Page 56 - Social Media Marketing

chapter 2: THE NEW ROLE OF THE CUSTOMER ■ Social Computing Policies

A clear policy for organizational adoption of social computing is essential. You can think of
social computing policies as the “Terms of Use” governing the use of social media within a busi-
ness. IBM offers its social computing policies for review. Some time spent with these is highly
recommended.

http://www.ibm.com/blogs/zz/en/guidelines.html

Before leaving moderation—and do visit Jake McKee’s resources (see sidebar
feature on Community Moderation) for further discussion on moderation best prac-
tices—one last point with regard to ensuring community health: Moderation provides
an important relief valve for seasoned members. By guiding conversations in the proper
course and keeping discussions on track, skilled moderators actually make it easier
(and more pleasant) for the experts in a community to stay engaged and to continue
34 contributing in ways that benefit everyone. This too contributes to the overall develop-
ment of effective social community programs.

Community Moderation: Best Practices

Jake McKee, Chief Strategy Officer at Ant’s Eye View (as well as the Technical Editor for this book)
offers a great interview with community moderation experts Joe Cotrell and Jay Bryant. Check
out this interview, and consider following Jake (@jakemckee) on Twitter.

http://www.communityguy.com/1626/ocrn-online-moderation-best-practices-
interview

In addition to Jake’s blog, The Community Roundtable is a great resource for community manag-
ers: the link below leads to a solid discussion of community management considerations and best
practices. You can follow Community Report principals Rachel Happe (@rhappe) and Jim Storer
(@jstorer) on Twitter.

http://community-roundtable.com/2010/01/the-value-of-community-management

You Are What You Post

Curation, which was touched on previously, is often presented in the context of con-
tent, rating a photo or commenting on or scoring an article. As briefly noted, curation
also occurs between community participants: In the context of the community par-
ticipants, curation occurs between members with regard to contributions and behav-
ior. Members are voted up and down or otherwise ranked according to the relative
value of the quality of their contributions and impact or value of their participation as