CASE STUDY

SR7 has undertaken assignments on behalf one of the world’s largest FMCG producers, with a 49 per cent share in the Australian market in their product category.  Our work is part of their broad campaign to demonstrate responsibility and guard against further onerous “preventative health” regulation of alcohol, tobacco and junk food.

 

The client had been been falsely accused of using social media to push its products, with health campaigners citing brand promotion on social media sites.  Consumers have independently joined “fan” sites for our client’s brands, and employees have discussed the company without the knowledge or approval of the manufacturer.

 

SR7 was commissioned by the client in January 2010 to undertake an audit of online and social media sites relating to its operations in Australia and the broader Pacific region.

 

The audit captures historical and emerging issues associated with information exchange and behaviour being exhibited online by nominated audiences and external users associated with our client across social media platforms.

 

Following a scoping workshop with representatives of our client geographic, brand and competitor search terms and issues were agreed as the basis of the Social Media Audit to be undertaken by SR7.

 

As part of the scoping session with the client, SR7 was provided with a set of supplementary search terms drawn from the client’s ‘Capital Monitor Keywords and Categories’ document.  This was provided to assist and guide SR7’s analysts during the research and compilation phases of the audit program.

 

In addition to the nominated search terms outlined above, the scope of the audit also encompassed specific issues relating to the business in Australia and the broader region.  The issues incorporated into the research phase include:

 

Employees – A key component identified by the client in the scoping session was the engagement of employees on social media platforms.  The issues based search included the following:

 

  • Privacy issues and risks facing staff from their personal online exposure, including exposure through open accounts;
  • The client’s corporate culture;
  • Internal information leakage, including conversations surrounding corporate restructuring, location of production sites, competitor discussions and other workplace topics; and
  • Employee events including multimedia uploads incorporating photographs and videos.

 

General Public – The scoping workshop identified comments and conversations by customers and the general public about our client and its reputation.  The scope included:

 

  • Commentary from the general public about our client and associated search terms;
  • Social media sites dedicated to being ‘pro’ or ‘anti’ products manufactured by our client; and
  • Spoofs of our client.

 

The result of this work was the development of an employee policy on social media use, and intelligence on community attitudes towards the preventative health agenda of the government, to guide our client’s regulatory engagement strategy.