Social media governance policy examples

Examples of social media workflow to review and respond to online comments about a brand

A while ago, I received this question by email, it describes a common concern of managing brand reputation given the growth in consumer comments in social media:

"I would be interested in any case studies or examples of controlling social media discussions, especially in a case of negative flow".

The questioner went on to explain that in her case, in the health sector, and many health and looks treatments etc. create a lot of social media input. Experiences, questions, complaints etc. Also, in some cases, competitors are creating negative posts. She explains that example is where companies have faced non-satisfied customers that are creating a lot of noise in social media.

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Example flowcharts for managing social media marketing governance

To define how to manage the workflow for responding to social media I suggest drawing up a comment response flow chart like this classic Dell governance process which was presented by Kerry Bridge when she managedial media communications for Dell in Europe. You can read the case study of Dell's social media journey at that time - it's a little dated now, but still a great summary of the essence of a social media strategy.  

@RichardSedley, one of our expert commentators at Smart Insights reminded me that this is only a derivation of the widely shared USAF response diagram.  It's still excellent though.

See whether you can spot the difference between the USAF and Dell examples!

You can also review other examples of social media policies at the Social Media Governance database - you can select by sector - there is a good range of examples from brands and charities. Note that some of these may not have been updated for some time, but the structures remain valid.

For a further example of a planned approach to managing social media governance, Expert members of Smart Insights can review the example social media plan template prepared by Miriam Shirav. This focuses more on managing outbound communications through status updates.