A couple of recent matters that caught my eye demonstrate how important it is for Australian public relations and communication managers to make as one of their 2011 priorities a more proactive approach as to how social media is managed and practiced within their organisation.
What sparked this was the recent controversy over Commonwealth Bank’s rather ham-fisted efforts to introduce a social media policy for its staff.
How could a major organisation (and by implication the senior PR, communication and HR people within CBA) seemingly do this so badly?
Immediately CBA released its policy the Financial Services Union got into the act with a scathing expose of CBA’s perceived inadequacies. If the media is to believed the FSU forced CBA to back down and revise and/or rewrite its social media staff policy. How embarrassing!
These days, given the amount of information on the internet, there’s no excuse for organisations making these kinds of gaffes. If you are a PR or communications manager there are so many ways to find out how to approach these issues.
One search on Google uncovered for me a great article which included access to six social media policies for employees – including from organisations such as Kodak, Coca-Cola, Kaiser Permanete and General Motors. All great stuff!
However, I’ve also been noticing several articles in marketing and media publications about how 2011 has reportedly been declared (I’m not sure by whom) as the Year of Social Media.
These articles, and the accompanying blogs, mainly focus on the marketing and promotional aspects of social media – seeing it as a promotional and ‘below-the-line’ marketing tool.
I’ve written previously on the need for the PR or communication department to take control of social media; also on how the Nestle controversy reinforced the need.
But here’s an interesting US article, which backs up and is complementary to my earlier article, and gives a number of reasons why social media strategy shouldn’t be owned by either a PR agency or an advertising agency.
Finally while on Google looking into social media policies I came across an interesting piece that examines how the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) in the US is putting the onus on organisations, and their employees, to act when engaging online.
It opens up new trains of thought (and implications for individual employees engaging in social media on behalf of their organisations) that I hadn’t considered before. And, I’m not aware whether Australian regulatory authorities are following the same path as the FTC.
However it’s just one of many elements that any PR or communications manager who seeks to better manage (and control) social media within their organisation needs to come to grips with.
Making better managementof social media as a 2011 priority should not be a grab for power and control. It’s about ensuring that social media is integrated into the public relations and communications values and strategy. But most importantly its about empowering employees and making use of the power they possess to favourably represent the company, organisation or brand.
|
|
|
|
|
 |
