CorpComms Magazine

Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer has rolled out a 'social media playbook' which offers advice to employees on how to handle comments on social networking sites and not embarrass themselves or the company.

The company has also launched a blog response flowchart, which is being adopted by Pfizer in North America and Canada, is based on a version originally produced by the US Air Force.

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The 'assess, evaluate, respond' chart offers advice on reaching out to 'congenial, positive, agreeable, truthful posts' and to 'fix the facts' when a post is 'misguided' and contains inaccurate facts.

If a stakeholder has posted about a 'negative experience', the chart recommends either contacting the social media lead to 'initiate rapid response' or acknowledging a problem, if the complaint is product related, and 'offer off-line discussion and contact info'.

The playbook has been rolled out all corporate communicators and webmasters at Pfizer, which is holding social media webinars to evolve the playbook into an interactive digital tool.

Kate Bird, digital communications strategy director at Pfizer, told a recent conference that the big question for the company was how to engage in social media dialogues 'in a mindful, respectful and transparent way'.

The social playbook also includes examples of best practice, both from within Pfizer and other organisations; templates for employees to use for their responses and other tools to help staff communicate.

Bird said the playbook had been launched because some employees were nervous of social media. 'We didn't want them to be intimidated,' she said. 'It's part of our everyday life. It's only going to become an even greater part of our everyday life,' she added.

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