There’s been a lot of talk about how social media is playing a role in the recruitment industry, and it’s clear that businesses are looking up LinkedIn profiles left and right. But there’s apparently a new, more disturbing trend emerging – businesses are now asking applicants for their Facebook login details.

Over at The Atlantic, there’s new information that businesses are actually asking applicants for login details, including Robert Collins from Maryland, who was apparently asked to reveal his password during an interview with a government department.

That incident has now sparked some involvement from the American Civil Liberties Union, while another, Justin Bassett from New York, ended a job interview after he was asked for a Facebook login, and a separate story from AP notes these aren’t just random incidents either.

“But the whole thing is also, more importantly, worrying. It’s striking how deep the divide can be between our conceptions of online privacy: To me, an interviewer asking for my password – Facebook or any other – would be a fairly shocking imposition. To Justin Bassett’s interviewer, though, it was a question like any other.”

This is a fascinating trend, especially as social media plays more of a role in recruitment. But there are significant legal questions around asking for a password, and businesses would do well to determine the legalities of asking such a question before they go ahead and do it.

Story source: http://www.smartcompany.com.au, story by Patrick Stafford

WHO really owns your social media profile and contacts?

When it comes to LinkedIn, a site popular with executives and white-collar workers, it is likely your employer can claim ownership of some of your contacts and legally tell you to delete them when you leave your job.

Your employer could also tell you to remove any reference on LinkedIn that you are looking for work elsewhere, according to employment lawyers.
Freehills partner Kate Jenkins said LinkedIn poses particular issues for employers as it blurs the lines between work and personal activities.

By publicly indicating on LinkedIn that you are looking for a different job, you could be in breach of an employee’s ”duty of fidelity”. ”I think the fact of doing that would be a breach of their employment obligations,” she said.

In Britain an employee was sacked after he made negative comments about his employer on LinkedIn and also said he was free to be contacted for ”career opportunities”. A decision is yet to be handed down in that case.

Ms Jenkins said LinkedIn contacts were another fraught area, particularly in industries where contact lists are commercially sensitive, such as professional services or recruiting. ”The other thing, which is quite untested, almost everyone is collecting a network of contacts, which in the past would have been a confidential client list.”

Staff, when they leave, can face restraints when they go to a competitor that they should not contact clients. But on LinkedIn, a simple update by an employee that they have moved jobs could tell hundreds of contacts of their new role.

Ms Jenkins said employers could be able to restrain employees from making an update for a certain period of time or negotiate with them to delete contacts they acquired while working for them.

University of Adelaide law professor Andrew Stewart said the legal issues were yet to be tested. ”Although these suggestions [by Freehills] may be soundly based in existing legal principles, they are yet to be fully tested in relation to LinkedIn,” he said.

Story by Ben Schneiders, source: www.smh.com.au

Airlines used to slip seat upgrades to people who “looked the part” and had the frequent flyer status to prove it. But now airlines are looking at the online social influence of an individual and their propensity to “tweet and share” before rewarding customers with a fancier seat.

The airlines’ new approach is one of an avalanche of emerging trends touted by Chris Sanderson, the co-founder of the London-based forecaster, FutureLab, which is advising Australian companies such Country Road, Just Group and Wesfarmers’ Target division.

The search by airlines for “social influencers” highlights how some companies are coming to grips with the new world of social media management.

Companies such as San Francisco-based Klout, which has built profiles and rankings on about 100 million online users so far, “scrapes” data from social media websites such as Twitter and Facebook to quantify the size and influence of a person’s social network based on their messaging and the interaction that takes place with them.

The way Sanderson explains it, several airlines which he will not name are developing systems that prioritise individuals for upgrades based on their Klout rankings to increase the likelihood of more positive “brand messaging” and influence in social media.

But before the social media evangelists get too excited, there is a counter trend coming.

Sanderson says the next decade will see consumers become highly capable “data curators” and “personal reputation managers”.

It means the information which online giants such as Google and Facebook now collect and monetise for free will cost them. Although privacy is a concern for many, Sanderson says people will realise marketers can make money from data about them. People will “lease” their information in exchange for hard cash or goods or services.

Privacy legislation around the world will push that trend along, says Sanderson, but he predicts commerce will get there faster. He predicts a smart company somewhere soon will produce an app that will allow an individual to centrally and easily control their data flow for any online business.

“The personal data curator is very much coming out of the idea that as we understand our data has value we will claim it back,” Sanderson says.

“One of the most valuable things we have in our online activities is our data. We will have apps that allow us to monetise our personal data in the way you lease something.”

Sanderson says people’s broad concerns over privacy will diminish as they realise they can get something by “leasing” their information.

“The moment you realise that by actually leasing your data back to someone like Target you get dollars off your monthly shop, you find the time and inclination to manage these things,” he says.

FutureLab predicts consumers will evolve into “traders”.

“We trade products, we trade value, we trade information and we trade time,” Sanderson says.

“Now we expect brands to reward us for trading. I can go to a 7-Eleven and exchange Facebook credits for a real product. If Facebook credits were translated into real-world value, it would be the third-largest economy in the world.”

Story source: http://www.afr.com/p/business/marketing_media/the_more_you_tweet_the_better_the_Dp4L5FHjReKQbzoj1WA79H

Date originally posted: 20 February 2012

You need to be careful about what you promise—especially when you make a promise on social media.

This adage is ringing loud and clear for Toronto-based Timothy’s Coffee. In an effort last month to grow its Facebook fan base, the company ran a promotion saying that anyone who “liked” its page would receive four free 24-pack boxes of single-serve coffee. As the Toronto Star reports, this was rather generous, as these boxes retail for over $17 CAD each.

A contest aggregating site picked up the promotion and, as you can imagine, responses poured in, reports the Star. Problem is, the stock of product was depleted within three days of the launch, yet Timothy’s still sent emails telling people their coffee was on the way.

Despite obvious problems, the company said nothing until Jan. 4th, when it told fans that the promotion was “first come first serve.” Consumers lashed out, on the company’s Facebook page and in blogs. One blogger claimed Timothy’s deleted nasty comments from its page.

Last week, the company issued a candid apology on its Facebook page:

“We are so sorry!
“This is our first go at this and we admit that we underestimated the response.
“We are blown away that our fans love our coffee so much.
“It really saddens us that we’ve disappointed our fans.
“We apologize.”

It also apologized in a video to fans and said that those who signed up will receive a coupon for a free 12-pack box. The coupon will “most likely” come via regular mail.

Clearly, Timothy’s gaffe illustrates its lack of understanding about social media. The company grossly overestimated the value of a Facebook fan, and then vastly underestimated the outrage caused by their bungled initiative and broken promises.

That it took almost a month to resolve this issue speaks clearly to its lack of comprehension about the way people behave on the social Web.

Don’t want this to happen to your brand? Check out this week’s PR Daily story on “How to avoid a social media nightmare“.

Story source: http://www.prdaily.com/Main/Articles/10597.aspx

Let’s talk about a good response to a customer service, turned social media, crisis, shall we?

During the holidays, a video of a FedEx delivery man throwing a computer monitor over a gate and onto a customer’s lawn emerged.

The scary thing is it’s actually in a computer monitor box, not a FedEx box, so he knew it was fragile. He didn’t try to open the gate or ring the bell. He just threw it over the gate. And it broke.

The person who lives in that house must have the same “neighbourly” issues we have because he has a security camera on the front gate. And the “delivery” was captured on video.

Here it is for your viewing pleasure.

Clearly this is not a PR or social media crisis. It is a customer service crisis. But it was turned into a PR crisis when the customer posted the video on YouTube (which got five million views in five days).

What did FedEx do, in return?

They did NOT ignore the video. They did NOT ignore the crisis. They did NOT stick their heads in the sand and pretend the video (that now has nine million views) doesn’t exist.

They took to YouTube and created their own video. Just like Domino’s did in 2008 when a YouTube video of a franchisee’s employees sneezing and spitting in food went viral.

In a blog post accompanying an embedded version of their video, Matthew Thornton, III, senior VP of FedEx Express U.S. Operations, said:

As the leader of our pickup and delivery operations across America, I want you to know that I was upset, embarrassed, and very sorry for our customer’s poor experience. This goes directly against everything we have always taught our people and expect of them. It was just very disappointing.

He goes on to describe what they did for the customer and how they’re using the video in employee training to make sure these kinds of things don’t happen.

Here is the video of the Thornton’s apology.

Customers and employees weighed in on the blog post, most citing positive examples or stories about being grateful for working at FedEx.

The lesson? Always answer with a real apology. Not “I’m sorry, but…” apology, but a real one. And answer it on the same social network where the crisis is happening.

FedEx did this exactly right, and in the right amount of time. They described the issue, said what had been resolved and how they were using this as a lesson going forward, and apologized.

Every, single one of us makes mistakes. It’s in how we handle them that is remembered.

Story Source: http://spinsucks.com/communication/fedex-customer-video-turned-good-pr/

Date originally posted: 11 January 2012