Preaching from the converted

I do a lot of social media training and one question always comes up about personal and corporate social network profiles.  Understandably people are needing guidance on the increasingly blurry lines that separate your online personas.

From an agency perspective, this frequently comes down to a questions over whether or not to use personal Twitter handles or Facebook and LinkedIn status updates to promote a client's product or service.

From my p.o.v., it's an easy one that can be answered by asking yourself two questions:

1. Would my audience / 'community' value this information? 

2. Would I be posting or tweeting this if I didn't have a commercial relationship with this brand?

If the answers are 'yes', then go ahead and post, acknowledging your relationship with this brand. Do this with the #client hash tag for Facebook or Twitter or use a little more prose if the format allows.

There's nothing wrong with liking your clients' services or brand. But don't let the commercial relationship get in the way of social media best practice.

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