most effective.
What should social media guidelines include?
Your social media policy should cover standards of behaviour when using personal accounts and guidance of how to use your business’s own channels. Social guidelines should also include:
- Guidelines for overall conduct
- Online etiquette
- Branding and how to talk about specific products
- Engagement procedures
- How to react to negative content regarding your brand
- Clear accountability for comments and content
- Confidentiality for business assets
When talking about accountability, it is important to stress whether your employees should have an “opinions are my own” disclaimer on their social media profiles. Other companies require business-specific hashtags to be attached to any tweets that are made from personal accounts that discuss business issues. Your social media policy should also clearly layout codes of conduct and any disciplinary action involved in a breach of said conduct.
Your social media guidelines should define roles for your employees. Everyone involved in your business’s social media strategy needs to know who is responsible for what in order to work effectively. This includes training staff in social media, keeping the guidelines up-to-date and all other elements of social management.
Social media guidelines to protect your business
Social media guidelines can help you manage security threats, such as malware, scams and hacking. While your general IT security guidelines will educate your employees in cyber security, your social media policy can help fill in the gaps and exceptions that dealing with social media present.
Remember to only give access to your business’s social account to those who need it. This will help you keep control of your accounts. Have guidelines in place that address the issue of apps and extensions to social accounts and make sure that everyone is up to date in their cyber security training.
Social media guidelines are an essential tool to protecting your business and your employees. They help structure your online presence in a positive way that supports your overall business goals and gives your employees the information and guidance they need. Like many HR policies, social media guidelines provide clear and consistent expectations for everyone.
Many small businesses struggle to put together a sound social media policy, or indeed any other policies that would protect their organisation. At IRIS FMP, our Employment Guardian service helps businesses establish robust and clear policies for social media management and all other areas of HR and payroll.
