This week I’ve been thinking a lot of social sharing and the self-censorship I practice when it comes to talking about brand names on my social profiles.
One of the opportunities gained in working at a large PR firm — with capabilities spanning strategic communications, branding, media relations, digital, social, grassroots, publicity, media training and more — is that every single product, company, brand and service is a potential client.
It’s difficult to name a company that wouldn’t benefit from public relations in some form, and because of the sheer size of a firm like ours — with about 2,000 employees working in offices around the globe — it’s impossible to know the current client roster at any given time.
Beyond current clients, it’s even more improbable for an individual to know which brands were previous clients in the past or may be potential clients in the future.
So where does that leave me, as an employee of a large PR firm but also a normal consumer, when I have perfectly normal interactions with brands and want to say something online?
I’ve boiled down my personal policy to two rules of thumb when posting to social networks:
- Never mention a brand name that is a client without disclosure.
- Never mention competitors of clients or potential clients. Period.
Although a normal consumer has the right to praise or vent about experiences with a big box store or a service company, I’m not a normal consumer. I’m a paid consultant who lives and breathes the marketplace in which I counsel clients. With that qualification comes a responsibility not to sabotage current or future client opportunities with my social accounts.
Does this self-censorship mean I’m missing out on engagement opportunities and the human expression experience? Perhaps. But not a lot of the brand-related content that happens online is productive anyway.
Beyond the client implications and while some “social media strategists” have made a living critiquing others’ efforts in the social media space, those of us building and executing social marketing programs know mistakes happen. We should give each other a break. With all the focus on brands, it’s easy to forget our peers are the ones behind some of the biggest success and largest failures in this new and emerging social marketing space.
A wise colleague once encouraged me to take a “Do Unto Others” approach when it comes to publicly commenting on crises of the day, and I should probably add that to my rules of thumb.
You never known when 140 characters could make or break potential revenue. And you can retweet me on that.
Do you have certain things you won’t say online? What are your personal rules?