Social Information

Filtering
Unit V
Social Information Filtering

• An information filtering system is a system that uses semi-automated or computerized

methods to remove redundant or unnecessary information from an information stream before
presenting it to a human user.
• Its main goal is to manage information overload and increase the semantic signal-to-noise
ratio. For this purpose the user's profile is compared with some reference characteristics.
• One way to find useful information among all the links, news, videos, and photos posted each
day is to rely on other people to find it for us.
• Social sharing and social filtering use the interests of others, especially friends on social
networks, to highlight information that is more likely to be of interest
Social Share

• Social Share refers to the action of distributing, posting, or reposting content to one's
own social media platform or other digital channels.

• The content can be in various forms, including text, images, videos, and links.

• The act of sharing content allows others to view and engage with it, thus increasing
its reach and exposure.
Benefits of Social Sharing

Enhanced visibility and Reach:

• Social sharing can significantly extend a piece of content’s reach, especially when it comes to
sharable content like blog posts or linkbait.

• Link Bait (also called “linkbait”) is the process of creating content designed to attract backlinks.
Common types of Link Bait content include controversial content, data, guides and
newsworthy pieces.

• As users share content, it gains visibility, potentially leading to increased website traffic.
Benefits of Social Sharing

User engagement and trust:

When users share content, it acts as a personal endorsement, building trust in the brand
or website.

This trust can translate into higher engagement rates, improved user signals and
potentially increased sales.
Benefits of Social Sharing

Backlink generation:

Shared content can generate backlinks as other websites may reference it.

These backlinks are crucial for SEO as they contribute to a website's authority and
ranking on search engines.
Increasing Social Shares

There are a number of things that can be done to increase social shares for a blog post or
other web page

1) Create shareable content:

By making sure content is relevant, engaging, and provides value to your audience,
engagement can be improved.

2) Use compelling visuals:

Images and videos can significantly enhance a piece of content’s shareability.
Visuals capture attention and can convey a message more effectively than text alone.
Increasing Social Shares

3) Craft catchy headlines : A post’s headline is the first thing users see. A compelling
headline can entice users to click on and share content.

4) Engage with the audience : Engaging with an audience by responding to comments,

participating in discussions, and acknowledging feedback can foster a sense of
community and encourage more shares.

5) Promote sharing on multiple platforms : While it's essential to focus on platforms

relevant to an audience, there is generally more than one platform that a target
audience uses. Promote sharing across multiple social media platforms to increase a
piece of content's reach.
Risks associated with social sharing

Alongside the many benefits, there are also some risks associated with social
sharing.

Negative publicity: Negative reactions on social media can spread rapidly.

Companies must be prepared to address criticism constructively to mitigate
potential damage to their reputation.

Content misalignment: If the content is not aligned with the audience's interests
or is poorly executed, it can lead to disengagement or negative perceptions of
the brand.
Automated Recommendation System

• A recommender system is a machine learning method that suggests relevant content

to users based on their characteristics or historical behavior within the system.

• These solutions have become increasingly popular among e-commerce, advertising,

entertainment and, more recently, training apps and platforms.

• Popular examples of recommender systems include apps such as Spotify and Netflix,
where the system learns and recommends songs or movies based on the probability
of the user liking the content, or Amazon, which suggests products based on your
browsing, purchase history or relevance to intended purchases.
How does a Recommendation System Work?

Recommendation systems use specialized algorithms and machine learning solutions.

Driven by the automated configuration, coordination, and management of machine learning predictive
analytics algorithms, the recommendation system can wisely select which filters to apply to a particular
user's specific situation.

It facilitates marketers to maximize conversions and average order value.

Recommender systems can forecast user ratings, even before they have provided one, making them
an effective tool. Mainly, a recommendation system processes data through four phases

1. Collection
2. Storing
3. Analyzing
4. Filtering
How does a Recommendation System Work?

Collection
Data collected can be explicit (ratings and comments on products) or implicit (page views, order
history, etc.).

Storing
The type of data used to create recommendations can help you decide the kind of storage you should
use- NoSQL database, object storage, or standard SQL database.

Analyzing
The recommender system finds items with similar user engagement data after analysis.

Filtering
This is the last step where data gets filtered to access the relevant information required to provide
recommendations to the user. To enable this, you will need to choose an algorithm suiting the
recommendation system.
Benefits of Automated Recommendation
System
Types of Recommendation Systems

• Collaborative Filtering
• Content Based
• Hybrid
• By Content Similarity
• By Latent factor Modelling
• By Topic modelling
• By Popular content promotion
 Types of Recommendation Systems

Collaborative Filtering

The collaborative filtering

method is based on gathering
and analyzing data on user’s
behavior.
This includes the user’s online
activities and predicting what
they will like based on the
similarity with other users.
 Types of Recommendation Systems

Content Based
Content-based filtering methods
are based on the description of a
product and a profile of the user’s
preferred choices.
In this recommendation system,
products are described using
keywords, and a user profile is
built to express the kind of item
this user likes.
Types of Recommendation Systems

Hybrid
In hybrid recommendation systems, products
are recommended using both content-based
and collaborative filtering simultaneously to
suggest a broader range of products to
customers.
This recommendation system is up-and-
coming and is said to provide more accurate
recommendations than other recommender
systems.
Types of Recommendation Systems

By Content Similarity
As the most basic type of content-based recommendation system, this strategy
involves recommending that is close based on its metadata.

This approach makes sense for catalogs with a lot of rich metadata and where
traffic is low compared to the number of products in the catalog.
Types of Recommendation Systems

By Latent factor Modelling

Going one step further than the content similarity approach, the crux of this
strategy is inferring Individual inherent interests by assuming that previous
choices are indicative of certain tastes or hobbies.
Where the previous strategy is based on explicit, manually filled catalog
metadata, this strategy hinges on discovering implicit relationships. This is done
by using the history of users' larger interactions (e.g., movie watched, item
purchased etc.) to learn these tastes
Types of Recommendation Systems

By Topic modelling

This is a variant of the Latent Factor Modeling strategy, whereby instead of

considering users' larger actions, one would infer interests by analyzing
unstructured text to detect particular topics of interest.

It is particularly interesting for use cases with rich but unstructured textual
information (such as news articles).
Types of Recommendation Systems

By Popular content promotion

This involves highlighting product recommendations based on the product's

intrinsic features that may make it interesting to a wide audience: price, feature,
popularity, etc.

This strategy can also take into account the freshness or age of the content and
thus enable using the most trendy content for recommendations. This is often
used in cases where new content is the majority.
Recommendation System Advantages

• Drive Traffic: A recommendation engine can bring traffic to

your site. It accomplishes this with customized e-mail
messages and targeted blasts.

• Provide Relevant Material : By analyzing the customer's

present site use and his previous browsing history, a
recommendation engine can deliver appropriate product
suggestions as he stores. The data is gathered in real- time
so the software can respond as his shopping habits change
Recommendation System Advantages

• Engage Customers : Consumers end up being more engaged in the

website when individualized item recommendations are made. They
are able to dive even more deeply into the product line without
needing to cany out search after search.
• Transform Shoppers to Clients: Converting buyers into consumers
takes an unique touch. Individualized communications from a
recommendation engine reveal your customer that he is valued as an
individual. In tum this engenders his loyalty.
• Increase Average Order Value: Average order values generally go
up when a recommendation engine in uses to show tailored
alternatives. Advanced metrics and reporting can definitively reveal the
efficiency of a project.
 Recommendation System Advantages

• Boost Number of Items per Order: In addition to the average order value rising,
the number of products per order likewise typically increases when a
recommendation engine is used. When the customer is revealed options that fulfill
his interest, he is most likely to add choices to his purchase.

• Control Retailing and Inventory Rules: A recommendation engine can add your
very own marketing and Inventory control directives to the customer's profile to
feature items that are promotionally prices, on clearance or overstocked. It offers
you're the versatility to regulate exactly what items are highlighted by the
recommendation system.

• Lower Work and Overhead: The volume of data required to create an individual
shopping experience for each customer is typically far too huge to be handled
manually. Utilizing an engine automates this process, reducing the workload of your
IT staff and your spending plan.
 Recommendation System Advantages

• Provide Reports: Providing guides is an integral part of a personalization system.

Providing the client precise and up to the minute reporting permits him to make solid
choices about his website and the direction of a project.

• Offer Recommendations and Direction: An experienced carrier can provide

suggestions on ways to utilize the data gathered and reported to the customer. Acting
as a partner and a consultant, the supplier needs to have the expertise to assist direct
the e commerce site to a prosperous future.
Application of Automated Recommendation
System

Recommendation systems are powerful applications in industries such as:

• Retail and e-commerce​​

• Entertainment subscription services – content recommendation​
• Travel sector and hyper-personalization of products and services​​
• News websites and social networks​
• Banking and financial services for new products​​
 Recommendation System - Applicable areas
Industries that stand to gain from recommendation systems

1. E-Commerce - Is an industry where recommendation systems were first widely used. With millions
of customers and data on their online behaviour, e-commerce companies are best suited to
generate accurate recommendations.

1. Retail - Shopping data is the most valuable data as it is the most direct data point on a customer’s
intent. Retailers with troves of shopping data are at the forefront of companies making accurate
recommendations.

1. Media - Similar to e-commerce, media businesses are one of the first to jump into
recommendations. It is difficult to see a news site without a recommendation system.
 Recommendation System - Applicable areas
Industries that stand to gain from recommendation systems

4. Banking - A mass-market product that is consumed digitally by millions. Banking for the masses
and SMEs are prime for recommendations. Knowing a customer’s detailed financial situation, along
with their past preferences, coupled with data of thousands of similar users, is quite powerful.

4. Telecom - It Shares similar dynamics with banking. Telcos have access to millions of customers
whose every interaction is recorded. Their product range is also rather limited compared to other
industries, making recommendations in telecom an easier problem.

4. Utilities - Similar dynamics with telecom, but utilities have an even narrower range of products,
making recommendations rather simple.
 Examples from companies that use a recommendation
engine

1. Amazon.com - Amazon.com uses item-to-item collaborative filtering recommendations on most

pages of their website and e-mail campaigns. According to Sources, 35% of Amazon purchases are
thanks to recommendation systems.

2. Netflix - Netflix is another data-driven company that leverages recommendation systems to boost
customer satisfaction. The same source we mentioned above highlights that 75% of Netflix viewing is
driven by recommendations.

3. Spotify - Every week, Spotify generates a new customized playlist for each subscriber called
“Discover Weekly” which is a personalized list of 30 songs based on users’ unique music tastes.

4. Linkedin - Just like any other social media channel, LinkedIn also uses “You may also know” or
“You may also like” types of recommendations.
 Social Media and Business Alignment

• Business alignment is the process an organization can use to ensure that systems and elements work
together to support long-term goals. Strategic alignments often bring together all areas of a company,
including : Allocation of management systems and resources to support business goals, such as
increasing profits or retaining customers.

• There are many different elements to business alignment, all of which work together to align with the
company's core purpose and ensure that it is understood by all employees.

• The business alignment process also includes eliminating parts of the business that do not support long-
term goals.

• This allows you to streamline your business and make your processes more efficient. Ultimately, aligning
your business increases productivity and improves business outcomes.
 Types of Business Alignment

1. Business-IT alignment

2. Alignment of management systems

3. Alignment of resources

4. Alignment of communication

5. Reward and recognition

Types of Business Alignment

1.Business-IT alignment:

• Business-IT alignment refers to aligning IT systems with the business to

achieve long term goals.

• Business IT alignment enables IT to align strategy with the business

leadership team.

• Such coordination allows the IT department to leverage its technical

expertise to update computer systems and quickly correct technical issues
as they arise to efficiently and effectively meet business objectives.
 Types of Business Alignment

2. Alignment of management systems

• A company's management systems include the systems it uses to operate, such

as processes and policies.
• Businesses use management systems to automate tasks and record data,
making them a fundamental part of their business.
• By connecting management systems, you can establish standard operating
procedures for each system and give employees clear instructions in various
situations. This can further increase the efficiency of your company.
• For example, coordinating an organization's management system requires
establishing a clear policy for managing documents. This allows employees to
quickly and easily find documents when they need them, giving them more time
to focus on other tasks instead of searching for resources.
 Types of Business Alignment

3. Alignment of resources

• The business coordination process can also include how the company
allocates resources such as budgets.
• In an aligned organization, all resources meet organizational goals and
support the organization's long-term objectives.
• This means that funds are only allocated to projects that directly support
the company's goals. In this way, strategic alignment helps companies
avoid wasting money and other resources
 Types of Business Alignment

4. Alignment of communication

• Strategic alignment also helps clarify communications between a company's

employees and between the company and its customers.
• Coordinating communications includes developing standard business and
product definitions and language so that everyone involved in the business
uses the same language and tone.
• Another aspect of coordinating communications is creating open lines of
communication with employees to ensure everyone is aware of important
news and events.
• For example, you can create a weekly newsletter to distribute important
information on a regular basis.
 Types of Business Alignment

5. Reward and recognition

• Business integrity also includes how companies reward and recognize their
employees. Motivate your employees by rewarding top performers in your
organization.
• You can also create a system to ensure that how you reward your employees,
such as salaries and commissions, is aligned with your organization's goals.
• This helps organizations allocate resources appropriately and create specific
policies for rewards.
 Three steps to align your social media
marketing to your business goal
1.Set your marketing goal:
For example, conversion goals can inclde video views, social interactions, PDF downloads,
newsletter singups, link clicks, filled-out contact forms, online purchase and more.

2. Identify the social media platforms

Your social media goals shold help you to determine the right channels to use. Depending on
your industry or product, your audience may prefer various platforms to others. For example,
most audience interested in fashion are more active on Instagram than on Twitter or LinkedIn.

3. Track & Report Your Campaigns

Finally, it's crucial to track you campaigns and tweak them for the best performance.
You should track every campaign you launch, the activities done, the cost of ads, time spent,
etc. You can use different tools to track the campaigns; from free ones like Google Analytics to
paid ones like Social bakers.
Strategic plan for alignment of Social Media
in Business Sector
 KPI

• KPI stand for key performance Indicators. In Social Media & Business Sectors KPIs to
determine performance over time, see if goals are being met and analyse whether changes
need to be made.

• Social media KPIs are the metrics used to determine if a business's social media marketing
strategy is effective. Basically, they're tracked data related to a company's presence on
individual platforms like Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, or across all social platforms
collectively.

• Social media metrics are the numbers you look at to see if your strategy is working and
meeting your goals. Metrics and KPIs by themselves don't tell the whole story. It's the
combination of several KPIs that will help you see if you're reaching the goal you want.
Roles for
building
Social
Media KPI
 KPI

• The KPIs listed below are grouped by category.

• Specific: Be as clear as possible. For example, do you hope to increase the brand's Facebook follower
count by 500 in the next month? Do you want to increase your click through rates by 20% by the end of the
year"

• Measurable: Will you be able to track and quantify your progress? For example during a monthly check in,
you should be able to determine how close you are to meeting the goal.

• Attainable: Keep it real. Set KPIs that are within an achievable scope

• Relevant: Make sure each social media KPI connects to the business's larger goals

• Timely: What's the timeframe for achieving this goal and determining whether success has been met? One
month, six months, one year?
Aligning
analytics with
business
objectives
Social Media Alignment Matrix
 Role of CIO and IT Management

• Senior IT executives, particularly the CIO, play an important role in

envisioning and creating aligned social media analytics strategy.
• The CIO is the person in charge of managing and aligning information
communications technologies (ICTs) to achieve business-wide goals.
• The role of CIO has evolved from a technical guru to an informed leader,
communicator, and strategic thinker.
• For a sustained strategic IT–business goals alignment, a CIO should
possess the skills and competences – Mentioned on next slide
Role of CIO and IT Management

Strategic Thinking and Evaluation

✓ Business and policy reasoning
✓ IT investment for value creation
✓ Performance assessment
✓ Evaluation and adjustment

Systems Orientation
✓ Environmental awareness
✓ System and social dynamics
✓ Stakeholders and users
✓ Business processes
✓ Information flow and workflow
Role of CIO and IT Management

Appreciation for Complexity

✓ Communication
✓ Negotiation
✓ Cross-boundary relationships
✓ Risk assessment and management
✓ Problem solving

Information Stewardship
✓ Information policies
✓ Data management
✓ Data quality
✓ Information sharing and integration
✓ Records management
✓ Information preservation
Formulating a social media strategy

The purpose of formulating social media strategy is to create

rules and procedures to align your social media engagement
with business goals.
Steps in formulating a social media strategy

• Get Hold of an Executive Champion

• Build a Cross-Functional Team
• Assess your organizational culture
• Review your current social media presence
• Determine your objectives
• Aligning social media goals with business goals
• Develop your content strategy
• Platform strategy
• Resource considerations
Steps in formulating a social media strategy

Get Hold of an Executive Champion

• For any organizational strategy formulation and implementation, the sponsorship
of a senior-level executive is crucial.
• The most important factor for success in social media analytics is not technology,
but leadership and top management commitment.
• Success is possible only when the transformation is steered through strong
leadership: setting direction, building momentum, and ensuring the
disciplined execution of an inspiring vision and ambitious plans.
• It usually is the head of the department or the government chief information
officer (GCIO). Enlisting the support of a champion is crucial for your social
media efforts to be fruitful.
• A champion should have several attributes including, power, vision, resources,
and willingness to sacrifice, and persistence to support the change
Steps in formulating a social media strategy

Build a Cross-Functional Team

• The first step in formulating a social media strategy is to create a cross-
functional team with senior management members from all the
departments, including the IT department.
• Ideally, this team should be led by a CIO.
• Having a cross-functional team will make sure that all the stakeholders
have their say and have the ownership of the social media analytics
initiative.
Steps in formulating a social media strategy

Assess your organizational culture

• Understanding organization’s vision, values, norms, systems, assumptions,
and beliefs about social media is very crucial.
• Is your organization ready to embrace social media analytics?
• What are the organization’s assumptions and beliefs about social media
analytics?
• Embracing social media in all aspect of business will require organizational
cultural transformation at all levels.
• For example, The Organizational Culture Assessment Instrument (OCAI) is
free tool for diagnosing organizational culture and Culture Builder Toolkit
developed by Corporate Culture Pros.
Steps in formulating a social media strategy

Review your current social media presence

• Before formulating a social media strategy, you need to document your current social
media use and presence. You may start by asking the team members about their current
social media status and by conducting a search for social media pages representing your
organization.
• The best way to do it would be to arrange small, interactive seminars.
• Your objective is find out all the officially sanctioned and unauthorized social media
outlets, including blogs, wikis, fan pages, and Twitter pages that use your organization’s
name.
• Documenting your current status will help you streamline your social media presence.
• This activity will become a basis for your organizational “as-is” state and for
understanding your current social media use and strategic positioning.
Steps in formulating a social media strategy

Determine your objectives

• Having understood the current stage of your social media presence, the next
step will be to create a list of the objectives and goals that you want to
achieve through your social media presence.
• With a clear idea of what you want to accomplish with social media, you are
likely to put together a sound social media strategy.
Steps in formulating a social media strategy

Some commonly identified objectives by governments.

• To share news, alerts, and updates through mainstream social media
platforms, including Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.
• To implement a participatory platform (e.g., blog) where customers can
submit ideas and suggestions and providing them the opportunity to
participate in business strategy making.
• To increase awareness about products/services by disseminating information
on social media platforms.
• To attract customers by driving traffic from social media platforms to
corporate websites.
• To network and engage in dialogue with customers.
Steps in formulating a social media strategy

Aligning social media goals with business goals

• Aligning social media goals with business goals is vital.
• In addition to each goal being specific, realistic, and measurable, it should
be aligned with the existing business goals and strategy.
• If the organizational goal is to network with customers via social media
platforms, the social media strategy should be designed to facilitate this
objective.
Steps in formulating a social media strategy

Develop your content strategy

• Developing a sound content strategy will make sure you know what to post, when to post, and how
to post.
• Content strategy is tied to your goals and only the content that supports your goals should be
developed and posted.

A sound content strategy should at minimum answer the following questions.

✓ What type of content should we post to social media; for example, news, updates, alerts?
✓ How often should we post the content? Daily or weekly?
✓ Who will create the content?
✓ Is the content approved by the organization?
✓ Who will respond to follow-up suggestions and comments?
✓ How will the feedback be handled?
 Steps in formulating a social media strategy

Platform strategy
• Platform strategy should detail the type of social media platform utilized to
achieve your objectives.
• Your platform selection decision is tied to your business goals and objectives.
• If your aim is to share news, alerts, and updates, you may choose existing
mainstream social media platforms, such as Twitter, Facebook, and
YouTube.
• However, if you are looking for a platform to crowd-source ideas, a purpose-
built Web 2.0 platform may be needed.
Steps in formulating a social media strategy

Resource considerations
• It is crucial to understand your desired level of social media engagement, as it
will determine the type of resources (technical, human, and financial) you will
need to pursue the goals.
• For example, if your goal is to establish an idea- generation platform to solicit
creative ideas, in-house, purpose-built platform may be needed.
• Bear in mind that establishing and sustaining even a simple Facebook fan page
needs considerable planning and human, financial, and technical resources.
• For example, it requires regular updates, answers to customer complaints and
comments, and extraction and analysis of the data (e.g., tweets or comments) for
better decision making.
Establish a social media ownership plan and
policy

• A social media ownership plan and policy should outline the relative rights and
responsibilities of employers and employees.
• Ownership plans covers social media ownership in terms of both accounts and
activities such as accounts themselves, individual and pages profiles, platform
content, and posting activity.
• Policies related to social media clarify issues related to personal and professional
use, trade secrets, intellectual property, confidentiality
• The guidelines touch on the following areas related to social media ownership
• Agency accounts and profiles—This part of the ownership plan deals with all
the social media accounts and activities, such as accounts themselves, individual
and page profiles, platform content, and posting activity.
• Ideally, all the agency social media profiles should be owned the agency.
Establish a social media ownership plan and
policy

• Individual profiles—Employees’ social media profiles are owned by the

individuals, but for the sake of agency reputation, governments should provide
all employees with guidelines about how they should represent themselves on
social media.
• Contact information—Social media allows people to have multiple contact
addresses (e.g., e-mail), and this policy should specify which contact the
employee should display on their personal profile. A good practice is that
employees include both a personal and a professional address.
• Contacts—This policy should specify the rules for social media contacts made
during the employment period (e.g., through LinkedIn).
• For example, you might specify that the contacts made are joint property, but
that employees can keep their contacts after leaving the organization.
• However, organizations should have an internal system or mechanism to capture
the important contacts.
Establish a social media ownership plan and
policy

• Comments—Ownership strategy should also provide policies and

guidelines on whether and how employees can comment on a variety of
social media platforms.
For example, when commenting, employees should make it clear whether
they are commenting on behalf of the agency or expressing their personal
thoughts.

• Posting—What should and should not be posted to the social media

platform is covered here. Clearly defining posting rules can help avoid
issues with trade secrets, intellectual property, confidentiality, defamation,
etc.
Establish a social media ownership plan and
policy

Groups—Organizations may establish policies and guidelines about the

kind of groups employees can join or be members of.
Allowing employees to join groups that promote your business goals is
encouraged.

Privacy settings—By setting guidelines for social media privacy settings,

agencies may encourage employees to set their social media privacy
settings in the best interest of the both individuals and the agency.
Managing social media risks

• Risk, in simple words, is the possibility of losing something of value such

as, intellectual or physical capital. “risk is a function of the likelihood of a
given threat- source’s exercising a particular potential vulnerability, and the
resulting impact of that adverse event on the organization.”

• Social media–related risks needs to be managed properly, both from the

strategic and technological points of view.

• To minimize the damage, organizations need proactive, rather than

reactive, social media risk-management strategy.
Managing social media risks

A simple but effective way to proactively manage social media risks is

through the social media crisis management loop which includes four
iterative steps:

1) Identify,
2) Access,
3) Mitigate,
4) Evaluate.
Social Media Risk-management Framework
Risk Identification

• Risk identification is the process of identifying social media threats in

terms of vulnerabilities and exploits that could potentially inhibit your
organization from achieving its objectives.
• At this stage, your goal is to identify potential accidental or malicious risks
that can come from within or outside the company.
• Examples of social media–related security breaches are hacking,
information leaks, phishing, and impersonation.
• Phishing and hacking are examples of malicious outsider attacks.
Risk Identification

The main social media risks identified were

1) Damage to reputation,
2) Release of confidential information,
3) Legal, regulatory, and compliance violations,
4) Identity theft and hijacking,
5) Loss of intellectual property.

Other potential social media risks include malware, loss of privacy, and
social engineering attacks.
Risk Assessment

• Risk assessment is “the process of assessing the probabilities and

consequences of risk events if they are realized” .
• The risk assessment process determines the likelihood of a social media
risk event that could impact the organization economically, technically,
politically, and socially.
• The potential risks identified in the earlier step are priorities and ranked
based on probability of occurrence and impact on an organization.
• Probability (P) is the likelihood of occurrence of a risk event and can take
a value from 0 to 1. Probability can, for example, be assigned to risks
events as follows.
Risk Assessment
Risk Assessment

Impact of a risk event can be characterized as

1) Severe,
2) Significant,
3) Moderate,
4) Minor, or
5) Minimal.
Risk Assessment

A risk event is considered severe, for example, if it has devastating

economical, technological, political, or social impact on your agency.
And a risk is considered minimal if its impact is very low or negligible.
Based on the impact and probability, social media risks can be prioritized as

1) High,
2) Medium,
3) Low
Risk Assessment

High priority risks—The risks that, if they happen, will have severe
economic, technological, political, or social impact on your agency.
These are the risks that needs immediate attention and should be managed
carefully.

Medium priority risks—The medium-probability risks that, if they happen,

will have considerable economic, technological, political, or social impact on
your agency.

Low priority risks—The low probability risks that, if they happen, will have
low economic, technological, political, or social impact on your agency.
Risk Mitigation

The risks prioritized and ranked in the earlier stage should be physically,
technically, and procedurally managed, eliminated, or reduced to an
acceptable Level.

Typical risks mitigation strategies are:

Risks management governance—New governance structures, roles, and
policies should be created within your business for properly managing social
media risks.
These activities may involve identifying and empowering a social media risk-
management manager, developing a business-wide risk-management
strategy, identifying actions and steps needed to implement the strategy, and
determining the resources required to mitigate the risks.
Establish a social media ownership plan and
policy

Training and awareness—Provide education and spreading awareness on

legal issues such as copyright, intellectual property, defamation, slander, and
anti-trust issues.

Social media policy—Create a sound social media policy that outlines the
relative rights and responsibilities of employers and employees.

Secure your social media platforms—Secure your social media platforms

to minimize the impact or likelihood of the risk.
Risk Evaluation

Social media risk management is a continuous process. In the face of rapid

technological, political, and social change, social media risks should be
periodically reviewed.

Your risk-management strategy, procedures, and techniques should be

continuously updated in response to the emergence of new social media
platforms, social changes, and potential new risks.