Social Media Integration in Organizations

This article discusses the impacts of social media integration on organizations and the importance of creating a social media policy. It explores the potential advantages and disadvantages of using social media, the impact of employee behavior on an organization's brand, and the key elements of a company's social media policy.

Running head: SOCIAL MEDIA INEGRATION IN ORGANIZATIONS
SOCIAL MEDIA INEGRATION IN ORGANIZATIONS
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author note

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SOCIAL MEDIA INEGRATION IN ORGANIZATIONS
To: Paul Morgan, CEO, Sunshine 100
From: Jane Wilson, Director of Social Media
Date: 4th January 2019
Subject: Sunshine 100’s social media policy
1. Introduction
1.1 Background
Corporations adapt themselves to the social media integrations to enhance the processes
relating tocustomer service amendments, marketing- promotions, internal communications and
corporate social responsibility(CSR). However, there are different issues that are faced by the
organization while integrating the operations with the social media platforms. Therefore, the
organizations must create a social media policy in order to regulate the activities that are
undertaken by the same.
1.2 Purpose
The purpose of undertaking the discussion is to analyze the different impacts of social media
utilization on Sunshine 100.
1.2.1 Thesis statement
The discussion will be aiming at evaluating the different impacts of social media
integration on the Sunshine 100 and the different policies that might be adhered by the
organization in order to avoid the issues relating to social media integrations.

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1.2.2 Blueprint
The discussion will be focusing on the identification of:
 Potential advantages and disadvantages encountered by organizations during the
utilization of social media
 Impact of the comments and behavior of an individual employee on the brand image of
the organization
 The major policies that might be adhered by the organization while undertaking social
media interactions
 The communication strategy that might be utilized by the management with the
stakeholders
2. What are the potential advantages and disadvantages for an organization when using
social media?
 The potential advantages of social media integration are:
Cost effective - Leonardi, Huysman and Steinfield (2013, p.16) stated that utilization of social
media platforms helps the organizations in enhancing the marketing operations of the same
through minimal capital investments. It helps the organizations in reducing the cost of processes.
It also assists organizations in regulating the price of the products and services.
Customer interaction and PR – Baruah (2012, p. 9) stated that thecustomer interactions helps
organizations in enhancing the Public relations of the same. In this relation, the utilization of the
social media channels helps organizations in perfecting the communication channels with the
different customers. It helps the organizations in maintaining the quality of the products and
services as per the requirements of the end users.

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SOCIAL MEDIA INEGRATION IN ORGANIZATIONS
 The potential disadvantages of the utilization of social media platforms are:
Ineffective utilization of the platforms- The ineffective utilization of the social media
platforms might affect the brand reputation of the organization. On the other hand, the
organization might also encounter different security concerns while undertaking the operations
through social media integrations (Tsimonis& Dimitriadis 2014, pp 332).
Difficulties in evaluation- Gray et al. (2012, p.55) stated that the organizations face difficulties
in evaluating the return on investments and the sales that are generated by the organization
through the utilization of social media platforms. The social media advertising restricts the
operations of the organization relating to the success of the processes that are undertaken by the
same.
3. What impact might an individual employee’s comments or behavior have on an
organization’s brand in the sense that it might be seen by broader and unintended
audiences?
The comments that are posted by an individual employee on a social media platform
might adversely affect the brand reputation of the organization. Picazo-Vela, Gutiérrez-Martínez
and Luna-Reyes (2012, p. 510) stated that the identification of the target audience is one of the
major steps that might be undertaken by the organization while operating in different
international markets. However, the inability of an individual employee in identifying the target
audience might result to misguidance. Trainor et al. (2014, p. 1207) stated that an individual
employee might resort to different provocative tools to instigate the audiences to make a buy of
the products or services. Therefore, it affects the organizational reputation on ethical grounds.

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4. What social media interaction should a company’s social media policy cover?
The social media policy of the organization must include the following steps:
 The organization must encourage the employees to maintain separate professional and
personal accounts.It will be helping the organization in monitoring over the interactions
that are made by the employees.
 Creating different passwords for the social media accounts for resolving the security
issues that might be faced by the same.
 The organization must provide the employees with proper training on the utilization of
social media platforms to maintain the professional approach of the same.
5. Communication strategy
Timing 29th March 2019
Audience The employees in the marketing department
Sender The CEO of the organization
Key message  Making the employees aware of the
different issues that are faced by the
organization relating to the ineffective
communication made by the employees
through the social media platforms
 Communicating to the employees the
needs of creating separate professional
and personal accounts

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 Communicating to the employees of the
training sessions that would be held by
the organization in order to enhance the
social media utilization skills
Desired outcome  Encouraging the employees to facilitate
the suitable utilization of social media
platforms
 Making the employees aware of the
different issues that are faced by the
organization to enhance the processes
Medium Meetings, seminars, emails, newsletters, dedicated
portal
Materials  The documentation of the different
processes that are planned by the
business
 Briefing the plans that are made by the
board of directors
Frequency Every month
6. Conclusion
Therefore, the discussion has helped in understanding the different impacts encountered
by organizations relating to the utilization of social media and the important points that must be
adhered by the organization’s social media policy. The communication plan, enumerated in the
discussion, will be helping to support the intention of the organization in making the relevant

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stakeholders aware of the change in the social media policy and the required step that might be
considered by the employees.

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References
Baruah, TD, 2012, Effectiveness of Social Media as a tool of communication and its potential for
technology enabled connections: A micro-level study. International Journal of Scientific and
Research Publications, vol. 2, no. 5, pp.1-10.
Gray, S, Chan, A, Clark, D & Jordan, R, 2012, Modeling the integration of stakeholder
knowledge in social–ecological decision-making: benefits and limitations to knowledge
diversity. Ecological Modelling, vol. 229, pp.88-96.
Leonardi, PM, Huysman, M & Steinfield, C, 2013, Enterprise social media: Definition, history,
and prospects for the study of social technologies in organizations. Journal of Computer-
Mediated Communication, vol. 19, no. 1, pp.1-19.
Picazo-Vela, S, Gutiérrez-Martínez, I & Luna-Reyes, LF 2012, Understanding risks, benefits,
and strategic alternatives of social media applications in the public sector. Government
information quarterly, vol. 29, no. 4, pp.504-511.
Trainor, KJ, Andzulis, JM, Rapp, A & Agnihotri, R 2014, Social media technology usage and
customer relationship performance: A capabilities-based examination of social CRM. Journal of
Business Research, vol. 67, no. 6, pp.1201-1208.
Tsimonis, G & Dimitriadis, S 2014, Brand strategies in social media. Marketing Intelligence &
Planning, vol. 32, no.3, pp.328-344.