Shopping for Ideas in Your Own (Company) Backyard
In an earlier post, I mentioned how important it is to gather your best minds to help manage a crisis. Of course it’s not a bad idea to enlist the smarts of all your colleagues as you navigate the social media path not to mention all the other ways your company communicates with the outside world. I’ve always thought that public relations is more than just one department or a team responsible for communicating a firm’s mission. PR seeps out of every crevice in an organization whether people call is public relations or not. And just as employees can erode a company’s PR efforts by posting something inappropriate on their Facebook pages (a photo with a drink in hand at a company event; sometimes those don’t go over very well with the public or HR) staffers can also make some fabulous contributions to the workplace, often in ways that a structured public relations plan can’t.
Here some ways to get everyone involved in raising a company’s image and visibility:
Make it easy for people to make suggestions. Unless employees know that their opinions really matter they may not risk offering them up. Provide a means for them to voice their ideas. Set up an email address, place an old-fashioned idea box in the lobby or kitchen, schedule a short meeting (standing room only—this way the meeting will go fast) during which all ideas are welcome and written onto a white board for everyone to see.
Encourage everyone to share their social media smarts. One of the greatest aspects of social media is the prospect of discovering some new way to use it, some incredibly creative way of sharing information in ways that turn that info into something truly memorable. I love, for instance, that a few weeks ago, after recognizing a woman in a photo accompanying an article in Parade I could go to her Facebook page and join in the conversation and basically acknowledge the solid commitment this woman (an old childhood friend of mine) and her husband have made to their autistic daughter.
Be clear. A lot of companies, large and small, are grappling with social media policies. You may be in the same boat, but that doesn’t mean you can’t do both—create procedures for appropriate and responsible social media “behavior” and encourage participation in helping the company use social media as a means to successfully promote the firm.
And speaking of social media, please follow me on Twitter @LeslieLevine
