Past Five

Social Media Best Practices in Staffing

Know Your Objectives

Before embarking on the rollercoaster ride that is social media, be sure to know what you’re aiming for. Are you looking to get sales leads? Communicate with candidates? Increase brand awareness? Get feedback from your clients and candidates?

• Whatever your objectives may be, be sure to clarify them before launching your social media campaign.
• In the staffing industry, it is wise to utilize social media to accomplish multiple goals, some focusing on business development and others on customer service and marketing, to create an effective social media strategy that supports all corners of your business.

Brand Yourself

The look and feel of your company’s social media campaign is just as important as the colors and content of your sales brochure, and the usability of your Web site.

• Before you begin communicating with candidates and clients via mediums like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or a company blog, spend time ensuring your brand is accurately portrayed.
• Driving candidates to a generic Twitter homepage will do little to promote brand awareness. Instead, utilize your Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn page to portray your company culture and services. For example, customize your Twitter background with pictures of company events, and utilize your profile to highlight services areas and drive traffic to your Web site.
• If employees outside of the marketing team are informally utilizing social media, be sure the look and feel of their communications are consistent with the company, as a whole. Provide content for employees to utilize in their profiles and pages so your formal marketing campaign isn’t belittled by a co-worker’s poorly executed communications. Social media exposes an organization to the public like never before, and before you go live, make sure you, and your colleagues, are representing your company well. 

Give More Than You Take

Like any healthy relationship, a successful social media campaign requires two-way communication.

• Give to your audience as much, if not more, as you hope to receive from them.
• The key to a successful social media campaign is to interact, really interact, with visitors, while at the same time being well-versed in the conversation going on outside your four walls. For example, share links to articles on Twitter your network might find interesting, give candid feedback on company news, answer questions and post helpful presentations on LinkedIn, respond to visitor comments on your company blog, post job openings on your company’s Facebook page or refer the community to other useful Web sites or blogs.
• The more you give, the more you will receive when it comes to social media, and spending time thoughtfully adding value for your candidates and clients will create the foundation for a lasting and fruitful relationship, online and off.

Manage Your Community

Social media is an open forum that allows direct and real-time contact between companies and consumers. However, with this free-flowing communication comes vulnerability.

• Your company Facebook page or blog can be an effective vehicle for brand awareness and positive reviews, but it can also be an easy target for disgruntled job seekers or unsatisfied clients. First, expect negative feedback; you can’t please everyone.
• However, when a harmful comment arises on your blog or Facebook page, have an action plan to remedy the issue, quickly. Ask yourself questions like, “Does this warrant a response?”, “Does it speak to a serious issue within the company that should be addressed?”, “Was there a misunderstanding of our services and process?”, “Does this warrant a response? If so, privately or publicly?”, “Is this a misrepresentation of our services, and if so, should we simply delete it?”.
• The ease of interaction that an open forum allows can be a powerful communication tool, however, be prepared for all types of feedback and respond swiftly and intelligently to negativity. 

Measure Your Success

After spending several months regularly utilizing social media, re-evaluate your progress.

• Which resources have been most useful? Are there areas in which we are falling short? Are our efforts moving us towards our objectives? If so, can we expand our goals? If not, on what do we need to focus to achieve them?
• Like any business plan, the social media return on investment must be measured. If you aren’t frequently evaluating your efforts and analyzing how they are contributing to the company’s ultimate goals, you are missing the purpose of a social media marketing campaign. 

Keep it Clean

Google yourself.  Go ahead, we'll wait...

 

What did you find?  Anything good?  Anything bad?

 

If you discovered something your mother wouldn't be proud of, it’s time for change.  If you're an active job seeker, you need to clean up your online profiles immediately. 

With the unemployment rate approaching 10%, job seekers can't afford to miss out on exciting job opportunities due to the content of their on-line profiles.  Whether you have a profile on Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, Flickr or Twitter- content is king and it better be clean. 

1. Privacy- You wouldn't leave your doors and windows of your home open all day, leaving it vulnerable for anyone to enter and snoop around.  So why would you let anyone view your online profile?  Social networking sites offer various degrees of privacy.  It's easy, but so many job seekers neglect to take advantage of this setting.  Block or limit users who aren't your friends from gaining access to your profiles. 
2. Content - Your online profile can show friends and connections a broader perspective of who you are, what you are doing right now, what books you read this summer, what your interests are, etc.  When presented well, this can portray you positively as a person.  However, when the content presented is negative, it can drastically impact how a colleague or employer feels about you.
3. Photos - Yes, visiting Cancun during your senior year was fun, but potential employers are going to think otherwise when they see the photos.  Untag and block any photos that may be inappropriate.  Upload photos that will strengthen your personality, not show the world how much you love being the center of attention.
4. Posts – Once you author a post on any social networking profile, you cannot go back.  Despite the ability to “delete” the content later, you have no control over who has already seen the material, commented about it, or forwarded the post/image to someone else.
5. Etiquette - Many of you have probably been friended by moms and dads of your close friends, and dare we say a grandparent or two?!?!  Yikes!  But remember “friending” a potential employer isn’t a professional way to go about getting hired.  Save the MySpace and Facebook friending for close friends, coworkers and colleagues that you have already established solid face-to-face relationships with.    

There is no denying that the Internet is one of today’s primary communication tools.  The popularity of social media has grown exponentially in the last several years.  Twitter, for example, grew from 1.6 million users in 2008 to more than 32 million today.  No one is expected to stay off the Internet, but people should be savvy social networkers while still maintaining a professional reputation online. 

 

We continuously urge our candidates to keep their networking profiles clean.  Think about it, you wouldn’t want to risk losing out on a new career because of the scandalous photos your friend tagged and the 37 comments that you made on them about how drunk and wild and irresponsible you all were on your summer vacation.  Your personal life is all your own, but employers, universities, and organizations see is put online, so keep your image clean.

 

 

 

Posted by guest author Bobby Wilson

Facebook

That's right, I joined Facebook. You can see my full profile here.

It's actually a really good site for networking, but for some reason I sort of feel like I've gone back to college by joining. Which, as my colleague pointed out, wouldn't be that bad. We could grab a six pack, hang out on the old, raggedy couch on the front porch of the fraternity house and talk people into joining us as they walk by. Actually, forget the six pack, let's make it a keg.

So, stop on by my Facebook profile if you feel like joining in the fun. Friends are welcome.