How well are you monitoring your social media messages?

• Author: Pry, Carl G.
• Position: MARKETING COMPLIANCE

Most banks maintain a formalized marketing COMPLIANCE PERSON or staff tasked with reviewing and approving all advertising and marketing messages before they are published or otherwise released. Processes are implemented and followed to look at print ads, Web pages, marketing scripts and the like. But is your bank catching everything that should be reviewed for compliance? What about social media, for example?

Similar to marketing compliance, most banks have formalized channels for social media conduct on sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and others. Any messages issued by or on behalf of the bank must be screened and authorized. Often messages are authored by a specific person or group.

Does your bank have a social media policy for its employees? Not a policy governing employees' use of personal social media while on the clock, but rather a policy around what employees may say about the bank or their jobs while on their own social media sites or accounts.

Is your message an advertisement?

Consider the following example: a loan officer, on his own Facebook or LinkedIn profile page, mentions he's a loan officer at your bank. In several posts he mentions that he is in the business to make loans, so if the reader is in the market for a mortgage or car loan, he or she should contact him. Maybe some specifics of loan products are offered. What to make of this type of statement?

Simply put, this message is considered an "advertisement" and must follow all the rules any other ad must. There is no exception in any law or regulation for statements made via social media. In this case, depending on how much detail is included, Truth in Lending (Reg. Z) and the Fair Housing Act (FHA) requirements must be followed. At the least, since the word "mortgage" is included, the words "Equal...