How to manage Social Media Risks Effectively

Social media has changed the way people interact and communicate. Not only you are given limitless possibility of connecting to the people that are far away, you can also use the platform to advertise and promote your business. However, there are always risks to everything, including to your social media account. It is possible that someone hacks into your account and do a lot of bad things under your name – tarnishing your reputation and name – which is the most common hack and attacks that is happening to social media. That’s why it is important that you prepare yourself with good and solid social media risk management.

Some cases have happened to business as well as individuals. Consider Delta Airlines, Twitter, and Newsweek Magazine that suffered from bad reputation because of the recent hack. You probably have heard about this, but not taking preliminary cautions because you think that such thing is impossible happening to you. Sometimes you can’t avoid or prevent such thing: you can only come prepared as Facebook predicts around 11.2% of the user accounts – which counts for 138 million users) are actually fake accounts. Sometimes the Facebook page will be made to look like the real one, luring innocent users to access it, providing personal data and information.

Of course you don’t want such thing from happening to you, right? So, here are the things that you should do in your attempts in managing risk management scheme:

• Understand the risk. If you aren’t careful and sensitive data is leaking, you will have to deal with privacy breaches and reputational damages. It is possible that the threats come from outside or inside, such as malicious employees. Understand and know the vulnerabilities; this is the only way you can minimize it.
• Make plans. Once you have understood the risks and possible issues, you need to create a plan concerning the risk management, such as: who will be responsible for the site? How do you deal with the attacks? Who should be speaking to the public on the company’s behalf?
• Include the right people. Social media risk isn’t the responsibility of the IT department only, but it takes thorough collaboration between legal department, internal audit, marketing, compliance, and corporate communication. Make sure that you put the right people on the right spot, enhancing the efficiency of the work task.
• Deal with feedback effectively. You need to keep an open mind for feedbacks – no matter how bad or good they are. Feedbacks provide you with valuable info and customers’ expression of their satisfaction. In case you deal with negative feedback, be wise and address it timely and appropriate manner – it will work best for your reputation.