This guest post is written by Shelby Benkert, an intern at Vanguard Communications.
Unlike most college students, I tend to shy away from many social media networks. Facebook is my go-to in order to stay in touch with my friends, and I rarely use anything else. I do have a Twitter account, but I have never tweeted. I’ve logged on only a handful of times just to check the profiles of the celebrities I am “following.” With the vast selection of social networking tools, I find myself reluctant to enter into a world where you are constantly connected. After reading an article about Foursquare usage written for Mediaite.com, I realize that my hesitation comes from the fact that I simply don’t want people knowing every aspect of my life.
From Flickr User Trucknroll
As a self-proclaimed “Facebook stalker,” I pride myself on being able to gather any and all information about someone just by viewing their profile. With features like “wall-to-walls,” tagged pictures, photo and wall comments, status updates, and the ever popular “Like” button, Facebook has become, now more than ever, a means of gathering information about someone. In five minutes you can find out somebody’s current location, schools they’ve attended, their place of work, and group of friends. Dig some more and you’ll know about their romantic relationships (both past and present), where they spent their spring break four years ago, and about their Cocker Spaniel named Sallie. And surprisingly, all this information is available about somebody you may not even be “friends” with.
While I think Foursquare co-founder Dennis Crowley has come up with an innovative idea, Foursquare and other social networking sites must be used cautiously. Foursquare has expanded past where to go on a Saturday night to include which Starbucks you get your coffee at on a Monday morning, and where your weekly meeting is held on Wednesday afternoons. Indeed, see past InSites posts from Brandi Horton and Chris Connelly looking at the applications of Foursquare for advocacy work. All this “checking-in” has lead me to ask the question, how much information is too much? And furthermore, how safe are you being when constantly updating your information?
Communicators should be aware of the privacy settings that exist on such social networks to understand what information people are, and are not, making available to the public. What’s more, privacy concerns extend to organizational profiles as well as personal settings. We must learn how to use privacy settings appropriately in order to control what information we share on behalf of ourselves and our clients. The consequences of not using privacy settings appropriately are wide ranging. They can be as small as somebody learning how old you really are – or as big as being fired by a client for revealing sensitive information.
So, how do we keep these negative consequences from happening? Here are a few tips to keep you safe and avoid the thin line between staying connected and over-sharing information:
- Check your privacy settings – Make sure that your profile isn’t open for everyone to view and that the information you put up can only be seen by your “friends.” If you work with a client on a social networking site, determine what privacy settings they will need in advance to meet their goals, serve their audiences, and deliver their messages.
- Be picky when it comes to choosing your friends – Have a plan for how you will deal with friend requests. The ideal profile is one where you know all of your friends, that way you are not giving out information to people who you don’t know. Personally, make sure you don’t just accept anyone who sends you a friend request. For clients, make an advance decision on how you’ll deal with requests from supporters – there are times where you may not want to be associated with certain accounts, and you’ll want to know how to deal with this when the issue arises.
- Be careful with what information you put on your profile – Social networking sites save all your activities. Before putting something on a profile, make sure it is something you won’t mind others seeing today, tomorrow, or 15 years from now. Also keep in mind, employers also look at profiles.
- Limit your location-based status activity – When talking about where you are and where you’re going, be sure to avoid giving too much detail. You never know when a random friend request has fallen through the cracks, so don’t allow people the ability to trace your every move. This could lead to dangerous situations. You’d rather be safe than sorry! What’s more, make sure location-based updates make sense for a client before activating these features on networks like Twitter or Google. If you don’t have a need for a location-based feature, there isn’t a reason to use it.
