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| DO IT RIGHT: People need to follow social media guidelines and never do anthing that is out of line. Image Source: http://www.beth.typepad.com/ |
By now, most companies or organisations have launched blogs, Twitter accounts and Facebook pages, mindful that actively engaging online audiences is essential to the survival of any business. But social media
offers a major benefit that is too often ignored, which is the ability to monitor the online space to glean information about your customers, your competition, and even your own company. Facebook continues to be an issue and an employee time drain, despite all the warnings about carefully using the privacy settings. Even updating your status from work can violate company policy if you're not supposed to be using Facebook in the office. Twitter is an issue too. Every tweet shows up in Google, so it's easy to see what you're posting. Blog posts show up on the search engines, too, so be cautious what you say when you blog. LinkedIn can be problematic, as well, even though it's a professional networking site. I read a story about the South African Transport and Allied Workers Union (SATAWU)' spokesperson, Reagoikanya Molopyane, who was suspended because of a post on the union’s Facebook page and tweets to the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) boss Zwelinzima Vavi. The news about SATAWU's spokesperson got relayed to her bosses and she was out of a job sooner rather than later. This issue is so controversial because when you work for a company, it is important that you follow your organisation's social media guidelines, properly in order to avoid expulsion from work.
offers a major benefit that is too often ignored, which is the ability to monitor the online space to glean information about your customers, your competition, and even your own company. Facebook continues to be an issue and an employee time drain, despite all the warnings about carefully using the privacy settings. Even updating your status from work can violate company policy if you're not supposed to be using Facebook in the office. Twitter is an issue too. Every tweet shows up in Google, so it's easy to see what you're posting. Blog posts show up on the search engines, too, so be cautious what you say when you blog. LinkedIn can be problematic, as well, even though it's a professional networking site. I read a story about the South African Transport and Allied Workers Union (SATAWU)' spokesperson, Reagoikanya Molopyane, who was suspended because of a post on the union’s Facebook page and tweets to the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) boss Zwelinzima Vavi. The news about SATAWU's spokesperson got relayed to her bosses and she was out of a job sooner rather than later. This issue is so controversial because when you work for a company, it is important that you follow your organisation's social media guidelines, properly in order to avoid expulsion from work.
Here are some do's and don'ts on social media:
- Do not post something that is against your company's social media policy
- Don't get fired because posting inappropriate information on Facebook are just a couple of examples of what can get you in trouble, or even cost you your job, especially when you do it from work
- Becareful about what you tweet because you don't know who might read it. Search Twitter for "I hate my boss or my jobs sucks", is an example of what I mean.
