This weekend I came across a LinkedIn company profile with “Biatch” among its employee titles. Sigh. Educating employees on the basics of social networking is very simple, and very important.

Social networking is not rocket science, but every one of us goes through a learning curve in which mistakes are easy to make. Today, these mistakes, as innocent and naive as they may be, can do significant damage to a brand.

Take this case for example; I’m sure this Biatch is not aware her personal LlinkedIn profile is showing up on the company’s main profile. She probably wanted to have some fun, and the one in charged of this at the company didn’t notice. Regardless of who’s at fault, this company’s brand takes an embarrassing hit every time someone views their profile.

Here are a few simple tips to help prevent these corporate embarrassing publications:

Create simple organization-wide  guidelines for social networking. Write a document short enough so that everyone will read it. Include the different social networks your company is participating, general guidelines on the company’s branding and general suggestions on how to participate in social networking. Avoid labeling them as “rules”, it works better.

Encourage but don’t force employees to participate in social networks. Why? Personality, passion and commitment come across very well in social media. Similar to a networking party, it’s very easy to spot people who are forced to be there. Besides, forced participants usually don’t communicate well or plainly say the wrong things. Let the ones who want to be there, be there. Their keenness will come across superbly.

Designate someone to oversee your online presence. Simple mistakes can be avoided by having someone review important profiles every now and then.

Think long term. An abandoned profile is just as embarrassing as these faux passes.

By Jose Uzcategui

Posted on Tuesday, October 13th, 2009 and filed under Networking, Online Marketing, Social Networking, social media monitoring.