Company Internet policy: Do you know what your employees are saying in your company name?

Reprinted from a blog post of Phyllis Zimbler Miller as a National Internet Business Examiner.

I had a surprising experience at an LA mixer event of the Entertainment Publicists Professional Society that showed me a big risk of companies that have their head in the sand when it comes to Internet marketing.

I met a person who is not a publicist who told me he didn’t know anything about Internet marketing. But his company, of which he is a senior exec, just found out there was an unauthorized company blog.

How could that be? I asked him. He didn’t know. I asked if his company had an Internet policy for his employees. He said no but the company was “getting one.”

I asked for his card and, once home, investigated the anonymous Web site. I checked the company’s Web site and the blog wasn’t there.

Then I did a Google search and discovered that there was indeed a hosted WordPress.com blog with his company’s name. I couldn’t actually read the blog because it was password protected, which means whoever is writing it is only allowing specific people to read the contents.

I thought about this for a second, and then realized that anyone can choose any name for a blog on a hosted site. There’s no gatekeeper saying: Do you have a legitimate right to call your blog by your employer’s company name?

RED LIGHT FLASHING: Let this be a warning for all of you senior company execs who have chosen not to know about social media and blogging. Your employees may be writing about you in your company name without your knowledge.

IMMEDIATE SOLUTION: One, start learning about social media and blogging ASAP. Either read everything you can on the subject right now, or hire a company (such as my company Miller Mosaic, LLC) to get you up to speed quickly.

Two, immediately set in place a company Internet policy. This does NOT take months to write. It’s really rather simple – once you yourself understand how social media (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube) and blogging work on the Internet.

You’ve probably worked very hard on your company’s reputation. Don’t be caught like a deer in the headlights. Get knowledgeable right now!

And to go on the offensive rather than being on the defensvie, check out www.WeTeachWebMarketing.com.

Tagged as: Internet policy, social media