MNG81001 Assessment: Developing a Social Media Policy for Business

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Sunshine 100's social media policy, examining the advantages and disadvantages of social media in the workplace, its impact on the organization's brand image, and the development of effective communication strategies. It discusses how social media can enhance employee engagement and facilitate communication but also poses risks such as reduced productivity and security breaches. The report highlights the importance of a well-defined social media policy to guide employee behavior and protect the organization's reputation. The communication strategy section outlines key elements such as timing, audience, sender, key message, desired outcome, medium, materials, and frequency to ensure effective dissemination of the policy. The analysis concludes that social media has become an integral part of organizational communication, requiring careful management and clear guidelines to maximize its benefits while mitigating potential risks.

To: Paul Morgan, CEO, Sunshine 100
From: Jane Wilson, Director of Social Media
Date: 14th January 2019
Subject: Sunshine 100’s social media policy
The working culture of an organisation has changed due to the increasing use of technology.
The use of social media and internet has changed the mode of communication. Social media
has changed the way of communication. In this memo the negative consequences faced by
the company due to social media is discussed. The advantages and disadvantages of social
media are also analysed and the development of social media policies are listed.
Advantages and Disadvantages
The advantage of social media for the organisation is that it allows cooperating activities for
the organisation. The corporation covers managing the meeting, creating awareness and
taking opinions from employee all over the globe (Chung, Andreev, Benyoucef, Duane and
O’Reilly, 2017). Social media is a best way to improve employee engagement which in turn
improves employee retention. Social media helps in connecting the employee from different
location and help in coordinating between virtual teams (Chadwick and Dennis, 2017). It is
also useful for clearing the queries and concerns irrespective of time zones and distance. The
benefit of social media is it offers feedback and allows testing of new ideas. They are
beneficial in implementing all the internal as well as external policies. Social media keep
employee updated about all the internal as well as external strategies (Hänska Ahy, 2016).
Social media assist the employees by developing personal relations. The array of social
media offer marketing services through which wider audience can be captured. It also allows
the organisation to communicate with the audience quickly.

Some of the disadvantages of social media at the workplace is it might hinder the
productivity of employee as there are various ways of distraction. The other issue is security
breach as it gives access to unauthorised user and increases the chance of information
leakage (Zheng and Yu, 2016). There are chances that strategies of business get leaked and
might be used by the competitors. The other barriers that are faced by social media are risk
of privacy and can cause breach of integrity and confidentiality. The only issue that is faced
by social media is leakage of sensitive information (Roshan, Warren and Carr, 2016).
Social media use and organisations brand image
The impact of social media affects the brand image of an organisation. Social media can be
used for marketing and advertising of services offered by the company. The positive impact
of social media is it offers ways for efficient and effective communication. Social media can
be used for brand image as it is a platform for advertisement of services so that more clients
get attracted towards it. Id customers have given positive feedback this will improve brand
image and will allow other customers to select this (Roshan, Warren and Carr, 2016). The
negative feedback can spoil the brand image as it can causes conflicts and can cause loss of
information. The brand image can be improved by choosing the right network through which
customers can be aligned towards the objective. If visual branding is overlooked it can also
be misused and can create false profile for the organisation (Hamoud, Tarhini, Akour and
Al-Salti, 2016). Social media is important for business marketing and branding as it builds
awareness by boosting the visibility among customers and reaching t wider audience in little
time and effort. Social media platforms also provide support in creaking down the barriers
between companies and their customers (Cawsey and Rowley, 2016). Social media is a
crucial part for business marketing and advertisement as the objective is to reach more
audience through social media platform. Social networks are one of the fastest growing

industries in the world and it is one of the reasons that showcase growth for the organisation.
It increases brand awareness and attract new customers (Panagiotopoulos, Shan, Barnett,
Regan and McConnon, 2015).
Communication strategy
It is important to create a communication strategy so that employees in the organisation
become aware about the social media strategies used.
 Timing- The awareness is spread on immediate basis
 Audience- The members who are part of organisation are the audience and the
management department also.
 Sender- The communication team is responsible for sending such messages
 Key Message- Importance of social media and its impact in the organisation.
 Desired Outcome- The outcome for this is designing social media policies for the
organisation (Stamati, Papadopoulos and Anagnostopoulos, 2015).
 Medium- It is transferred through the means of email and memos.
 Materials- The rules and regulations designed by the government and code of
conduct.
 Frequency- It needs to be monitored and updated regularly.
From all the above discussion it can be said that social media has become a significant
part of an organization (Alalwan, Rana, Dwivedi and Algharabat, 2017). In this study
the impact of social media in a positive as well as negative way is discussed. These
policies were needed to show the direction to employees in terms of use of social media.
These policies are applicable to every member in the organization.

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