Social Media Policy … Does it Assist with Reputation?

When people talk about a Social Media Policy (SMP), the thought that instantly comes to the minds of those that manage the company's brand/image are the guidelines that they should follow to maintain same. They think of how frequently posts should be made, what message should be put out, how the narrative should be controlled, etc. But that’s not what a SMP is about.

Any company policy is generally put in place to control the behaviour of staff outlining what is acceptable and what is not. With respect to a SMP, it will generally outline whether or not SM is to be used while on the job, which subsets are allowed or not, if there is a particular time that employees are allowed to use SM and/or the internet in general but most importantly, if they are allowed to post or comment on company events, pages or activities on their personal SM platforms. Typically, only persons in Public Relations (PR) or the Communications Department are tasked with posting on SM platforms and managing the company’s image.

Does a SMP assist with a company’s reputation? It absolutely does, but not in the way you are still thinking about it. It assists by controlling the content that a company’s employees post about the company or its brand. The quality, narrative and intentions of actual posts are also maintained by the persons whose job it is to do so. In so doing, they have less of a task, if any, to clean up any potential messages published by employees that damage the company’s reputation or any possible misinformation that they communicate based on their lack of knowledge or personal opinions. This also helps by not inadvertently having employees leak work in progress without thinking about it if they get the information from events or meetings which provide updates on where the company is headed or what the targets are that are being set for the upcoming period. Policies are always useful as long as they are not too overbearing or restrictive. Keep in mind too that different people play different roles in an organization and if everybody plays all the roles or did everybody else’s job, imagine all the “dirty work” that would need to be cleaned up.

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