If you’re like most nonprofits, you probably have a presence on Facebook. And if you’re using Facebook strategically, you might have asked yourself this question:
Who should be in charge of Facebook community management?
It makes sense to ask this question. After all, you have someone who’s in charge of grant writing, someone who’s in charge of event marketing, and someone who’s in charge of email marketing.
So why not put one person in charge of Facebook?
The reason why is that Facebook is different than these other channels in one very important way:
Many people in your organization use Facebook
Imagine if all of your employees were in charge of email marketing, and had access to all of your donor email? Yeah – very bad idea.
Everyone’s job description has changed
Of course you want to have someone own Facebook strategy. But because all staffers swim alongside your constituents in Facebook’s waters, implementing a policy is critical.
This will allow all employees understand what’s appropriate, what’s not, and what’s encouraged.
A policy should be a concise set to easy to understand “playbook” that encourage your evangelists, not freak them out.
Nine critical components of a social media policy
A social media policy should include these components:
- A stated purpose for why the org uses social media.
- Clear goals for what the org wants to get from these channels.
- Praise for the employee’s alignment with the orgs mission and why their voice is of utmost importance.
- A reminder that employees are responsible for all that they post online, and that exercising good judgment is important for everyone.
- A reminder that each employee has different comfort levels for how public or private they want to be online, and that all boundaries should be respected.
- A statement around copyrights and fair use, so that employees don’t unknowingly increase the orgs liabilities.
- A focus on creating value and positivity online, and that it’s important that each staff member has an attitude to adding value in whatever conversations they participate in.
- A list of the key players in the orgs online voice (bloggers, Facebook admins, Twitter managers and other community managers).
- Clear procedures for handling “bad press”, emergencies and other unexpected situations.
If you’re looking for some good examples of social media policies, check out this list.