As a communicator, you may be asked to tweet on behalf of the company. It is obvious that you need to get appropriate approval before registering a new Twitter account for your company's business. Always check to ensure an account for your function or group doesn’t already exist. As a general rule, you cannot comment or make commitments on Twitter on behalf of the company, unless you are empowered to do so. So, check with your legal department if they already have a Twitter policy in place, as most social media guidelines tend to disregard Twitter, the most popular micro-blogging platform.
What are some of the best practices to follow while tweeting or blogging for 'official purposes'?
Let's take the case of Microsoft. Its employees are bound by its Twitter Policy to not register micro-blogging accounts on behalf of Microsoft teams and groups unless they are clearly responsible for the team’s or group’s community engagement activities. "If in doubt, don’t," the MS company policy clearly states, and follows up with a best practice to tackle the frequent career moves its employees make: "Please choose an alias for the account that can be easily managed by your group if you move to a new role." A Twitter account, for instance, that an MS employee registers for company business, or any account that contains Microsoft product names and trademarks are obviously considered the company's intellectual property. If an employee intends to use an MS product name or trademark in the account name, the company wants them to ensure that they be a "good steward" for the company by using the full name of the product, which will help build consumer awareness while respecting trademarks guidelines. MS employees are prohibited from using other companies’ product names or trademarks for an account name, e.g., AppleSucks, which may create legal risk or PR problems for the company.
While tweeting always try to be yourself and use your own voice. Most importantly, be very clear about your identity. You may already have a personal Twitter account, which you should keep distinct from your official account. Don't link the two, lest you make a mistake and tweet something inadvertently about your company, service, product or people. It's a no-brainer that anyone can use statements taken from employee posts, comments or tweets against the company. While expressing an opinion or making a comment, it is advisable that you make it clear that you are speaking for yourself by using lingos like “IMO” or “IMHO.” When blogging, if you have revealed your identity as an employee, use a disclaimer that, for instance, says, ‘this blog contains my own views and does not necessarily reflect the view of employer.’ The same holds true even for tweets or twits. However, this rule does not hold good for media companies. (see Washington Post’s Guidelines below)
According to the Microsoft’s micro-blogging guidelines, if an employee plans to tweet about any professional matters or business, in addition to referencing their official e-mail ID, the company urges them to use the service’s profile or contact information to assert, whenever possible, that the person is a Microsoft employee. Moreover, if an employee is blogging on behalf of Microsoft, it is a must to disclose their affiliation. The company policies relating to blogging clearly states: "You may not hide or mislead others about your affiliation with Microsoft, and if asked, should respond honestly. If you think it will matter to the audience that you are a Microsoft employee, you should say that you are..." As for individual blog posts or tweets, Microsoft asks its employees to “be smart” and to think about how their blog can affect Microsoft: "Using your public blog to gratuitously trash Microsoft, our products, partners or competitors reflects poorly on all of us," its policy states.
Walmart's Twitter Guidelines, for example, says that the company encourages its employees to engage in online conversations with its customers about the products, brands and initiatives, etc. and welcomes thoughts, replies and comments from employees. The company urges employees to contribute to the dialogue, and support claims with links to sources: "We love opinions. We love it even more when you back them up," it says. While many of its 2.2 million associates are using Twitter and other social networks, all official Walmart Twitter users need to be identified on Walmart's Corporate Twitter landing page with a link back to this page from their Twitter profile. But don’t miss the fine text! The postings on Twitter, the company policy clearly states “does not necessarily mean that Walmart agrees with the content, ensures its accuracy or otherwise approves of it.”
Wells Fargo asks all its employees to disclose their employment status when they post a comment or question on the official Wells Fargo Blogs or Twitter feeds. “Whether you are at home or in the office, working for Wells Fargo or Wachovia is a material fact that may influence content and that community members have a right to know about… Thank you for helping maintain the integrity of our community by disclosing that relationship,” says Wells Fargo Blogs & Social Media Community Guidelines.
However, if you are a journalist or work for the media, things can be very different! Take, for instance, the Newsroom Guidelines for Use of Social Networks by Washington Post employees. When using social networking tools even for our personal lives, they must remember that "Washington Post journalists are always Washington Post journalists." Here's an excerpt from the guidelines that apply to all Post journalists:
"All Washington Post journalists relinquish some of the personal privileges of private citizens. Post journalists must recognize that any content associated with them in an online social network is, for practical purposes, the equivalent of what appears beneath their bylines in the newspaper or on our website... What you do on social networks should be presumed to be publicly available to anyone, even if you have created a private account... Reality is simple: If you don’t want something to be found online, don’t put it there... Post journalists must refrain from writing, tweeting or posting anything—including photographs or video—that could be perceived as reflecting political, racial, sexist, religious or other bias or favoritism that could be used to tarnish our journalistic credibility."
Recent Comments