All companies have a known and unknown social media presence whether they are aware of it or not. The large majority of companies have corporate social media accounts that they own and operate, however in addition they have a variety of other accounts that they may not know about. These unknown accounts can include impersonation accounts, brand smashing accounts, or employees using social media on behalf of the company without the company’s knowledge. Our DAST (Discover, Analyze, Secure, Test) process ensures that you will start to secure your digital footprint. The first step is Discover: There are three steps every company should take in order to identify, discover, and control their digital and social media landscape:... Read more »

There are 2.3 billion active social media users worldwide. A new Facebook profile is added every six seconds and there are over 80 million photos uploaded to Instagram every day.  With staggering numbers like these, it is inevitable that companies feel overwhelmed just thinking about their social media presence. In the age of social media, we are constantly operating in a state of social chaos, there is constant communication, networking, marketing, lead generation, sales and many other activities all happening simultaneously. In order to make sense of this social chaos and convert it into a well-organization and easily digestible social media presence, organizations need to take the following steps:... Read more »

According to Facebook’s 10-K Annual Report, approximately 2% of all Facebook accounts (approximately 24 million total) are “undesirable”, meaning they spam or otherwise violate Facebook's terms of service. Of the 300 million Instagram users, more than 10 million, or 1 in 12, are fake. As the problem of fake accounts emerge across all social media networks, it is becoming increasingly important for companies to be aware of the social media risks caused by unauthorized accounts using their brand name. In addition, it’s important for companies to have the ability to take action on these unauthorized social media accounts in order to instantaneously remediate these social media risks.  The types of social media risk most commonly associated with unauthorized accounts are:... Read more »

There are a variety of different solutions on the market that seemingly fit the social media “compliance” bill. We often get asked: Which approach to compliance is most appropriate for a company? How a company knows what they really need to ensure their social media efforts are compliant? There are two options when it comes to social media compliance, which we refer to as basic and active compliance.... Read more »

The Rise of Malware on Social Media... Read more »

Five years ago when social media began to find its way into corporate marketing plans, countless social media publishing tools emerged. As companies within highly regulated industries also began to adopt social media for business, publishing tools had to scramble to find a solution for the compliance piece of the puzzle. As a quick fix, they created a way to check a post for risky keywords through the publishing tool itself but as corporate social media evolved, the need for complete compliance, regardless of the source of the post, became a necessity. In addition, regulatory bodies began to release guidelines for social media use and keyword identification was no longer a sufficient solution for enterprise social media compliance needs. The main focus of a social media publishing tool is and has always been marketing. Compliance was always an afterthought and now companies are starting to realize the difference between a social media publishing tool and a social media compliance tool. Here are three primary reasons why traditional social media publishing tools are being replaced or supplemented by new age social media compliance tools:... Read more »

The global pharmaceutical market is a $300 billion dollar industry, which is expected to grow to $400 billion in the next three years. The size and revenue of the industry has enabled pharmaceutical companies to make a significant impact on public health by partnering with community organizations and government agencies to launch non-product-related health initiatives. There are currently 2.1 billion people on social networks worldwide, thereby making it the preferred method for pharma companies to launch these health initiatives. Social media has provided pharma companies with the opportunity to connect with patients through online communities while simultaneously enhancing brand image and providing relevant health information to the public.... Read more »

The traditional pharmaceutical buying cycle (represented below) has two linear paths from manufactures creating drugs to patients receiving drugs from pharmacies.  Conversations were traditionally one dimensional, however social media has changed the dynamic and is now allowing pharmaceutical companies to impact the conversation from many different angles.... Read more »

What can you say about your product in 10 seconds? If you don’t know, it is time to figure it out.  Ten seconds of 100% customer engagement is the secret sauce behind the rise of the popular social network, Snapchat, which is now reportedly valued at $19 billion. Snapchat CEO and Co-Founder, Evan Spiegel, recently confirmed the company has plans for an IPO. Just two years ago Snapchat turned down a $3 billion acquisition offer by Facebook and since then, the social network has continued to grow rapidly. A $19 billion valuation would make Snapchat the third most valuable tech start-up that is not publicly traded.... Read more »

Social media is a tool that is becoming increasingly more important within the Healthcare and Life Sciences industry. Social collaboration works with the line of business, speeds employee engagement and fosters innovation. Within customer relationship management systems (CRMs), there are many features that enable a workforce to be social and collaborate, however there are always compliance concerns surrounding what employees will say within a CRM system that could potentially cause harm to the company in terms of regulatory violations and fines. Pharma, Biotech, and Medical Device companies commonly choose to enforce a dropdown approach which prevents free text from being entered into a CRM, however dropdowns provide a false sense of comfort for compliance.  Just because an employee can’t enter information into a CRM system, that doesn’t mean the comment or note isn’t being recorded via another medium that is out of sight of compliance. There are many reasons social CRMs are actually much less risky than dropdowns:... Read more »