On October the 21st, Rob Hagen and myself did a webinar for Automotive News entitled “Automotive News Dealer Intelligence Webinar: 10 Ways Social Media Can Help Dealers Boost Their Reputations” This was the first tip, stay tuned for the others!

With the total transparency that the web offers it’s important to know what your sales people, sales managers, service advisers and others are saying and doing on social networks, both work related and personal. Like it or not people are forming opinions about your dealership without ever having to do business with you, of course that can be both good and bad, it just depends on the opinion being formed.

Today, not tomorrow, you should institute a social media policy at your dealership. Have all employees and future employees read and sign a policy so they know what they can and can’t do. This is the first, most important step when deciding if you are going to utilize social media in your marketing efforts.

After careful research I put together the following policy to get you started creating your own social media policy. Keep in mind that I am not a lawyer and the following policy should only be used as guide and is not a stand-in for legal advice. I encourage you to download it, take a look at it and draft your own policy.

Social media can be a powerful supplement to any marketing campaign but it can be a double edge sword, use it wisely and make sure that you know what your employees are saying, it could be the different between positive word of mouth and negative word of mouth. As we all know, negative word of mouth can spread like wildfire and before you know it , it can engulf the whole dealership. Be vigilant.

The following policy is saved in an RTF format, it can be opened with most word-processing programs on both PC’s and Macs.

Automotive Social Media Policy

Related posts:

1. Automotive Social Media Policy – Free Download
2. Automotive News Webinar: Implement A Strategy Tip #2
3. [Webinar Recording] The New Rules Of Automotive Social Media Engagement – The 20-20-60 Rule

As the saying goes, an elephant never forgets, neither does the internet. Everything said, everything posted, every video created and image uploaded is there for the world to see. People are forming opinions about your dealership without ever having to be a customer, of course this could be good or bad, it just depends on the opinions being formed.

It’s becoming increasingly more important to monitor your employees and how they interact on the internet. In a transparent world it’s easy to connect what a person says to where they work, that can be a problem if one of your employees lacks integrity, and is posting defamatory, pornographic, proprietary or libelous material about the dealership, employees, customers or even the competitors. In fact, they don’t even have to mention anything that relates to the car business but through association can have an impact on the public opinion about your dealership.

After careful research I put together the following policy to get you started creating your own social media policy. Keep in mind that I am not a lawyer and the following policy should only be used as guide and is not a stand-in for legal advice. I encourage you to download it, take a look at it and draft your own policy.

Social media can be a powerful supplement to any marketing campaign but it can be a double edge sword, use it wisely and make sure that you know what your employees are saying, it could be the different between positive word of mouth and negative word of mouth. As we all know, negative word of mouth can spread like wildfire and before you know it , it can engulf the whole dealership. Be vigilant.

The following automotive social media policy is saved in an RTF format, it can be opened with most word-processing programs on both PC’s and Macs.

Automotive Social Media Policy

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Related posts:

1. Automotive News Webinar: Social Media Policy Tip#1
2. Automotive Social Media Seminar – Las Vegas
3. FREE Webinar: Creating Customers Who Create Customers- The Real Power Behind Social Media