{"id":132,"date":"2018-06-14T19:04:36","date_gmt":"2018-06-14T19:04:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/bus3060\/chapter\/ch07-9\/"},"modified":"2026-02-14T22:48:23","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T22:48:23","slug":"ch07-9","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/bus3060\/chapter\/ch07-9\/","title":{"raw":"7.9 Get SMART: The Social Media Awareness and Response Team","rendered":"7.9 Get SMART: The Social Media Awareness and Response Team"},"content":{"raw":"
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Learning Objectives<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n<\/header>\r\n

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After studying this section you should be able to do the following:<\/p>\r\n\r\n

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  1. Illustrate several examples of effective and poor social media use.<\/li>\r\n \t
  2. Recognize the skills and issues involved in creating and staffing an effective social media awareness and response team (SMART).<\/li>\r\n \t
  3. List and describe key components that should be included in any firm\u2019s social media policy.<\/li>\r\n \t
  4. Understand the implications of ethical issues in social media such as \u201csock puppetry\u201d and \u201c[pb_glossary id=\"655\"]astroturfing[\/pb_glossary]\u201d and provide examples and outcomes of firms and managers who used social media as a vehicle for dishonesty.<\/li>\r\n \t
  5. List and describe tools for monitoring social media activity relating to a firm, its brands, and staff.<\/li>\r\n \t
  6. Understand issues involved in establishing a social media presence, including the embassy approach, openness, and staffing.<\/li>\r\n \t
  7. Discuss how firms can engage and respond through social media, and how companies should plan for potential issues and crises.<\/li>\r\n<\/ol>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n \r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n

    For an example of how outrage can go viral, consider Dave Carroll1<\/sup>. The Canadian singer-songwriter was traveling with his band Sons of Maxwell on a United Airlines flight from Nova Scotia to Nebraska when, during a layover at Chicago\u2019s O\u2019Hare International Airport, Carroll saw baggage handlers roughly tossing his guitar case. The musician\u2019s $3,500 Taylor guitar was in pieces by the time it arrived in Omaha. In the midst of a busy tour schedule, Carroll didn\u2019t have time to follow up on the incident until after United\u2019s twenty-four-hour period for filing a complaint for restitution had expired. When United refused to compensate him for the damage, Carroll penned the four-minute country ditty \u201cUnited Breaks Guitars,\u201d performed it in a video, and uploaded the clip to YouTube (sample lyrics: \u201cI should have gone with someone else or gone by car\u2026\u2019cuz United breaks guitars\u201d). Carroll even called out the unyielding United rep by name. Take that, Ms. Irlwig! (Note to customer service reps everywhere: you\u2019re always on.)<\/p>\r\n

    The clip went viral, receiving 150,000 views its first day and five million more by the next month. Well into the next year, \u201cUnited Breaks Guitars\u201d remained the top result on YouTube when searching the term \u201cUnited.\u201d No other topic mentioning that word\u2014not \u201cUnited States,\u201d \u201cUnited Nations,\u201d or \u201cManchester United\u201d\u2014ranked ahead of this one customer\u2019s outrage.<\/p>\r\n\r\n

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    Video<\/h3>\r\n

    (click to see video)<\/a><\/p>\r\n

    Dave Carroll\u2019s ode to his bad airline experience, \u201cUnited Breaks Guitars,\u201d went viral, garnering millions of views.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n

    Scarring social media posts don\u2019t just come from outside the firm. Earlier that same year employees of Domino\u2019s Pizza outlet in Conover, North Carolina, created what they thought would be a funny gross-out video for their friends. Posted to YouTube, the resulting footage of the firm\u2019s brand alongside vile acts of food prep was seen by over one million viewers before it was removed. Over 4.3 million references to the incident can be found on Google, and many of the leading print and broadcast outlets covered the story. The perpetrators were arrested, the Domino\u2019s storefront where the incident occurred was closed, and the firm\u2019s president made a painful apology (on YouTube, of course).<\/p>\r\n

    Not all firms choose to aggressively engage social media. As of this writing some major brands still lack a notable social media presence (Apple comes immediately to mind). But your customers are there and they\u2019re talking about your organization, its products, and its competitors. Your employees are there, too, and without guidance, they can step on a social grenade with your firm left to pick out the shrapnel. Soon, nearly everyone will carry the Internet in their pocket. Phones and MP3 players are armed with video cameras capable of recording every customer outrage, corporate blunder, ethical lapse, and rogue employee. Social media posts can linger forever online, like a graffiti tag attached to your firm\u2019s reputation. Get used to it\u2014that genie isn\u2019t going back in the bottle.<\/p>\r\n

    As the \u201cUnited Breaks Guitars\u201d and \u201cDomino\u2019s Gross Out\u201d incidents show, social media will impact a firm whether it chooses to engage online or not. An awareness of the power of social media can shape customer support engagement and crisis response, and strong corporate policies on social media use might have given the clueless Domino\u2019s pranksters a heads-up that their planned video would get them fired and arrested. Given the power of social media, it\u2019s time for all firms to get SMART, creating a social media awareness and response team. While one size doesn\u2019t fit all, this section details key issues behind SMART capabilities, including creating the social media team, establishing firmwide policies, monitoring activity inside and outside the firm, establishing the social media presence, and managing social media engagement and response.<\/p>\r\n\r\n

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    Creating the Team<\/h2>\r\n

    Firms need to treat social media engagement as a key corporate function with clear and recognizable leadership within the organization. Social media is no longer an ad hoc side job or a task delegated to an intern. When McDonald\u2019s named its first social media chief, the company announced that it was important to have someone \u201cdedicated 100% of the time, rather than someone who\u2019s got a day job on top of a day job\u201d (York, 2010). Firms without social media baked into employee job functions often find that their online efforts are started with enthusiasm, only to suffer under a lack of oversight and follow-through. One hotel operator found franchisees were quick to create Facebook pages, but many rarely monitored them. Customers later notified the firm that unmonitored hotel \u201cfan\u201d pages contained offensive messages\u2014a racist rant on one, paternity claims against an employee on another.<\/p>\r\n

    Organizations with a clearly established leadership role for social media can help create consistency in firm dialogue; develop and communicate policy; create and share institutional knowledge; provide training, guidance, and suggestions; offer a place to escalate issues in the event of a crisis or opportunity; and catch conflicts that might arise if different divisions engage without coordination.<\/p>\r\n

    While firms are building social media responsibility into job descriptions, also recognize that social media is a team sport that requires input from staffers throughout an organization. The social media team needs support from public relations, marketing, customer support, HR, legal, IT, and other groups, all while acknowledging that what\u2019s happening in the social media space is distinct from traditional roles in these disciplines. The team will hone unique skills in technology, analytics, and design, as well as skills for using social media for online conversations, listening, trust building, outreach, engagement, and response. As an example of the interdisciplinary nature of social media practice, consider that the social media team at Starbucks (regarded by some as the best in the business) is organized under the interdisciplinary \u201cvice president of brand, content, and online2<\/sup>.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

    Also note that while organizations with SMARTs (social media teams) provide leadership, support, and guidance, they don\u2019t necessarily drive all efforts. GM\u2019s social media team includes representatives from all the major brands. The idea is that employees in the divisions are still the best to engage online once they\u2019ve been trained and given operational guardrails. Says GM\u2019s social media chief, \u201cI can\u2019t go in to Chevrolet and tell them \u2018I know your story better than you do, let me tell it on the Web\u2019\u201d (Barger, 2009)3<\/sup>. Similarly, the roughly fifty Starbucks \u201cIdea Partners\u201d who participate in MyStarbucksIdea are specialists. Part of their job is to manage the company\u2019s social media. In this way, conversations about the Starbucks Card are handled by card team experts, and merchandise dialogue has a product specialist who knows that business best. Many firms find that the social media team is key for coordination and supervision (e.g., ensuring that different divisions don\u2019t overload consumers with too much or inconsistent contact), but the dynamics of specific engagement still belong with the folks who know products, services, and customers best.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n

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    Responsibilities and Policy Setting<\/h2>\r\n

    In an age where a generation has grown up posting shoot-from-the-hip status updates and YouTube is seen as a fame vehicle for those willing to perform sensational acts, establishing corporate policies and setting employee expectations are imperative for all organizations. The employees who don\u2019t understand the impact of social media on the firm can do serious damage to their employers and their careers (look to Domino\u2019s for an example of what can go wrong).<\/p>\r\n

    Many experts suggest that a good social media policy needs to be three things: \u201cshort, simple, and clear\u201d (Soat, 2010). Fortunately, most firms don\u2019t have to reinvent the wheel. Several firms, including Best Buy, IBM, Intel, The American Red Cross, and Australian telecom giant Telstra, have made their social media policies public.<\/p>\r\n

    Most guidelines emphasize the \u201cthree Rs\u201d: representation, responsibility, and respect.<\/p>\r\n\r\n