The finance industry is now starting to realise the power of engaging with customers through social media, according to James Leavesley, CEO, CrowdControlHQ.
Although praising social media as a brilliant engagement tool, Leavesley has warned that the instantaneous nature of social media could prove to be a double-edged sword.
Leavesley comments: "There was a time when a company’s ‘two sets of eyes’ policy meant sanity-checking one or two pieces of print advertising each week."
"Today, companies are regularly tasked with monitoring several hundred social media interactions every day, putting huge pressure on already stretched specialist departments in terms of managing workflow and information security."
"The sheer volume of interaction and the need for immediate response demands strict protocols over social media risk management and compliance."
Leavesley anticipates that the soon to be published FCA social media guidelines will be likely to cover the entire digital environment (based on the draft published in 2014) including blogs, microblogs, client forums, images and video sharing platforms.
Leavesley then outlines the top tips to ensure social media success in the finance sector, including:
1. Ensure any social media policy is consistent with company employment contracts
2. The policy should be clear on the boundaries and expectations associated with personal social media accounts
3. Have centralised control of social media accounts with full audit trails to minimise risk
4. Communicate guidelines for social media engagement clearly to all employees to avoid confusion and encourage consistency
5. Establish a review of all outbound content – If carried out in-house, assign distinct roles and foster cross-function collaboration.
6. Keep messages clear and fair and take care to ensure they are not misleading (just like all other forms of advertising) – Don’t over-sell products, use social media to improve the way you do business, acting as a guru in your field
7. Openly answer questions from peers to reflect a spirit of collaboration and strengthen the reputation of your industry
8. Maintain adequate records of important social media communication and demonstrate a proven ability to manage third party posts from clients
9. Consider investing in an on-shore social media risk management and compliance platform to ensure data storage is compliant and to generate accurate audit trails
10. Ensure that any management tools used have been robustly penetration tested and can evidence industry security standards. Systems should demonstrate that all employees (who potentially access data) have been security checked and are effective in the event of a problem or security breach.
Leavesley concludes by saying: "Social media should be considered a huge opportunity not a threat. Those in the finance sector need to take the bull by the horns and not hold back on investing in social channels for fear of falling foul of regulations, incurring hefty fines or damaging their corporate reputations."
"Now is the time take action."
