ANALYSIS
Employees or an external agency:
Who should handle your social
media presence?
management personnel, materials and unique company insights.
Author: Damjan Dano, IWM Network, Ltd.
The ongoing debate on whether to insource or outsource your organization’s social media presence
is nothing new. One side argues that outsourcing a
company’s social media presence is risky and even
unethical, since the whole point of social media presence is to give direct access to company resources.
The other side argues that a serious social media
presence requires specialized skills and attention that
aren’t generally available in-house.
Clearly, companies need to believe that paying for
external services brings value they could not generate with existing resources. In short, there is no right
answer; it depends on a company’s specific situation,
goals it wants to achieve and the level of resources it
has available.
In-House
Pros: The pro-“in-house” argument is that social
media communications must be handled by someone who knows the business in detail, has experience
and relevant industry knowledge and easy access to
Emerging Macedonia Fall 2014 Issue 43
Cons: Most managers think that handling a company’s social media presence is about taking a few minutes to post a few status updates. With this in mind,
they delegate the responsibility of managing their
social media profile to a lower level employee who
already has a full-time job. The truth is that it requires
significant knowledge, time and focus to manage
social profiles, post daily content that will engage an
audience, answer questions and moderate discussions from customers online. If this responsibility is
treated as an insignificant, part-time job for someone with no management connections, a company’s
social media presence is bound to suffer.
Outsourcing
Pros: To execute a successful social media strategy,
you need a combination of industry knowledge and
relevant social media experience, design, unique
content, video production, public relations savvy,
the ability and tools to quickly handle the occasional
“troll” (i.e., people that just want to