Creating a Social Media Policy

Creating a social media policy or guidelines for your organization can be a daunting task.  I think the number one question is where do we start?  Many companies begin communicating in the social media landscape and then have to step back to build their policies.  There are many different approaches that I’ve seen, however, here’s an easy way to tackle the development of your social media guidelines:

• Put together a coalition of people who will need to be a part of the creation of the document and who understand the goals and objectives of social media communications (Communications, Legal, HR, IT, etc.)
• Select 5 or 6 good social media policies that have been created by other organizations.  It’s important to compare different types of policies, but make sure you find a couple of policies that are representative of your industry, non-profit or government sector.
• Audit your social media outreach and activities, if you are currently communicating through social media.
• Develop a matrix or Guidelines for Engagement that will include the six companies that you select and then list the various sections that these organizations use in their social media policies. You will find that these policies vary in length.  Select relevant or useful parts of each of the policies, especially the guidelines that you feel may pertain to activities within your organization, as well as other issues/concerns that look useful and may relate to future social media activities.
• Go through the comprehensive list of policy sections on the matrix and mark “Yes” or “No” to determine whether a company has the guidelines or not.  You are looking to find similarities between what different organizations are using in their guidelines.
• If you find that a particular section or guideline is used by at least four of the six companies, then that guideline should be highlighted as one that may appear in your policy.  These highlighted sections are a “must include” and then go back to the other parts that are not highlighted to see which may pertain and be relevant to your organization’s communication.
• From my experience doing this exercise, many of the popular social media policy sections include:
• iv.      Creating podcasts or videos

1. An introduction to social media and details on the types of social media tools
2. How social media policy ties to a company’s Code of Ethics or Code of Conduct
3. Potential legal concerns for the organization
   1. i.      Consumer Protection Unfair Trading Regulation
   2. ii.      Advertising Standards Authority
   3. iii.      Intellectual Property (copyright and trademark)
   4. iv.      Disclosure/Confidentiality
   5. v.      Defamation
   6. vi.      Invasion of privacy
   7. Statement for employees or members of the organization on the 3 R’s (Representation, Responsibility and Respect)
   8. Rules for engagement with explanations: i.e., be judicious, be transparent, stick to what you know, etc.
   9. Emerging social media issues
      1. i.      User generated content
      2. ii.      Branding guidelines and standards
      3. iii.      Contributing to wikis

You should be able to use the matrix comparison to build your own social media policy.  This method will provide you with the infrastructure for your guidelines.  Ultimately, your social media policy should be included in your overall communications policy for the organization.

Don’t wait for a legal issue or a social media crisis to occur.  Get your policy framed out and continue to update it as you become more involved in social media communications.  These guidelines will serve your employees and your organization well.  When you take the time to get all of your employees on the same page with respect to social media, they will feel empowered to discuss your company in a meaningful and appropriate way in the social media landscape.

Here’s what a matrix would look like:

What steps are you taking to develop your social media policy?