By now all the commentary (here, here and elsewhere) has died down on Google blogger Lauren Turner's post. This incident underscores the importance of social-media training for people in your organization. I'd like to use this as an opportunity to discuss how you may want - rather need - to help your business with some social-media training. Much as you would train anyone speaking on behalf of your company, two of the more overarching lessons would be:
- if you are writing on a corporate blog, people will naturally assume you are writing on behalf of the company.
- if you are writing on a personal blog, people may still make the assumption that you are writing on behalf of the company.
Whether or not you like it, people may see you as a spokesperson for the company, and you need to weigh the responsibilities and outcomes of what you post before you publish.
One of the issues facing the corporate adoption of Social Media is the "what to do" factor. I'm asked all the time; what should I do about this or that? So, now I'm developing a social-media "training" curriculum. Basically, it's about preparing those who are unaware of how to engage.
This "training" isn't about how to blog, it is about helping people understand the likes of:
- what to do when the New York Times calls you for comment about what you just posted on your blog?
- someone just commented about your product and they got it all wrong - how do I respond?
- what are the potential risks of engagement?
- someone just wrote a highly critical post about my product, and it's all true - how do I respond?
- what are the potential rewards of engagement?
- what's the difference between the print media, online, blogs and social networks?
- etc.
This is a work in progress. I'd very much like to hear your thoughts/experiences/recommendations. Remember, the goal here is to educate those that don't yet understand the nuances so that they too can participate effectively.
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