This is a frequently debated topic in the social media space. Yesterday when I was at the Social Media Club event in San Francisco the debate was who owns social media in a corporation? Is it the marketing department, the PR department, the product department, etc. or is it a mix of all of them? While I don’t think there will ever be a unanimous consensus on that topic I still think it’s an interesting question to think about.
Perhaps companies can create social media budgets or departments that operate as their own entities? Or perhaps this is a decision that the companies themselves should figure out internally. Perhaps this depends on the goals of the company. All valid points but the problem comes into play when social media begins to leak from one department into another. As many of you know social media is very dynamic and can be used for a variety of things, so if you end up using social media strictly for PR and then the product department starts getting useful information, who pays? who takes the risk? who is rewarded? who is on the chopping block? How do you split up the budget?
Now you noodle on that for a while…
While this is an interesting topic, it is NOT the subject of this post. The topic of this post is “who owns social media”, but on a different scale. I’m talking about the person in charge of the social media campaigns/relationships vs the company the person works for. Let’s say I create a whole social media campaign over at Apple, I represent the company and I’m the one on the Apple twitter and facebook accounts interacting with and connecting with all of you. Does Apple own the social media campaign and the relationships that I have built or do I?
I think the answer to this question is neither and I’ll tell you why. The decision of “who owns social media” ultimately rests in the hands of the users and the customers that I have built the relationships with. Robert Scoble is a good example of this. Robert used to blog over at Microsoft and he had a pretty solid following there but when he left, so did the users. The users followed Robert over to his blog and his twitter account. So regardless of how hard Microsoft tried to keep the relationships, the ultimate choice was left with the users. It’s like dating someone you have a good connection with and then having them swap with someone else 6 months into the relationship, chances are you are going to stay with your original date.
This is why being in a social media role is so powerful. Regardless of what company you work for the social media connections and relationships you are building do not only represent the company you work for but also you as an individual, as a separate entity. If you connect with users and then shift roles, more often then not, your relationships are going to stay with you. This really is a powerful position to be in.
What’s your take on either topic:
who owns social media within a corporation (department)?
OR
who owns social media, the company, the creator, or the users?
thanks for reading
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Social media is centered around relationships and you can't own relationships. The connections that are created within social media sites and mediums don't belong to anyone other than the people being connected.
I agree. The people who created it should be the owners. But we all must be careful of some sites and their terms of service. Cause you never know when signing up to the hot new site to post your content on that you just might be signing your work away to the devil.
I think the problem with making someone responsible for the organisation's social media presence is that it can become difficult for the individual to make the rest of the organisation embrace the principles thereof equally. As such, it is possible that the social media strategy will become disjointed and may insufficiently represent the entire organisation. I think that it is important to make social media everyone's responsibility. Employees should be empowered to take ownership of the various social media types, and then represent their organisations accordingly. By imposing minor regulations on the employees (e.g. with regards to language and content restrictions etc), the organisation can ensure that the content doesn't get out of control, whilst allowing a degree of transparency. Such a strategy will help the organisation to appear more human.
Social media is no different from many other facets in life when it comes to “ownership”. The point you make about Scoble is true of many things:
* A salesman leaves a company and his best clients decide to follow. The company can't do anything if it's the clients' choice.
* A singer leaves a band – many fans will follow the singer (particularly in the tweenie boy band world)
What companies have to do is ensure they have a strong overall social media presence. Despite what people might feel, not one person – not even the social media rock stars – can know everything and be on top of every new social media app, topic or similar.
And don't leave it to one department – have strong crossovers throughout the company.
very well said tim, it's almost a bit of a philosophical topic to discuss but i think you summed it up nicely.
thanks for reading and commenting tim, always good to hear your thoughts
hey mike,
that's true, social media networks do have a pretty brutal terms of service. in fact some people are using social networks as “evil” platforms in general. I just read an article which talked about how students are sabotaging each other to get into good schools by sending schools photos of other students to make sure that they dont get in.
thanks for commenting and reading mike
hey chris,
i think the problem is scale, in a large corporation like dell or best buy there is just no way for all of the employees to get engaged in social media and corporation dont have the power or ability to enforce that. as a result there needs to either be a department or team that is responsible for carrying out social media strategies within an organization.
perhaps companies can do a better job of encouraging their employees to get involved.
thanks for commenting and reading chris!
hi danny,
thanks for the great analogies, you make some solid points there. it's true that not every social media “expert” can know all of the apps or topics out there but at the same time i dont think they need to be. I think using a core set of platforms (perhaps 3) that you have a dominant presence on and are able to update frequently, should be sufficient.
better to use a few and use them well then to use many and spread yourself thin.
thanks for reading and commenting danny, hope to hear more form you.
very well said tim, it's almost a bit of a philosophical topic to discuss but i think you summed it up nicely.
thanks for reading and commenting tim, always good to hear your thoughts
hey mike,
that's true, social media networks do have a pretty brutal terms of service. in fact some people are using social networks as “evil” platforms in general. I just read an article which talked about how students are sabotaging each other to get into good schools by sending schools photos of other students to make sure that they dont get in.
thanks for commenting and reading mike
hey chris,
i think the problem is scale, in a large corporation like dell or best buy there is just no way for all of the employees to get engaged in social media and corporation dont have the power or ability to enforce that. as a result there needs to either be a department or team that is responsible for carrying out social media strategies within an organization.
perhaps companies can do a better job of encouraging their employees to get involved.
thanks for commenting and reading chris!
hi danny,
thanks for the great analogies, you make some solid points there. it's true that not every social media “expert” can know all of the apps or topics out there but at the same time i dont think they need to be. I think using a core set of platforms (perhaps 3) that you have a dominant presence on and are able to update frequently, should be sufficient.
better to use a few and use them well then to use many and spread yourself thin.
thanks for reading and commenting danny, hope to hear more form you.
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