There is no doubt that business use of social media has the ability to introduce many benefits to enterprise. The list goes on – providing platform for companies to showcase engaging content for strong brand presence, increasing brand loyalty (53% of Americans who follow brands on social are more loyal to those brands ), reduced advertising cost (Grinberg, 2012 ), access to valuable market insight statistics in social media expressions (in the form of likes, tweets, shares) for relevant consumer data and using it to make corrective decisions.
Examples of positive & engaging content in expanding brand exposure & presence
However, behind the merry also lies controversies surrounding its use in business. Generally, these controversies are concerned with ethical issues such as abusing freedom-of-speech in social media, privacy issues “52% reported an increase in malware attacks due to employee use of social media” (Websense, 2011), and most prominently, integrity risk.
Integrity Risk (IR)
I believe IR is the biggest ethical issue as “integrity is synonymous with trust” (Shira Levine from Business Insider) in the business world. Trust is a delicate subject – it takes a lot of effort and times to build up trust between a brand and their customers, yet it can be destroyed within a single social media post. To company, reputation and relationships are all you really have!
Getting compliance to established policy from the whole organization proves to be challenging as even with formal and written policy, employees in charge of company’s social media account may still post irrelevant or even offensive content to their hearts’ content, that clearly “undermine company commitment to ethical practices and expose it to integrity risk”. Once integrity is damaged, it is almost impossible to restore fully.
Case Study: Nestle (2010)
A company that suffered severe integrity damage is Nestle, when they stir up angry mob with unprofessional replies to consumers’ negative feedbacks in the wake of Greenpeace campaign.
To the horror of social media users everywhere, Nestle’s replies were filled with sarcasm. (Posts screenshot from here. Compiled by me). How will you feel if your concerns are addressed this way?
The poor Public Relation (PR) management conducted by Nestle’s administer clearly violates Nestle’s Corporate Business Principles that states employees must “avoid any conduct that could damage or risk Nestlé or its reputation (Nestle, 2007 “Code of business conduct“)
It is a misdeed conducted by a single employee, yet it leaves Nestle’s reputation as a company staggering. Receiving backlash after backlash, it has embodied itself as a brand with social media screw-up.
It’s PR 101: Don’t insult your customers. And in PR 2010, mind your manners in public forums — especially those expressly created for fans of your company! It may be true that there’s no such thing as bad press, but there’s definitely bad social networking — and this [Nestle] is a prime example.
(Headline screenshot from the following article)
(Headline screenshot from the following article)
Learning from this case study, I believe company should make use of social media to the fullest in caring about customers’ well being – addressing their complaints and concerns professionally, instead of taking defensive stance. This also reflects on the importance of management in managing the company’s posts.
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References:
Convince & Convert, 2016 “53% of Americans Who Follow Brands in Social Are More Loyal To Those Brands” [online] written by
Discussion panel, 2014 “Social Media: To like or not to like” [online] (Last visited: 11/11/2016)
One million by One million Blog, 2011 “New Threats Bring New Opportunities For Websense, Symantec” [online] (Last visited: 11/11/2016)
Shira Levine, 2010 “The Importance of Keeping Your Integrity in Business” [online] (Last visited: 11/11/2016)
Institute of Business Ethics, 2011 “The Ethical Challenges of Social Media” [online] (Last visited: 11/11/2016)
The Guardian, 2010 “Nestlé hit by Facebook “anti-social” media surge” [online] (Last visited: 11/11/2016)
Nestle, 2007 “Code of business conduct” [online] (Last visited: 11/11/2016)
Musings & Thoughts 
Hi Adelene,
Thanks for highlighting on the issue of integrity risk and how detrimental it could be to businesses if one does not handle the situation tactfully. According to Financial Times, the Greenpeace campaign launched a social media attack because Nestle has been sourcing palm oil from an unsustainable supplier. Upon viral outbreak of criticisms, Nestle initially forced for the video’s to be taken down as citing for its copyright.
https://www.ft.com/content/90dbff8a-3aea-11e2-b3f0-00144feabdc0
I believe the “severe integrity damage” done was not because of the insensitive remarks the employee made, as it only further triggered the outrage amongst consumers. Rather, Nestle’s reputation was damaged due to engaging unsustainable suppliers.
I agree it is essential to manage the company’s posts as it concerns professionalism. Social media is a good platform to engage relations with consumers, however do you think it is necessarily important to “address their complaints”, when more time and effort could have been spent on creating better contents and strategies?
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Hello, Xinlin! Thank you for pointing it out. Indeed, just as you said, I agree with you that the beginning of Nestle’s reputation downfall was due to unsustainable supplier.
However, I believe how a company respond to these concerns (crisis management) are the true determinant in maintaining trust & integrity. Hence, in answering your question, I would like to draw a parallel between BreadTalk’s 2015 Soy Milk and Nestle’s 2010 Supplier scandal. Both are similar in a way the scandal draws concern regarding their source of products, and ended with companies releasing official apology statements and taking corrective actions.
However, the stark differences is that BreadTalk did not engage aggressively to the negative onslaught in social media and they choose to honestly admit their mistake instead of being defensive and starts a condescending chain of replies, like what Nestle did. Honesty goes a long way in mollifying irate people as it puts a human face to the company and shows critics that they are listening. In my personal opinion, Breadtalk is able to restore their integrity way further than what Nestle did.
Therefore, I believe it is necessarily important to address complaints FAST and SHORT. This can be in the form of one long apology post, where they can issue an apology to show they care for customer’s concerns, and consequently lay out their plans in restoring integrity (this can be the in the form of sponsoring relevant non-profit events, or switching to more reliable suppliers and more). Afterwards, let the incident pass. Fast decision-making relates to company avoiding on wasting time and able to allocate more time for better contents and strategies.
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