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When the President of the United States releases policy via Twitter, you know that social media has entered a new and unprecedented age of significance. This also highlights the real and, potentially, damaging impact of uncontrolled social media usage.
These days, companies must have a strong social media presence to remain relevant, but it can be challenging to balance this fun online persona with your professional company image. This issue is compounded when you have a number of different colleagues managing your company’s social media accounts. How do you maintain consistency of tone, while also ensuring all content posted is on-brand, appropriate and relevant to your company values?
In the same way you have brand guidelines for your official communications, it’s imperative to have a clear and accessible social media policy to manage your company’s online image. This policy will inform colleagues on the appropriate content, tone and frequency of social media posts, ensuring consistency while offering practical guidelines on personal social media usage at work and what constitutes social media abuse.
With an online social media guide, it’s easy to keep your colleagues informed. An interactive eBook is simple to share, and can even be incorporated into your company intranet for easy access. Even better, you can apply updates to policy in real time without having to take the document offline or incur the costly re-printing expenses you face with printed material. This is especially important given the pace at which social media is growing and evolving.
With PageTiger it’s simple to create online policy guides. You can even include interactive content like videos, quizzes and surveys for an engaging reading experience which actually tests colleagues on their knowledge as they progress through the guide. PageTiger’s reporting suite means you can track readership, and you can include compulsory elements within the eBook to ensure colleagues have read and understood the essential elements. This offers peace of mind and provides your team auditable evidence of due process.
For inspiration on how to transform your social media policy, see our interactive example here and read our best practice guidance below.
1.Tone of voice
When posting on social media you can afford to be more casual than you would in other communications, in fact a fun and approachable persona is expected and anything less will make your company seem out-of-touch. That being said, normal rules of spelling and grammar still apply. Make sure everything you write is of a professional standard and never post anything that would be deemed inappropriate in tone or content. This also applies for content you are sharing from third parties.
2.Be part of the conversation
Social media is a fantastic opportunity to enter into a discussion with customers, other businesses and potential clients. You should be aiming for meaningful conversations, not just advertising your company and services. This ensures people continue to listen to what you have to say and allows you to build invaluable relationships with your audience. To achieve this, you should encourage comments and respond to them in a timely fashion. Equally, be sure to have an external outlook and share content from other blogs, videos and news posts to broaden the conversation.
3.Separate personal and professional
You have to leave your personal opinions at the door when managing a company social media account and reply in-line with the company values. This being said, it’s important to inject some personality into posts and write in the first person so followers know they are interacting with a real person, not just a TwitterBot. When dealing with a difficult follower, don’t allow yourself to be dragged into an argument. Remain professional and always be the first to own and correct your mistakes, but try to avoid amending or deleting content unless absolutely. It’s also important to remember that, even in your personal social media accounts, you are still a brand ambassador and your opinions will reflect on the company. Bear this in mind and be sure that all content associated with you is consistent with your work and your company’s professional standards.
4.Quality not quantity
While it’s important to have a strong social media presence, ensure everything you post is a valuable and meaningful contribution. Nobody enjoys spam, so while you should post regularly, take the time to post interesting and engaging content that people actually want to read.
For a great example of an engaging social media policy, see our interactive example and get in touch to learn how to create your own.
