The following is a guest post from Lindsay M. Allen, a PR and communications pro from central Michigan. I’ve had the pleasure of connecting with her on Twitter and meeting her a few times in person this year. Enjoy. -AM
This post has been brewing for awhile — too long, really (and I bet Amy won’t disagree … ha ha ha). It started when I noticed a brand that is near and dear to my heart (and shall therefore remain nameless) making what I felt was a big ol’ Facebook boo-boo, leading me to ponder when — or whether — it’s acceptable click that “Remove” button on the Facebook pages we are called upon, as professional communicators, to moderate.
Back to the inspiration for this post …
Organization X posted on its Facebook fan page, “(Organization X) has some breaking news to officially announce… Stay posted for details.”
Unfortunately for Organization X, there were several other organizations involved in its “big news,” and the scoop was already floating around out there and being reported on by credible mainstream media outlets that regularly cover the organizations involved, including Organization X. Bottom line: Lots of people already knew the “exciting news” and began posting about it in the comments section under the post.
As I revisited the page several times to see when Organization X would finally, officially post the news, I noticed something. The fans’ comments — all positive, excited remarks about the forthcoming news, which also was positive — were being deleted almost as quickly as they were being posted. It was sort of like a a clay-pigeon shoot, communication-style: The comments kept popping up, and someone kept shooting them down … so quickly that it would’ve been impossible to get accurate screen captures of the situation.
I was stunned by, a little angry at, and quite disappointed in Organization X. But then I realized … Organization X and its Facebook gatekeeper(s) probably aren’t alone.
Really?! Are there communicators who need so badly to control their organizations’ messages that they go so far as to delete positive comments about positive news just because they haven’t posted the news yet (probably because a news release is caught up in the review process and stuck on a manager’s desk somewhere)?!
Most conversations I had with people in the aftermath of the situation yielded one opinion: In cases like these, don’t delete! Arment Dietrich PR CEO Gini Dietrich said one of the things I’d been thinking:
Gini also suggested that any deletion of tweets, comments, etc. could be unethical, but I definitely saw something on another Facebook fan page this fall that made me think that a deletion is sometimes justified:
The folks behind the Kohl’s Facebook page removed Gilbert’s comment, and I can’t say I blame them. Would you leave something like that on your company’s Facebook page? Shelby’s “Wow” comment — presumably posted with a “holy crap; I can’t believe someone posted that” sentiment – echoes the likely thoughts that others had upon reading Gilbert’s comment (myself included).
Regardless of whether it was true, would you want to read something like that about a store where you shop? I don’t know about you, but I’m a fan of Kohl’s on Facebook so I can get news about sales … not so I can read about the company’s employees’ sexual exploits with one another. Someone at Kohl’s must’ve thought that, too, since the comment was deleted.
So, the question remains: To delete, or not to delete? And under what circumstances?
Lindsay,
This is a great post and one that is near/dear to my heart for a few things. While on the side of the consumer I am all for as much openness as possible. At the same time I also manage pages for a brand so I see both sides of the fence.
The first mistake that the company that you reference made was that they tried to set individual hype and social ownership of an event that they could not control at all. So their deletes were merely sour grapes and I would not get too offended by it. They probably shouldn’t have, but at the same time were probably being asked by a higher-up to remove them (I hope).
The only time that something should be removed from a company’s fan page is when it is one of the following three things:
1. Offensive, vulgar, etc.
2. Blatantly false or competitive advertising
3.Repeat abuse
While I would like to say that my company’s page is completely positive I can say that it is not. Some of the complaints are justified and we offer advice, but there are some that blatantly want to repost the same complaint over and over again despite the fact that the issue was resolved. To me this is spam – we have helped you and offered commentary, please leave it alone. It is like grade school at times where folks want to be above the fold. We also have seen competitors post links on our wall and also folks write up utter lies, which have also been deleted.
So while I feel your pain, I think the return Tweets and other information posted will help you win out in the long run.
Jeff
Great post, and something I’m experiencing a different slant on. I manage my organization’s page and we’re having an issue with a former employee who parted with the company under bad terms–many years ago. There was some legal action involved–I’m not sure exactly what–but apparently the upswing was that he was prohibited from something having to do with the company–not sure if it was contacting people or posting stuff on the internet about the company, but something to that effect. Now he regularly posts stuff on the wall deliberately meant to get a rise out of people–taunts about stuff he feels the organization should be doing and complaints about what we are doing. So far we haven’t deleted anything–ignoring the comments seems to get him to go away for a while, but then he returns with another nasty comment.
What would people do in this situation? Ignore? Or delete and risk him ramping it up more?
Wow! Amy is super patient with you! When did we talk about this? Six months ago? :)
In the case of Kohl’s, it makes sense to delete that comment. It’s libel and defamatory and the woman should be hearing from their attorney. If the comment, however, were from a customer, they should leave it and respond immediately so other fans see that not only are they listening to the good AND the bad, but that they are fixing the situation. Deleting it would only fan the fire. The difference is ex-employee saying libel things and unhappy customer who can be helped.
I have a similar issue. A former employee who was fired is putting threatening messages to me on her facebook page. HOW DO I GET FACEBOOK TO WARN HER OR REMOVE?
There is no answer on point in the HELP section, given that I am not a “friend” of this woman.
Hi Lindsay,
Very relevant post, and way to represent central Michigan! I definitely agree with Jeff’s suggestions of when Facebook comments should be deleted, especially his points on vulgarity and repeat abuse. Companies should use negative, non-vulgar comments as an opportunity to offer help and additional information if a customer had a bad experience. This hopefully would prove to the customer that the company cares and is taking an initiative to make things better, which in turn would encourage the customer to continue buying from said company.
Let’s hope Organization X learned from this experience. You cannot control news, particularly on social networks. They were too slow (you’re right, probably because the higher ups couldn’t approve the news release!) and missed the boat on being the first to make the big announcement. They should have sucked it up and jumped in on the conversation with their fans.
Thanks for sharing your experience!
Wow, what timing! I had this EXACT issue come up just today.
I manage the facebook page for a Miami neighborhood full of high end retail, restaurants, day spas, etc. Seems as if the owner of one of the spas was on a Bravo spa makeover reality show that aired a couple of weeks ago where she portrayed herself in a less than favorable light. When we made a post a couple of weeks back about how this same spa was hosting a “Toys for Tots” drive, the comments began about how horrible a person she was.
In this instance, I let it go since the comments were not too egregious and, facebook being what it is, I knew that it would get pushed down the wall and out of everyone’s consciousness before too long.
TODAY, however, someone posted a link to a facebook group that has been created asking people to boycott her spa using some rather negative language. Here is how I chose to deal with it: I sent the admin of the group a note saying that we had no intention of removing his link, and that we were not in the habit of editing or deleting comments since sometimes people have bad experiences when they transact their business. Nevertheless, I continued, we would appreciate it if he could see his way clear to taking it down on his own since the overall tone was not representative of how people ordinarily interact on the page and it didn’t seem fair to give this one business more weight or importance than any other one in the neighborhood. The overall goal of the page is to drive more foot traffic to this particular neighborhood and the response has been 99.9% positive so far. His post seemed unnecessarily vitriolic.
I got no response from him, but in the meantime I visited the facebook group in question where I noticed he had posted that the owner was a “b**ch” and “deserved to die” along with some other vulgarities. At this point I sent him ANOTHER e-mail saying that I would be more than happy to discuss it, but we were removing his link. I left my e-mail and told him to contact me at any time, further mentioning that we were not blocking him from our page, simply removing his post.
I still have not heard from him, but my decision was governed by my feeling that virtually anything goes in the social media realm, until you cross the line into personal attacks, threats of violence, racism, sexism, homophobia… well, you get the idea. Let’s play nice because, after all, we’re talking about a mean owner of a spa, not a genocidal dictator. It’s important that the “punishment” fit the “crime,” and in this case, I felt like it crossed the line.
Social media is great because it gives everyone a voice. Social media is not so great because it gives everyone a voice.
What do you all think? Did I do the right thing?
Matthew–I think you totally did the right thing taking it down. I think as soon as obscenity, personal attacks or scary stuff like death threats–even in jest–happen, there’s no question that you’re justified in removing those remarks. It’s one thing to express an opinion or a preference, but nobody wants to see stuff like that. I think you handled it really well–I like the first email, but then when you saw the nasty things, how you took the situation in hand and just removed them–the punishment absolutely fit the crime.
Thanks, Maggie. As I said, you have to take the good with the bad when you jump into the social media ocean, but this just seemed unnecessarily bitter and mean.
I’m wondering if I will ever hear from the original post-er. I suspect not.
Thanks, everyone, for your comments! Obviously, Gilbert’s post is a bit of an extreme example, but it shows that these things do arise.
@Jeff: Good points! And I may have been a tad overdramatic in describing my reaction to Organization X’s faux pas. I blame the fact that I am so attached to Organization X for that. LOL.
@Maggie: I wonder if, in your case, it would be worthwhile to block the person altogether. It sounds like what he’s doing is a blatant violation of the “no contact” order/agreement anyway …
@Gini: Thanks for clarifying the ex-employee/customer distinction. Former or even current!) employees with an axe to grind are often even more dangerous than disappointed customers, I’d think, which is why Gilbert’s comment was so incendiary.
@Nikki: Thanks! “You can’t control the news” is the one thing companies really need to be told when leaping into social media. Unfortunately, I think so many companies are in such a rush to get into the game that they don’t put a qualified person in charge of it, and then things like this happen because the person understands how to use the tools (including the “REMOVE” button … heh) but doesn’t get strategy creation and/or big-picture thinking. Based on what I know, I think that’s what happened in the case of Organization X.
@Matthew: I don’t think you’ll hear from that person again. And I actually might’ve been quicker to take down the post, but I’m also notoriously overly cautious about those things. I probably would’ve been more concerned about the spa owner coming after me than about upsetting the person — a clear non-customer — whose offensive post was deleted.
We recently opened a fan page for our company (Zend). It’s been really successful, already passed the 1,000 fans mark with hardly any promotion. However as the number of fans is growing, we’re starting to see individuals or companies using this page to promote themselves. Is there anything wrong with taking their posts off?…
Ron.
@Ron: Zend is an awesome company, congratulations on your successes! Here’s my take on answering your question. Amy hit the nail on the head when she asked (about the Kohl’s situation) “[W]ould you want to read something like that about a store where you shop?” I think it’s about the flavor and group culture you want to cultivate. Coincidentally, I just visited Gary Vaynerchuk’s Facebook wall and since he’s all about self-promotion – he’s the new guru of self-promotion, IMHO – anything goes on his FB page. Not to my taste: I’m not likely to hang out there! But Gary V’s approach fits his brand. Would I expect that on Zend’s wall? No, I would be put-off and think you guys weren’t reading posts on your page. I would also expect “spam” to be deleted as a courtesy to me and my time. In other words, different content for different communities. But either way you pay a price as well, by setting the tone for conversation and creativity in posts. Oh, and by the way, didn’t you just promote your own FB page by posting this comment? :-)
@Bruce: thanks for your comment, it makes perfect sense to me. Thinking about it, I would certainly not want to see spam on other companies’ fan pages I visit. In fact, some fan pages, LinkedIn groups, etc. have become highly “polluted” by spam, and I believe their value as platforms for open communication may be decreasing. As to your last comment – I didn’t think any of the folks here are geeky PHP developers, I had no intention of promoting our brand ;-)
Great discussion here guys. Just wanted to point out that this was a guest post from Lindsay, and not me.
You both bring up good points about knowing your audience and making sure that the content of a Facebook page matches the culture of that audience. Facebook pages can be seen by everyone, however, so it’s also good to keep in mind that something that may not offend your target audience could offend a different group – and we all know how quickly things can spin out of control on the Web when a group of people decides to take up arms against a brand or company for a perceived wrong.
And Ron, you are probably right – not too many PHP developers read the blog! But very much appreciate your questions and perspectives nonetheless!
Ron, I completely agree with Bruce. Leaving on “spammy” comments might give the audience — especially if it’s a more “serious” audience — the impression that you’re not (wo)manning your Facebook page. That is such a pet peeve for me. I think deletion of others’ spam/self-promotion will help keep your page useful for your fans/customers/users and will help prevent it from becoming like the legions of spammy, useless LinkedIn groups I’ve seen …
Hi Lindsay (and Amy),
This topic comes up for me regularly as I manage various Facebook pages for numerous organizations. The only difference is that my clients are mainly entertainment studios, not corporate entities. The reason I bring this is up is because many times sensitive videos for movies and TV shows get leaked, which is technically a violation of copyright laws. When fans post links to leaked videos in the comments section on an official Facebook page, how do you think the studio should respond? Is deleting the content inappropriate in this case?
It would be great to read what you and your readers think about this situation so I can provide my clients with the best ways to handle this, as it happens frequently!
Thanks,
Meg
Meg –
In a case like that, I say “delete away!” There are so many potential legal ramifications (especially if the link is to *another* studio’s production) that it seems awfully risky to leave those links up — not to mention the fact that it is almost an endorsement of piracy to leave them posted. It might even be worthwhile to e-mail those individuals whose comments/links were deleted to let them know it is a legal issue rather than a matter of censorship … especially if the same people keep doing the posting.
Anyone else? Thoughts?
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What a great discussion! I am in charge of several fan pages for my college and we are having heated discussions about deleting posts. I am not a fan of deletions, unless they are way over the top – in one year I haven’t deleted any. I believe discussion is a good thing and anything questionable gives my company a chance to set things right. But several of our students lately have been posting things that lead people to our competitors and this is the reason some people want them removed. My argument is that these discussions will happen whether we remove them or not and that it gives us a chance to say “don’t forget about our X guides that can help you study too.”
I’d love to hear everyone’s thoughts…thanks for the good reads!