Social media can bring about benefits for individuals by connecting them to people and interests they may not have discovered otherwise and for businesses by spreading information about their product or service. However, it can have some harmful effects as well. It is easy to get carried away online and forget our manners or proper etiquette. An error in judgment or a typo online can quickly spread and scar your reputation. Here are some possible ways to avoid or at least recover from such a faux pas.
- Miss Debrett on… Online Manners (Debretts) “Make it a general rule that you will never say anything online that you wouldn’t be able to articulate directly, face to face. Do not use the technology as a shield, masking your true feelings and personality. So always write polite emails, and never send messages (on social networking sites, chatrooms, SMS etc.) that contain intemperate language or sentiments that you would never normally express in your everyday life.”
- Ethics and Social Media: Where Should You Draw The Line? (Mashable/Sharlyn Lauby) “The Ethics Resource Center (ERC) is the oldest non-profit organization in the U.S. dedicated to independent research and advancement of high ethical standards and practices in both public and private institutions. Since 1994, the ERC has produced the National Business Ethics Survey (NBES), available for free to the public, to gather information about employees’ perspectives of ethics in the workplace. Dr. Patricia J. Harned, president of the ERC, says the NBES is the only longitudinal study that represents the views of the U.S. workforce in business.”
- The Social Media Decision Tree (Loftyaspirant/The Digital Marketer) “Social Media is about relationships. As such monitoring the social media space is essential to find out what your customers are talking about and their perceptions of your brand, products and services. The engagement part of this is to make sure that you address your customers questions, concerns and complains in the right manner. Failure to do so can be disastrous as everything occurs in an open and transparent manner, where bad publicity can spread across multiple social networks like wildfire, destroying brand equity and bring an onslaught of negative product sentiments.”
- Social Media Governance Policy Database (Social Media Governance/Chris Boudreaux) “The most complete listing of social media policies. Referenced by the world’s largest brands and agencies.”
Social Networking fact:
According to Nielsen research, social networks and blogs continue to dominate Americans’ time online, now accounting for nearly a quarter of total time spent on the Internet.
