Gavin Baker

Last night I attended the Winter Panel put on by Social Media Club – Knoxville which was focused on social media liability, ethics and policy.  The featured panelists were Erin Donovan of WBIR, legal and marketing consultant Jeremy Floyd and Chad Parizman of Scripps Networks who did a great job representing a few perspectives on social media, and entertaining the crowd with funny quips. The evening covered a broad range of topics from the local liability story of The Pizza Kitchen (link to News Sent) to understanding the line where policy ends and ethics begin. If you missed the event checkout the tweets about the evening #smcknox.

One thing that wasn’t covered in depth that I wanted to shed some light on is the difference between policy and guidelines. Often the term “social media policy” is used to cover a document that is both policy and guidelines but they are very different documents and serve very different roles.  Moving forward in this post I’ll use the terms policy and guidelines to represent different pieces of that social media policy document.

When we talk about policy, we’re really talking about a document that is going to largely drafted by legal and HR professionals. It’s essentially about what employee’s SHOULDN’T do.While a very important piece of the puzzle if you’re a in marketing role this part of the document will seem very dry.  This document will detail who can can be a spokesperson for the brand utilizing these channels, what other policies they must adhere to in this sphere and the repercussions for not following the policy.  This document will read like a legal contract because, well it is.  Ultimately the role of part of the document is to protect the company, also known as CYA.

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UPDATED: With slides below

We all know that the world has been quickly transformed (you might also say overloaded) by social media.  News anchors are on twitter and ESPN has a social media policy, and you’ve only just signed up for facebook!  No worries, if you’re in Knoxville – you may be interested to join me (and a few friends, see Katie’s post on the topic) tomorrow as we explain our views and answer your questions at “Social Media 101: For Grownups” a panel put on by Leadership Knoxville.

The topics and presenters:

Social media is the new “civic” club. Learn how to make it useful personally and professionally. Presented by Katie Allison Granju Director of Digital & Social Media at Ackermann PR.
Nuts & Bolts of Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. How to get started and what you need to know now. Presented by Bob Wilson Director of New Media at Moxley Carmichael.

Social Media Business Success! Hear how the use of social media and personal branding has produced measurable ROI in this challenging economy. Presented by Suzy Trotta Realtor at Coldwell Banker Business Benefits of Social Media

Social Media in the Enterprise. Hear how Ruby Tuesday, Inc. uses social media to build awareness and traffic to build its business and strengthen its brand. Presented by me.

The details:

Reserve your seat today!

Wednesday, Oct. 28th
4:00 – 6:00 p.m.

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After I presented at the SMC- Greenville meeting I was approached by a college student and asked an interesting question, “what’s the best background to get into a social media job?”  at the time, I mentioned that my background was business and marketing, so I could speak to that but not social media in general.  I decided to tweet the question since I knew I’d get quite the mixture of answers. Here are a few responses, each with a different viewpoint – technology entrepreneur, marketing consultant and in house technologist.  (All who are worth a follow by the way).

from @jpatrickhunt trial by fire. on the job training. offer your services for nothing and dive in. learn and adapt. you will be assimilated.

from @jfloyd journalism, photography, video production, advertising, english, web design…what does Seth call it…a multipationalist?

from @BJ_Emerson Great question, may depend on the needs of the org. My opinion: Don’t skimp on the tech skills, be good at relationships.

I expected the answers to be all over and I wasn’t disappointed.  So where does this leave us?  Ultimately while a background in in PR or marketing has an upside, I’m going to go out on a limb and say I don’t think it really matters for hiring.  To be clear, one should have some manner of understanding of the basics of communication and if the job has a strategy component you’ll need to understand the social landscape.  But what matters the most is that you be customer focused. Which may seem to be a no brainer to some of you, however it’s not to everyone.  Customer focused means thinking of yourself as the advocate of the people your organization exists to serve.  So you are approaching problems with the mindset of it you were the end user.

This is important because at the end of the day, social media is about people.  It’s a set of tools that are allowing customers the ability to connect with and give feedback to their friends and the public – and we as organizations have the ability to be part of that exchange.  To learn and respond and share. If you want to work in social media, you’ll be well on your way if you can be that voice of the customer.

Updated: Slides embedded below and on SlideShare

I’m heading out to Greenville, SC to this weekend at the invitation of Trey Pennington to speak to the great members of  Social Media Club – Greenville on Monday morning (Facbook Event link) about Social Media in the Enterprise.  I’m going to cover the why, the how and the what about social media at Ruby Tuesday, Inc.  If you’ve wondered about how large companies think about and use social media – this will be a great chance to hear more about it.

I’ve got the honor of following the great panel from last month – (watch the video captured by Bobby Rettew).

Spike Jones of Brains on Fire
Olivier Blanchard of The Brand Builder
Jeff Elder from the Charlotte Observer
Top Chef’s Celebrity Chef Michael Parise

The deets – Monday, October 12, 2009

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One of the things I love to do is read.  I recently finished “Groundswell” by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff which is a great resource.  It’s a very balanced look at social technology and what can happen when companies choose to adopt them.  I’m late to the party on reading this book, but it launched to great acclaim in 2008 – and I now understand why.

They’ve managed to find what I’m considering the perfect blend of background, statistics, how to’s, case studies and sage advice in 286 pages.  This is not a book about marketing, this is a book that shares it’s view on how social technology is changing (and will change) companies big and small as we’ve known them.  Most helpful to me were the case studies, examples are concrete and share the actions and results; additionally they serve as inspiration of how those ideas could be applied at the organizations I’m involved in.

The book isn’t about specific tools, it’s about understanding the relationships, and knowing that social tools enable relationships to form faster and become mighty much quicker then they would have 10 years ago.  Even since the book was written technology has changed and will continue to change – so the key takeaway is focus on the relationships, how people connect with one another and it will impact how you do business.

Oh and it had 32 stickies for me – if you’re looking for a book that is a one stop stop on social technology then this is it.

32 Stickies