What are your thoughts on a comments policy for a corporate blog?
At LinkedIn, we've just launched our corporate blog (http://blog.linkedin.com/) and we are fine-tuning the comments policy.
Have you worked on a comments/privacy policy for a corporate blog and if so, what are your thoughts on the same. Any tips?
Good Answers (2)
Mario- I think that the stated policy on comments that sits in the corner of your blog is great. I agree with the others here who have said that allowing negative comments to stand is the way to go; if you engage folks in a dialog, you have a far better chance of resolving their issues. If you don't allow them to communicate directly with you, they will go elsewhere and hold a one-way dialog about you... without your feedback or participation. Negative comments are hard to swallow sometimes, but they do show that you are living that transparent ideal. You gain far more trust and respect doing that, rather than holding the public at arm's length.
I would recommend captcha features that filter spam bots and don't be afraid to delete offensive comments- I do it all the time and just post my own comment saying why.
Welcome to the blogosphere!
In our blogs (blog.wellsfargo.com), we've found our comment policy a practical way to keep the conversation on topic, civil, etc. You need to be very open about what comments you will or will not publish. Sometimes, it's painful to post a comment, but we've developed a thick skin. You have to take the good with the bad. Lucky for us, it's been 99% good. The fears brands have about negative comments are (at least in our case) unfounded.
Here's a link to our comment policy:
http://blog.wellsfargo.com/GuidedByHistory/comment-guidelines.html
Links:
More Answers (17)
Kathie M. T
Author, Blogger, Founder of Virtual Assistant Industry in Australia, Speaker, VA Coach
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Congratulations, that's great to see!
Now, I don't have any experience with a 'corporate' blog but do maintain some business blogs. I expect you'd want to cover things like not using the email addresses of those leaving comments for any other purpose. Although I haven't seen anything like that on the blogs I visit regularly and must admit I've not looked for that either.
Comment moderation is a must in some form or another. I've seen it done by using a graphical code that people have to enter and for others they use systems like Akismet to capture the spam and separate it from the real stuff.
But I did find some samples for you that might assist.
Links:
Sergio C
Consultant at EGP-UPBS
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Hi Mario! The blog is a great idea as a communication channel between you (LinkedIn) and we (users). Regarding the comments policy I believe you are referring to an internal (LinkedIn's) set of rules that you and your guys should have in mind when posting... I have no experience with that because the places where I worked didn't use corporate blogs. If you're speaking about a public comments policy then I would say for me what you state in the blog is just enough! Regards!
Maurice W
Currently Looking for a new position
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1 require valid email to comment
2 mod first comment and trust them after that
3 have some mechanisiam to flag up seriously bad comments eg grisly abusive racial comments death threats etc
Saif S
| Strategist | Entrepreneur | Visionary | Bridge Builder | Mobility Evangelist | Networker | Mentor |
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Saif S suggests this expert on this topic:
Ron specialises in setting up, facilitating and providing content for corporate Blogs.
I'm sure he'd be able to assist you.
Seth R
Financial Consultant at National Basketball Association
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Seth R suggests this expert on this topic:
Tom Biro is a strong resource to comment on Blogs as he leads our New Media Practice at MWW Group. Tom has several blogs including OpentheDialogue.com and theMediaDrop.com to name a few. He is constantly requested to review consumer products as his reviews have credibility and substinence.
If I were the only decision maker, I would let comments totally free (with captcha check only) - blogs are about transparency and free-speech, therefore moderating comments is purely ridiculous.
A few blogging guidelines resources:
http://www-03.ibm.com/developerworks/blogs/page/jasnell?entry=blogging_ibm
http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache:_-cfjb9vMbwJ:jeremy.zawodny.com/yahoo/yahoo-blog-guidelines.pdf+%22blogging+guidelines%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=5&gl=us
Good luck!
First create your policies and make them transparent, so users aren't surprised.
Second- Allow negative commentsw to stay up- but respond. this will bring your dissatisfied customers out, and give you a forum to address them, as well as bringing you into negative dialogue that may be going on anyway, and allow you to address concerns.
To make this work though, you have to respond quickly, and honestly- even if the best you can muster is "I'm looking into it, and will have a full response within..."
Best of luck.
Noah D also suggests this expert on this topic:
I think Noah's answer covers the key points.
First, put your policies out front, and stick to them. Tell people: no profanity, no personal attacks, whatever - and mean it. You're not a government agency; the first amendment doesn't apply (and I speak as a wholesale supporter of free speech).
That said, if the purpose of your blog is to open a dialogue with your customers, then accepting critical comments is extremely important. If you deal openly and honestly with complaints, your customers' respect and trust will grow.
One more thing. Run those policies by the corporate lawyers. They're probably going to be unhappy with the notion of comments, even moderated comments, but they'll have to learn to live with it.
The one time I did this I stated that the only comments that would be spiked were those containing inflammatory speech. When it came customer service questions the policy was that comments would not be made live but would be forwarded to that team, where contact would be established.
Is this policy for privately managed employee blogs, or for an official company blog?
For the former, rules are a little more lax - comments are generally welcome, and the conversation is robust. In my experience, this is usually where some of the most interesting dialogue occurs between brands and customers (Robert Scoble's blog comes immediately to mind, when he was back at Microsoft).
Official company blogs are trickier - it's one thing for us to admit that the control of our brands is rapidly evaporating in a Web 2.0 world, but it's an entirely different thing to simply sit back and allow our brands to be positioned with abusive, racist or otherwise humiliating comments in an official, corporate context. Thus, the few corporate blogs I've seen that have comments activated are generally moderated (meaning a human editor reviews each one before posting), and this seems to be a safe middle ground.
One thing that I would not recommend - don't moderate comments to the extent that only the good ones are shared. This reeks of public relations and is a painfully obvious and manipulative stance. Remember that your blog readers are experienced and street-saavy - try to use negative comments as an opportunity to address (and hopefully alleviate) your customer's concerns.
Hope this helps.
Damon B
Director, Customer Evangelism
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1. Allow comments.
2. If the blog gets large, I would say that moderation will most certainly become an issue (spam bots). Don't moderate criticism.
3. Realize that responding to comments is essential.
4. Clarify that the blog isn't a customer service channel.
Easton E
Blogging and Social Media Consultant
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Good answers so far. Try auto-publishing comments by default and only switching to moderation if spam becomes a problem. Feel free to zap comments you don't think are appropriate. Oh and try to answer comments whenever possible.
Chris W
Owner at The Wireless Man
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There are many ways to handle this - the main decision is this:
Are you ready to be transparent and accept that people are going to want to criticize you publicly for some decisions you make with regard to the direction of LinkedIn; strategically and from a tactical POV?
The simple way here is to ensure that you have an email address that has been verified (or a LI account of course), and let them say what they want - maybe filtering for extreme language.
OR - you could make them do this - plus have every comment pass a simple editorial process - now this is where it gets a bit sticky! A corporate blog should be a public platform allowing anyone to say anything they want - after all it's their opinion and view. Sometimes this isn't jiving with what LI would maybe want to have published but you have to take your lumps sometimes. I would ensure that this editorial pass only checks for potential abuse of things like copyright, defamation etc - and as long as it's lawful - you should publish.
The full on censorship route is there - but if you go down it 'they'll' soon know that you are censoring to create a 'fluff Blog'.
Good luck.
this is a great feature and must be handled carefully:
- be transparent
- fix rules
- tell when someone is not respecting them and the action you took against
Hi Mario,
Long story short, let your comments be visible by all after denying only the outright offensive/illegal material (porn, etc.) I'm a big fan of transparency in corporate situations as I find it strange/mildly offensive when a corporate blog is set up ostensibly to foster communication and doesn't allow people to post comments. That's like creating a "suggestion box" with no hole in the top.
Writing a blog is a commitment, largely in the sense that you are letting people know you want to be communicative about your content. That means you should be willing to hear critique/negativity as well as positive comments, etc. And these days, also have a response for people who will largely see your blog as a PR vehicle to get their message out.
My view with clients (when I help them implement a blog strategy) is to also remember that each blog post is essentially a daily press release opportunity, written in your voice. But ALWAYS reread your posts before posting in a corporate situation, and remember you're representing your firm/brand as well as yourself. You may get a troll on your blog who burns you up - if you can counter their ire with positive spin, great. But if after a while they wear you down and you'd love nothing better than to flame them into the netherworld, my STRONG advice is to hold off. Your nasty comments will go much farther in hurting your career/company than they will in curbing said troll.
Links:
It's different for many types of corporate blogs. I've seen some who would rather moderate all comments (as our blog does), but then I've seen others who would rather removed questionable comments after they have been posted, in order to further the conversation.
If blogs are going to have moderated comments, then there should be a person that will watch the queue constantly so that comments don't sit in it for more than an hour or so before being made public.
Mario, I think comment moderation at that level is absolutely essential. If for nothing other than keeping out the obvious junk/spam/crude/flamer type posts that take away from the conversation.
The problem with this is that some companies moderate too strictly to make sure everything makes them look rosey.
