We are in the middle of some heavy discussions considering the value of social media at the office. Will it help or hurt our brand? Is it a security risk? How can we control our employees work-time involvement and a host of other concerns. There are really two issues here. One, should employees be allowed to engage in social networking at work? Two, Can your company use social media to their advantage at growing and maintaining customer relationships?
I’d like to hear from you – what is your company doing about social media?
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I think social tools can be utilized for companies of all sizes. For example, a small company could use twitter updates when employees are out the office. Larger companies would benefit from internal social networks like Facebook. The Financial Times just had an article on this very topic highlighting a company called Yammer. I haven’t heard of them before, but they focus on developing internal social networks for companies like you described. “We want to make employees as connected with each other as they are with their friends in the real world” (Gelles, 2010). The benefit for any size company could be a transition away from email. “By having some conversations in public on these networks, many employees are spared from being cc’ed and overburdened with unnecessary attachments. Instead, employees can monitor the progress of a project and get involved only as needed†(Gelles, 2010). I don’t think social networks will be bound by the type of the company or its size, and may ultimately change the way we work with customers and colleagues.
Reference:
Gelles, D. (2010). Companies embrace social net tools. Financial Times. Retrieved, September 23, 2010, from http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/d97ff734-c691-11df-8a9f-00144feab49a.html
This is a very interesting topic. When I look at it from a marketing perspective, I think this lends itself to a good internal marketing strategy. Anyone who has worked for large corporations before knows how large companies can easily become siloed. As such, social media is used to create dialogue and foster relationships. Using this internally between teams is indeed beneficial, especially when it means communicating lessons learned or communicating best practices, which contributes to overall company efficiency and profitability. It helps to break down those barriers or silos within companies and encourages communication and comrade between departments and employees. That said, I do believe that company policies will need to be enacted to ensure that employees do not abuse the use.