If you're like many business owners or managers, you may hesitate to allow your employees to participate on social media sites. What if they spend hours on Facebook instead of working? And what if they say bad things about the company? You may think that the risks outweigh the benefits.
Actually, your biggest assets are your employees. If you make them part of your social media presence, they can help build your fan base and their activity may strengthen company loyalty. Before you decide to ban social media at work, consider these guidelines:
- Have a policy: If you don't want your staff uploading personal photos all morning, set some ground rules. Make it clear that social media is only okay during personal time-at home or on break. If you are really concerned about abuse, allow access to Facebook and other sites only from common computers in break rooms.
- Give assurances: If your employees are worried about becoming fans of your business, make sure they know you won't be starting a witch hunt. You won't analyze every comment they make, but you will expect them to present your company in a positive light. If they want to hide personal posts and photos from you, advise them to set their privacy settings accordingly.
- Set expectations: Ask your employees to help grow your brand. Have them tweet and post about company events, sales, or promotions. If they tell their friends, who tell their friends, you can build excitement with a simple (and free) strategy.
- Assign certain roles: For your staff members who have marketing and sales positions, give them broader access to social media sites. Have them create events on Facebook, communicate with clients, and do live tweets from company seminars or sales programs. Also, be sure someone is given the task of responding to your fans. If a customer complains about or compliments your business on a social media site, it's important for someone to answer-as promptly as possible.
According to the OpenDNS 2010 Report, 14.2 percent of companies blacklist Facebook, while only 1.2 percent blacklist Playboy and Pornhub. Now, does that make sense? Rather than having a blanket, no-social-media policy at your company, figure out what will work best for you and your staff. Remember, they are your best advocates. Encourage your employees to collaborate with you and make your company as strong-and social-as it can be.