Social media policy

The Importance of a Social Media Policy

The social media policy’s aim is to provide more comprehensive guidance for the employee. Since workers have complete discretion of what is shared on social media. As a result, it is important to enforce policies that can help us realize the role that journals, wikis, micro-blogs, discussion boards, chat rooms, electronic newsletters, online forums, social networking sites, and other internet services play in delivering the company’s message to customers. It is necessary for employees to understand the importance of a social media policy so that they are aware of the fact that they control the way consumers perceive things and any negativity will cause them to lose their loyal customer base.

The Impact of Social Media on Business Activities

Since the advent of technological changes, social media has emerged as a very significant player in shaping our lives and business activities. Everyone has easy access to social media applications like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Snapchat, Instagram as well as blogging and the power to say whatever comes to their mind. However, they seem to forget the threat that some of those posts can have on other people’s lives or even their own. The issue was depicted in the case of Justine Sacco which was covered by the New York Times. It described that Justine’s one tweet ruined her career and also led her to lose her loyal employers as well (Burnett, 2015). Similarly, another case was seen in 2009 of the Avvo Corporation.When the company’s vice president, Josh King randomly started checking the company’s Tweets through an online tool, he realized that the young employees had been talking unprofessionally about the company and posted unprofessional pictures of them. The action greatly disrespected the company’s image, hence leading him to develop and implement an effective social media policy (Henricks, 2011).

The Need for a Social Media Policy in a Newspaper and Media Publication Company

Since the company for which the policy is being made is a newspaper and media publication company, so it is necessary to implement such a media strategy that will exercise full control over what the employees will be posting on the social media platform. Recently, the company has been facing some backlash regarding the articles that have been posted by the employees as well as their posts on Twitter, Snapchat, and Instagram. Since the CEO was not in the position of firing a significant number of employees that would have left the company in an unstable state, so the CEO chose to implement a social media policy.

Guidelines and Regulations in the Social Media Policy

The first and most essential step of the plan would be to educate the employees about the fundamental of social media as well as the consequences of posting anything inappropriate or unprofessional. Being a media publication company, it is crucial to the company’s stability that the employees follow a defined code of conduct and are well aware of the terms and conditions and limitations of the site. Moreover, they need to be aware of the distinction between their personal and professional life. Combining both of them has not reaped benefits, so it is for the betterment of the company that they are provided with a clear outline about their level of professionalism (Bertot, 2012). It is necessary for the employees to understand the controversial issues can generate positivity as well as negativity, hence, employees need to pen down their thoughts with utmost caution and respect for the mission and vision of the company. Unprofessional activities like cyberbullying are strictly prohibited because they tend to ruin careers of not just the employees, but the employers as well. It is always encouraged that companies try to keep a neutral stance towards external and internal issues. Additionally, if the company is facing an internal matter, then it is strictly advised that the employees maintain their opinions confidential and not make a show out of things on social media. The confidentiality will also avoid in attracting negative attention towards the company’s image. Lastly, it is essential for the company to state that the workers should not reveal any private information related to the company and they should always add a disclaimer statement at the end of each blog post so that unnecessary conflicts are avoided. All these guidelines need to be conducted to the employees after they have joined the company and any violations would lead to disciplinary action or worse getting fired.

Compliance with Laws and Privacy Regulations

Since under the national and state laws of the United States, information related to financial activities, health care measures, along with information regarding children who are less than 13 years old is not allowed to be made public. So the employers need to keep that in mind as well before posting any article or other social media post. Moreover, company’s social media sites are not allowed to collect private information from its users; otherwise, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has full right to take action against them. Similarly, loss of data from the company’s side is also not acceptable, hence, for the company to run smoothly without any legal notice, and then they need to strictly follow the social media policy and make sure that its employees are doing so as well. Despite the lack of reliability of social media sites, the company still needs to take all of these safety precautions for maintaining the company’s reputation.

References

Bertot, J. C., Jaeger, P. T., & Hansen, D. (2012). The impact of policies on government social

media usage: Issues, challenges, and recommendations. Government information

quarterly, 29(1), 30-40.

Burnett, S. (2015, February 19). The Importance of Having a Social Media Policy. Retrieved August 12, 2017, from HR ZONE: https://www.hrzone.com/community-voice/blogs/suzanne-burnett/the-importance-of-having-a-social-media-policy

Henricks, M. (2011, January 6). Why You Need a Social Media Policy. Retrieved August 12, 2017, from Entrepreneur: https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/217813