According to Brown, who has over 7,000 Twitter followers, Sigma Financial/Parkland Securities uses Twitter to engage employees and display the company’s corporate culture.
“We are not using it to “check-up” on our reps; we are using it to engage our reps and show how fun we are as a brand in [financial services],” she explained.
Brown also guides employees on how to use Twitter. She advises that the utmost important thing for employees to remember is that Twitter is a visible conversation and to make it entertaining and meaningful.
“If you can take something fun and make it emotionally impactful or make someone laugh, that is just as important as sharing important financial-related matters,” says Brown. “Make your presence human.”
The company's social media policy is what David Banks, senior content marketing manager for Navex Global, would refer to as a permissive policy.
“Most organizations are leaning towards a permissive policy because they understand most of their employees are using social media,” said Banks.
When social media in its early years showed it could threaten a business’ image, many companies enforced a restrictive policy on their personnel, Banks said.
“I think it was more a knee-jerk reaction by corporate,” said Navex Global’s general counsel Shon Ramey. “Rather than prohibit something that’s going to happen, provide guidance on how to use them.”
Navex Global is a compliance program management software provider with over 3,500 Twitter followers. Banks and Ramey believe that brokerages and their registered reps should have codes of conduct that clearly outlines what employees should not share, especially for quiet periods.
“Make sure that you have an actual, explicit provision in your code of conduct so people are not guessing,” said Ramey.