10 Recommendations for HR in Social Media Marketing

Social media affects almost every aspect of our life and business. According to the data, “social networking is one of the most popular online activities with high user engagement rates and expanding mobile possibilities. In 2017, 71 percent of Internet users were social network users and these figures are expected to grow.”

All HR managers must know what effect social media has on the recruiting process. Nowadays, organizations try using all forms of social media to draw employees and further develop their skills. The social media policy varies for different companies. However, if you don’t apply the right strategy for social media, this can cause such problems as lack of employees or client confidentiality, labor relations issues, miscommunication and spamming.

This article contains 10 strategic pieces of advice about social media trends. It can help you create an effective social media policy for your company.

1. Communication with employees

The social media role in the world of human resources is continuing to grow. Social media has led to a rise in communication between employers and their employees. Some companies prefer to discuss business events on social media, so the public gets to know about them faster. Other companies use messaging apps to talk among co-workers. In this case, colleagues can communicate with each other and solve their problems more quickly. That increases the efficiency of their work. Consequently, the company’s productivity levels improve.

2. Contextual advertising

Contextual advertising on social networks can help your company draw employees as well as customers. It totally makes sense to show targeted ads when you are in a dire need of first-class professionals.

3. Company image in social media

Social media can have a positive effect on the promotion of your company and help with branding. When it comes to reinforcing the brand of the company, social media becomes an appropriate tool for HR specialists. When a problem affecting the image of the company appears (for example, a customer complains about something), the HR department can connect with the clients on social media to improve the company’s reputation.

4. Assemble your team

A social media policy must be unique to your company and should primarily include a contribution from many different people with a variety of skill sets. It cannot be written by only one person.

A team approach to the situation guarantees that any future challenge that may arise will be handled fully and adequately.

Besides the employees directly involved in social media, the team can include a CEO, a HR director, an IT director, a marketing director or a social media-savvy lawyer.

5. Social media for recruiting

Using social media for recruiting new employees makes this process easier and more successful for the company. Also, HR managers can post information about open positions on all social media pages of the company. Here you can read more about the ways to recruit employees.

This makes it easier not only for the company, but also for the candidates who search for a job and want to apply for the offered vacancies. People write resumes by themselves or with the help of a resume writing service and send it to the e-mail of the HR manager.

Moreover, HR managers can browse the social media pages of potential candidates to find out if the person fits for this position or not.

6. Specific policy for different social media

Social media is constantly transforming and varies from one website to another. Your policy cannot be one for all social networks. If a company uses only one specific social media page, this will be ineffective.

Generally, the whole point of the policy should focus on correct distribution of roles and responsibilities. It depends directly on the employees’ qualifications and skills.

The process of drafting instructions also helps employees understand better what they are doing and why. Particular instructions can be created specifically for a certain social media page. These can also help in the case of staff turnover.

7. The importance of cyber-behavior education

Many employees don’t fully realize the consequences of their cyber-behavior. Therefore, employers can prevent problems with confidentiality by providing cyber-safety education.

First of all, the company should provide job-related training to the employees working on social networks on behalf of the organization.

Also, you must educate all employees on Internet safety, including responsible cyber-behavior during the work. They should know how to establish and protect the online reputation of the company and defend it from cyber-crimes.

Regular training helps keep your organization on guard and gives your employees a unique possibility to learn and stay safe.

8. Separation of work and personal life

The best solution for controlling the company’s work will be the separation of work and personal life in social networks for your employees. You should make two types of policies. One for the employees using social media for their jobs and another – for those using it for personal needs.

The first policy should focus on work and define roles and responsibilities in the company. It is important for your employees to understand what internal and external policies to comply with.

The second policy should focus on using social media in personal life. It should provide employees with the information about what they can and cannot share on their personal pages. Trade secrets and client information must be kept strictly confidential.

Some organizations like military and health care are very specific about what their employees are not allowed to say online.

9. Legal regulations for employees

Also, most legal regulations for employees concern social media as well. Remember that your corporate training has to mention not only confidentiality and branding but social media too.

The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) was enacted primarily to protect employees’ rights. Labor relations issues are the main reason for most of the court cases related to social media. Legally, employees have the right to discuss conditions of employment with fellow employees. With the advent of social media, they also can do it online.

It means that even a casual conversation on any social network about working conditions might be protected under the NLRA. You should know about legal regulations when you tell your employees about what they can and cannot do on their own personal social media pages.

It is easy to misstep, especially in the areas of labor relations, so legal advice is critical.

10. Don’t complicate your life

Your company probably already has internal policies about activities applying to social media. This may also relate to policies about confidentiality, photo consents, the Internet and mobile phone usage.

You can reference all these policies in your social media, paying attention to any differences that may be related to social networks. Read more about making up HR manuals.

Social media changes frequently. Bureaucratic policies aren’t likely to be successful.  Thus social media policies should be reviewed at least every six months. Let everyone on the team review the policy separately and then do it again together.

If your social media policy is developed properly, it can support your current employees and draw future ones.

Charles Ebert is a career mentor, motivational speaker and human resources consultant with more than 10 years of experience in HR sector. Charles is a lead expert at Professional Resume Solutions. Apart from career mentoring, he loves photography and football. Find him on Linkedin, Twitter, Facebook and Google+.

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