Manage social media risk

Effectively managing your social media accounts has become crucial for B2B brands. James Leavesley, CEO and founder of CrowdControlHQ, explains how to handle social media risk management

Social engagement is recognised as a valuable marketing communications tool and many B2B companies are actively exploiting social media channels to promote their products and services.

However, we have all read news stories about companies that have got it wrong when responding to an unhappy customer via Twitter or Facebook. With many organisations making up the rules on social media engagement as they go, it’s not surprising that companies are blissfully unaware of the risks involved and can fall spectacularly from grace.

For the marketing department, the remit must be clear – a focus on giving the customers the content they want, when they want it and in their channel of choice.  A fast response to feedback or queries is vital, but it’s not just monitoring how and what is being said, it’s about proactively providing content that boosts customer loyalty and builds a solid brand.

Here are five steps to help you take control of social media and manage the risks:

1. Make sure you have guidelines in place

Well-defined rules should be enforced – for essentials like password sharing and storage procedures. You should also have the authority to lock down corporate social media accounts should an employee be at risk of posting inappropriate updates, whether by accident or with malicious intent.

It’s important to enlist the help of your HR department to communicate clear guidelines for social engagement and ensure that such policies, for corporate and personal accounts, form part of company employment contracts.  The Defamation Act 2013 has strengthened the protection for channels such as Facebook and Twitter and encourages the victims of libel to pursue those responsible for damaging or defamatory media posts or reposts which leaves organisations open to legal action if an employee or corporate account is involved.

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) provides advice to financial services organisations to maintain best practice and its guidelines cover everything digital, including blogs, micro blogs, client forums, images and video sharing platforms. 

Finally, get your legal teams involved. They can outline the processes and define what checks need to be put in place. When should the ‘two-sets of eyes’ policy be invoked? How strict should the rules be on retweeting? Some organisations treat every tweet or reply on Facebook as a press release, with rigorous controls as to what can be said and by whom. 

2. Create an effective response process

As customer service enquiries increase, response teams can experience growing pains. Collaboration across internal teams can help to manage social media effectively, but it must be very clear what the protocols, procedures and accountabilities are for responding to a customer service enquiry. 

The latest social media risk management platforms allow for multi-site/multi-user ‘team’ campaigning.  This means content can be checked before going live: audit trails record who posted what and when, and inbound queries can be allocated to the right member of the customer service team to be dealt with.

3. Be clear on the goal

No business should enter the social media environment without first being clear on the outcome that social media is being tasked to deliver.

The best plans in the world fall to pieces if there is not the resource or the content to drive the plan. Only once these elements are in place can the risks be effectively evaluated and the appropriate measures enacted to minimise their occurrence. 

In B2B environments, the focus can be on using social media to add value for existing customers, a way of reinforcing or drawing together the supply chain, or getting noticed as part of the sales process. 

The goal will heavily influence the social media channel selection e.g. some may use LinkedIn to focus on awareness raising, while others may use a Facebook fan Page or a digital news themed platform like Paper.li as a centre piece to their social media engagement.

4. Be SMART on analytics

We all know that objectives should be SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timed). Social media provides one of the easiest objective-setting and evaluation environments of any of the communications activities. 

All too often however, businesses focus on inappropriate metrics or worse, fail to measure or record analytics entirely!

For example, many digital managers are still being evaluated on the number of followers or page likes rather than engagement and effective reach metrics.  Having asocial media risk management and compliance platform in place enables teams to really sharpen the focus and impact of social media activity. Analytics can provide strong ROI information, helping to secure additional investment and resources as well as highlighting what’s working and what’s not.

5. Use the right management tools

The social media environment is constantly evolving and technology needs to be scalable to adapt to the changing requirements of the business. The high volume of social media activity and the need for immediate response demands strict, consistent processes and a sophisticated technology platform that offers a level of automation. A platform that allows you to manage all communications and provide an audit trail ensures that you stay firmly in control. 

The tools you use to help you manage social media should be secure – all bona fide solutions should be able to demonstrate penetration testing protocols –, should store your data on-shore to help you with compliance, and provide a customer support team for times when you need that extra helping hand.

Social media is a key part of the communications mix; however, it also has to move up the corporate risk register and become part of an organisation’s business strategy. With cross-functional collaboration, sound processes all supported by an automated social media risk and governance platform, the marketing team can really use social media as a successful tool to manage brand reputation with a tangible impact on the bottom line, while minimising risk.

 

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