To be safe, firms should create a compliance hotline so that employees can ask if what they are about to do online is appropriate or not, just in case the guidelines are not clear.

A Point For Debate
One question that will arise, "Do employees own their social media profiles or does the firm?" The quick answer is that the employee owns their own page. (Really the social network does), but as soon as they put company information on their page, they become a public face of an organization.

It is a tricky topic, but firms need to say, "If you want to work here, we need you to act within a manner that represents our brand in a good light and stay within strict industry regulations."

One Advisor's Experience
"Personal privacy of employees is an issue that our firm respects and appreciates. But the fact of the matter is that our industry requires industry participants to forfeit some privacy for the sake of investor protection and investor confidence in the fairness of capital markets. Many industry employees have historically been comfortable with the requirement of fingerprinting upon taking a new job. Employer access to employee brokerage account statements and trading preclearance discloses very personal financial information, but the connection of these issues to client interests is fairly straightforward for employees," said Matthew Slaney, principal and portfolio manager at FinArc LLC.

Slaney added, "Granting employers and regulators access to employee social media accounts can require more education on the reasons for these controls, particularly if an employee views a social media account as personal and not connected to the business. Our firm has chosen to address this issue through a combination of education, written policies and employee agreements to adhere to these policies, along with the use of an automated social media service that monitors and archives social media posts and requires preclearance of posts to certain social media accounts."

Stay Up On Privacy Settings
As social media sites evolve, messages will not have to be blasted to all those in social networks. For example, in 2011, Facebook and Google+ allowed for messages to go out to limited groups. This segmenting can help keep personal communications personal, allowing business communications can go to those they are intended to reach.

It still does not change the guidelines, but it does aid employees to be smarter with how they communicate.

Along With A Social Media Policy
Social media has become so big, it impacts so many disciplines within a firm, including management, marketing, sales, compliance, human resources, etc. For that reason, here is a short list of other related documents that social media guidelines impact:
    A media relations policy.
    HR policies (e.g. on the topic of harassment, diversity, confidentiality, privacy, etc.)
    Job descriptions with clear performance goals.
    Technology security and accessibility.
    A disaster recovery plan.
    And more.

Sources For More Information
One great example of social media policies and training outside of the industry is provided by the U.S. military. Check out the Army's SlideShare page to see its handbook, protecting military members, the Army and in some ways the United States.

The National Labor Relations Board has also provided information that is helpful. Plus, a quick Google search will bring up all kinds of policy examples.