Social media scares executives because they don’t understand its potential. However, there is another reason. Abuse. It’s hard for employees to separate personal use of social media from a work use. When working with a company in my area, I encouraged them to get involved in social media. I helped them set up a LinkedIn page and to get involved in conversations related to their industry.
They also set up a Facebook and Twitter account. Guess which ones they spend the most time on? Guess how much of that time is work related.
Social media for companies requires strict guidelines for usage, but that takes work and given the amount of time employees have each day, it’s easier to say, “we don’t allow for social media during work hours.”
There’s one other comment I’d like to make. I’m not sure I agree about the creativity comment. Perhaps we’re agreeing but from two opposite perspectives.
What I see is marketing that has as its motto: creativity for creativity’s sake instead of developing marketing campaigns that incorporate a certain element of creativity but has its focus of selling the company (brand and products).
Marketing needs to regain its focus on helping customers/prospects move along in the sales process of a company.
