Sunshine 100 Social Media Policy: A Comprehensive Report

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MANAGEMENT COMMUNICATION
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To: Paul Morgan, CEO, Sunshine 100
From: Jane Wilson, Director of Social Media
Date: 5th May 2019
Subject: Sunshine 100’s social media policy
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Contextualization/Background
Usage of social media has been increasing rapidly due to which it has become a vital marketing
tool for the business. Social media helps the business in developing a positive and strong brand
image in the global business environment.
Purpose
The fundamental purpose of this report implies as the analysis of specific events on social media
due to which Sunshine 100 had to deal with the negative consequences.
Thesis Statement
The social media policy plays a crucial role in shaping a positive brand image.
Blueprint
This report contains the critical challenges faced by the business due to social media tools and
traditional communication tools along with the influence of an employee's social media
behaviour on the organisation's brand. Also, it identifies social media interactions and a
communication plan for social media policy.
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1. An organisation has to deal with specific challenges while implementing social
media tools; however; these challenges are different and similar to that of
traditional communication to some extent.
Traditional channels of communication for business are highly expensive while social media
tools are less costly. Traditional communication channels come with the challenge of less
interaction with the audience whereas social media tools are more useful in gaining effective
interaction. It observes that traditional channels are more rigid and due to this, change integration
is difficult. On the other hand, social media tools provide a significant degree of flexibility to the
business to make changes easily (Lepkowska-White, 2017). Apart from one-way
communication, traditional communication makes it difficult to measure the marketing strategy.
With social media tools, a business can attain feedback and collects data for measuring the
effectiveness of the strategy. Social media tools help in conveying a large amount of information
in little time to the massive audience whether targeted or not. Traditional channels make
communication a time-consuming process for the business (Poba-Nzaou et al., 2017).
However, developing a communication strategy and selection of suitable tools implies the
critical challenges for both social media and traditional communication. Developing a healthy
relationship using social media tools becomes difficult for the business due to the intense
competition. Likewise, in traditional communication, a company does not get much opportunity
to interact with the audience (Wamala, 2014). Social media tools involve specific challenges
such as measurement of ROI of social media, development of differentiated content, and training
the employees into the brand ambassadors of the business.
2. Employee behaviour on social media and organisational reputation shares a healthy
relationship in the external business environment.
With the social media behaviour of an employee, the organisation might affect to a large extent
concerning the brand or reputation development. The positive behaviour of an employee on
social media can assist the organisation in shaping a healthy or positive brand image. Contrary to
this, the brand image could harm severely on social media. It is because there is a strong
connection between the employee social media behaviour and the organisational brand. In the
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external world, employees are the representatives of the organisation whose behaviour moulds
the brand image of the organisation accordingly. It is evident that with social media, a business
can convey its message to a large number of audiences with little time investment. It is one of the
key reasons business uses social media tools (Engel et al., 2013). In the case of Sunshine 100, the
organisation had to deal with the negative consequences due to the post by one of the employees
on Facebook. It becomes difficult for the organisation for recovering the brand image perception
of the audience after getting harmed. Therefore, it becomes vital for organisations to have
effective and strict social media policy.
3. Social media interaction that Sunshine100’s social media policy should cover
There is a significant role of social media policy of the company, and therefore it should cover
all the vital elements. Sunshine 100 social media policy should include the following-
Rules and regulations- The social media policy of Sunshine100 should ensure to use all the
relevant laws and regulations including fair use, copyright, defamation, and financial disclosure.
The management of Sunshine 100 should develop a code of conduct and ethics. All the
employees will be binding to follow all the rules and regulations rigorously. There must be clear
guidelines for handling the sensitive areas particularly concerning the laws and regulations of the
company. The norms related to the confidentiality must cover in the policy and no disclosure of
company's information either regarding its products or of any other type can be made by
employees or any other member of the company (Obar, and Wildman, 2015).
Roles and responsibilities- The policy of social media must cover the roles and responsibilities
of each designation, and there should be an allocation of work as per the capabilities and
experience of the employees. For handling social media the roles and responsibilities include
providing services to customers, providing training to the employees, legal and security
concerns, approval of message, social engagements and monitoring (Youmans, and York, 2012).
Accountability- The social media should cover that there should not be any type of offensive,
illicit, or insensitive material to post on the social media site or page of the company. Each
employee will be held accountable for the acts or the posts made by him. It is essential for the
company Sunshine 100 to give proper and regular training to its employees regarding this, and
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adequate monitoring and control should get exercised for avoiding the issues that can negatively
affect the Sunshine's goodwill (Meske, and Stieglitz, 2013).
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4. Communication Strategy
Timing 10 AM to 6 PM will be the working hours
Audience Company's managers and employees are the audiences
Sender Adobe Williams- Director of social media policy, will send the social
media policy to all the staff and he will also make any amendments
required.
For alteration in the employment contrast- Human resource manager
Key message Social media policies and norms and any modifications will also
communicate
Desired outcome  Company's employees to evaluate based on the social media
policies
 Guiding the employees and managers
 Keeping the company's information secured
Medium E-mails
Materials MS Word, Outlook, and PowerPoint
frequency Quarterly
With this report, Sunshine 100 would be aware of the significance of having a strict social media
policy so that such social media events could prohibit. Sunshine 100 must consider fundamental
social media interactions while developing a social media policy.
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Conclusion
Hence, it can conclude that there is the significant role of social media which can impact
company both positively and negatively as the brand awareness and brand reputation of the
company can be created or destroyed through it. Social media is a better channel of
communication in comparison to the traditional communication channel as the company can
communicate with a large amount of audience through social media. It is essential for the
company to cover specific rule and regulations, laws, roles and responsibilities, and
accountability in its social media policies.
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References
 Engel, Jan, Tran, Caroline, Pavlek, Natalie, Blankenberg, Nina & Meyer, Anton 2013,
‘The Impact of Friendliness on Brand Perception’, Marketing Review St. Gallen, vol. 30,
no. 6, pp. 82–95.
 Lepkowska-White, Elzbieta 2017, ‘Exploring the Challenges of Incorporating Social
Media Marketing Strategies in the Restaurant Business’, Journal of Internet Commerce,
vol. 16, no. 3, pp. 323–342.
 Meske, C. and Stieglitz, S., 2013, June. Adoption and use of social media in small and
medium-sized enterprises. In a working conference on practice-driven research on
enterprise transformation (pp. 61-75). Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.
 Obar, J.A. and Wildman, S.S., 2015. Social media definition and the governance
challenge-an introduction to the special issue. Obar, JA, and Wildman, S.(2015). Social
media definition and the governance challenge: An introduction to the special issue.
Telecommunications policy, 39(9), pp.745-750.
 Poba-Nzaou, Placide, Lemieux, Nathalie, Beaupré, Daniel & Uwizeyemungu, Sylvestre
2016, ‘Critical challenges associated with the adoption of social media: A Delphi of a
panel of Canadian human resources managers’, Journal of Business Research, vol. 69,
no. 10, pp. 4011–4019.
 Wamala, Caroline 2014, ‘Theater, Gender, and Development: Merging Traditional and
New Media to Address Communication Challenges in Uganda’, Signs, vol. 39, no. 4.
 Youmans, W.L. and York, J.C., 2012. Social media and the activist toolkit: User
agreements, corporate interests, and the information infrastructure of modern social
movements. Journal of Communication, 62(2), pp.315-329.
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