To what degree should we try to control social media?

You are being both sensible and a little over-controlling. Better to start that way than being completely loose!

Being a natural control-freak myself, I can totally relate to your concerns and questions, and have had to come to terms with the fact that any attempt to control a conversation or community online will stifle it. Trying to control the interactions on social media is like inviting a group of lively, intelligent, like-minded people to a dinner party and then giving them rules about what they can and can't talk about. If you provide a platform or home for a community of people (such as a Facebook group), then you can’t start playing Big Brother with it.

In a presentation I heard him give about community online, Pete Miller from Woolly Mammoth Theater Company in Washington DC said "Embrace criticism more than praise". He explained that although this is not easy to do, it builds credibility and you’ll find that defenders within the community will emerge. He says "do it, don't fake it".

In fact, I myself have experienced a fascinating phenomenon when an online global community I belong to, made up of very independent-minded individuals, broke away completely from the host site (after misguided attempts were made to censor the community’s conversations) and re-formed with all of its original members on a new site. The entire community just upped sticks and relocated – it was incredible to witness.

So in order to allow the conversation to thrive, you need to be prepared to accept honesty and – as a potential result – negative criticism or comment.  But if it’s hosted by you, you have a chance to respond and listen.

On the other hand, although you want to be able to give your audiences freedom for frank discussion, it is important to maintain a degree of control and to be able to potentially avoid unfortunate situations.  That is where your internal policy comes in. This can cover things such as acceptable subject matter in status updates, who is responsible, frequency of updates, tone of voice, response times to comments, etc.

There are advantages and disadvantages to allowing multiple team members to have permission to update. On the positive side it shares the load, helps to keep the sites updated and maintained, creates team ownership and reduces risk (if the key person leaves the organisation, you have back-up). However, it does open up the doors to a slightly looser approach, so more effort has to be put into policies, training and monitoring; and you lose the clarity of the voice and particular personality, as well as clear accountability and ownership.

I would love to hear the views and experiences of others.

Vicki Allpress Hill Connecting audiences to the arts va@vickiallpress.com

Hi Robert

You make some really interesting and very valid points.

I agree totally about the marketing goldmine! Could we have even imagined such access to information and audiences in the past? I love your comment "now you can hardly stop the flow"! It's so true.

In terms of exceeding expectations - it always amazes me how easy it is to do this. Really. People are just so amazed to get a human response to a vent or a query. If it's actually prompt, helpful and empathetic they are generally extremely responsive. Most people just want to be listened to.

Which brings me to your first point. How frustrating to share your opinion with an organisation, only to be discretely silenced! It is so important for us to acknowledge, accept and maybe even learn from (!) views that are not our own or we don't necessarily want to hear. I have a philosophy that if someone is feeling something negative about you, whether you choose to listen or not, they are still feeling negative.

Social media and Web 2.0 tools really do give us a chance to be real, to hear what people are saying about us, and to start interacting in a genuine and honest way with our audiences. We will be respected for it.

My colleague Josie and I attended a Marketing Association 'Brainy Breakfast' at which Air New Zealand presented on their social media strategy. They were refreshingly and courageously honest, sharing a story about a Grab-a-Seat campaign which crashed their website because it was so popular. They started to receive negative gripes on their Twitter page. So one member of their team posted a tweet - "AAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH" (or similar!) Within minutes the responses turned to those of support. "At least it's a website and not a plane" one of their followers stated.

If you show that you are human and make mistakes, and demonstrate that you are willing to admit it and learn, your audience will love you for it.

I think social media is making us all more honest - do you agree?

Vicki

Vicki Allpress Hill Connecting audiences to the arts va@vickiallpress.com

Okay, looking back, I see the question was about honesty and I went off on a tangent about Mamet's confidence tricksters.  Not quite where I meant to go on that one!  But I think approaching an audience with respect and honesty leads to honesty and respect in return.  THAT's what I meant to say...give what you want to receive, start in the way that you want to go on, reap what you sow, etc.
R!

Exactly.  It's hard to talk about photography at the best of times, but in 140 characters...well, I'd just be posting a lot of links to images anyway.  Which isn't exactly Twitter's strong point!

Mamet's a genius.  Try any of these - 'Writing in Restaurants', 'Three Uses of the Knife: On the Nature and Purpose of Drama', 'True and False: Heresy and Common Sense for the Actor', or 'Bambi vs. Godzilla: On the Nature, Purpose, and Practice of the Movie Business' - all good libraries should have them!  (And of course everyone should see the film of Glengarry Glen Ross at least once in their lives.  Pacino. Lemmon. Spacey.  I rest my case.)
R

Simon, thanks for sharing your thoughts and your honest case study - bravo!

I stumbled across Simon at some recent social networking events and online on Twitter, and I can say he really is someone to listen to and to watch - he is making a big impact here.

Thanks for turning my rather dry word "policy" into something much more appealing! I like the idea of having the whole team share in the creating of this.

Simon makes a very, very important point, which really is one of the key drivers behind this social media phenomenon: "the years of mass-produced messages are over".

This case study teaches us a lot, and congratulations for being someone hugely creative and ambitious, who continues to push boundaries - we in the arts sector can relate to the courage needed for this.

I loved these two quotes, which I think are very relevant the frequent question I receive (someone asked me just yesterday) "but what if we open ourselves up to negative criticism in such a public forum?":

"We’d rather be too ambitious, and make mistakes, than never try anything at all."

"Controversy works. If we had created a safe, normal event, it wouldn’t have received the attention it did. Yes, we made a mistake, but responding to that mistake gave us a platform to explain ourselves. And we can now assure our clients who face misrepresentation and hostility, we can relate."

Vicki Allpress Hill Connecting audiences to the arts va@vickiallpress.com