Four Reasons You Need a Social Media Policy

At a meeting of independent insurance agents, a group of about 100 agents was asked if their agency has a social media policy. Only two hands were raised.

Given the concerns agents often voice about social media – from reputation to employee behavior – an internal policy is a great place to begin your planning for social media. A social media policy helps you take a responsible, thoughtful look at the areas you can address to prepare your agency team for work and life in today’s digital world.

4 Reasons to Create a Social Media Policy

1. Put the moose on the table. Address the elephant in the room. However you want to phrase it, your agency leaders need to openly discuss their fears about social media. Your concerns are valid. Social media does come with risks, but you can’t stop it from impacting your agency by ignoring it. Get it all out on the table in a meeting where concerns are listed and grouped into categories.

2. Decide up front how you’ll handle risks. The process of openly discussing concerns and deciding how you’ll handle them can be cathartic. Walk through what you would do in your group’s worst-case scenarios. If someone posts a negative review on your Google+ page, how will you respond? What would you do if one employee harassed another on Facebook? This is a valuable exercise to increase everyone’s comfort level and understanding of social media. As a bonus, it will begin to form your policy.

3. Set expectations and provide guidance to employees. Your staff is waiting to hear from you about social media. Simply saying “don’t use it” or “don’t do anything stupid” doesn’t provide the clear expectations your team needs to be effective. Social media is part of millions of people’s lives. Something that may be second nature to some of your employees needs to be addressed head on, with honesty and clarity. A policy lets them know what you expect and can give them guidance on issues like privacy and reputation that will serve them well in their personal lives as well as at the office.

4. Clear the path to use social media effectively. Your team understands the risks, is prepared to handle them, and knows what is expected of them when using social media. Now, you can all work together to determine how social media can benefit your agency and your customers. You’ve already started the conversation by introducing and explaining the social media policy. Now, ask your staff for their ideas and feedback. 

Resource:

The Agent’s Council for Technology created a guide to help you through the process of creating a social media policy. It also has sample social media policies from other agencies to serve as a reference.

Creating a Social Web Policy for Your Independent Agency (ACT)