Brands must make right judgement on UGC moderation

Rob Marcus, director of Chat Moderators, has responded to the backlash against Honda removing negative comments from its Facebook page.

I would urge brands to weigh up the pros and cons before making such a move themselves.

By accepting a certain level of criticism from members of its forum, but not all, Honda is protecting its reputation but still allowing users to voice their opinions freely.

Honda is playing it exactly right.

Too many brands are put off of experimenting with social media by making the wrong assumption that they have to live with whatever is contributed.

The truth of the matter is that audiences expect unreasoned rants and abusive postings to be removed.

Honda should surely be applauded for having a policy in place regarding user-generated content, and for applying it.

Other brands should follow this example and not be afraid to get involved with social media, as long as they make the right judgements when it comes to moderation.

Having a heavy-handed approach to moderation may alienate users but an overly slack scheme can result in libellous or defamatory comments being made and associated with your brand.

Chat Moderators offers a number of tips to help organisations maintain a successful social media initiative.

Once you have settled on your social media objective, you will be well placed to choose which platform for UGC will suit you best; for example social networking profiles/comments, blogs, story comments, forums, chat rooms, picture galleries.

Escalation procedures will need to be established early on.

The 'what if' scenarios do occur from time to time and you need to know in advance how to handle them.

Whether you are using an in-house moderator or outsourcing the job, there needs to be a stringent set of moderation guidelines.

These may differ from organisation to organisation but should be followed at all times.

How prescriptive are you going to be about the content you are happy to publish on behalf of your customers and prospects? In many cases, the tighter the brief the less attractive the social media initiative will prove to your audience.

However, most users would expect abusive or defamatory comments to be removed and this will highlight the level of the brand's responsibility.

Come down fairly, but swiftly and heavily, on trolls.

Some people are just out there purely to ruin the social media experience for others and in these instances the comments should be dealt with immediately.

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