When using social media for marketing purposes you need to ensure that you understand the Terms & Conditions of each specific platform. Every platform has different rules for advertising on there. In our latest blog, we break down these individual rules and give an overview of the expected etiquette when using social media.

Rules

Minimum Age:

When marketing on a platform it is essential you check the minimum age of that platform. Most platforms have a minimum age requirement of 13 to join but some have slightly different rules to this. This needs to be checked before a business markets anything to a specific audience. If your product is aimed at 6-year-olds, for example, then you won’t promote this product on Instagram (which has a minimum age of 13) to that exact target market. Instead, you will be advertising to their relations such as parents or grandparents. Conversely, YouTube has a Kids platform (which has no minimum age with parental consent), so this promotion could be targeted directly at 6-year-olds as they are eligible to be on this site.

Copyright and Trademarks:

You must ensure you have the full rights to use any content shared on any social media account to avoid any risk of infringing copyright legislation, which can lead to your content being removed or even your account being suspended.

Account owners also need to be aware of the licensing of content to a social media platform. When you post on a social media platform you give the platform a license to use that content. Here’s some key words that are associated with the license of content:

  • ‘Non-exclusive’ = you can also license your content to other parties
  • ‘Royalty-free’ = the license is free of charge for both parties
  • ‘Sub-licensable’ = the platform can license out your work to others
  • ‘Worldwide’ = the license is applicable anywhere in the world

Platforms are also able to modify your work under most licenses, so it is important to read these before posting any content, if you aren’t comfortable with these conditions.

Content Guidelines & Ad Policies:

Before anything can be posted onto social media, you must understand what content is allowed to be shared and advertised. There are some guidelines that are unanimous across all platforms (e.g., not advertising anything illegal and not posting anything hateful/harmful). However, some platforms have more specific regulations on certain areas. Here are some examples of these:

  • On TikTok you cannot advertise any accountancy services, legal services, anything healthcare related or any alcohol
  • On Instagram/Facebook you can advertise alcohol but only to the legal age in that country
  • On X alcohol can be advertised as long as it complies by their regulations, same as healthcare related products/services
  • On YouTube the advertisement of alcohol is banned, and healthcare is regulated by the platform to confirm it is from a licensed source

Branded Content:

Any branded content on any platform must be disclosed to safeguard the public’s interests. This includes paid product placement, endorsement or sponsorship. This enhances the transparency of brands & also helps followers understand whether the influencer is recommending a product just because they like it or if they have been sponsored by a brand to promote it.

Etiquettes

When marketing on social media there are some key expectations when it comes to how you present the brand.

Here are some of these:

Respect others and their opinions – Don’t forget that whilst you are the one that is posting, you are a representative of the brand, so you must ensure you are respecting what customers have to say.

Select the right tone – On social media it is much harder to understand someone’s intentions behind what they are saying, so it is crucial to pick the right tone.

Abide by privacy regulations – It is extremely important to ensure that as a business you are protecting your customers data. One big mishandling of data is when consumers post a query about their order and businesses reply asking for their email address for confirmation, this should be done via a private chat not in public view.

Give credit – When posting someone else’s words or content it is expected that you will credit this person for their comments or work. This can be done by tagging or quoting them. This can aid you as they may share your content to their audience which expands your reach.

Don’t be overly promotional – Customers don’t want to be bombarded with sales talk but instead want to see a range of content to keep them engaged. Regardless of platform, 80% should be valuable content that is made just for your customers and only 20% should be promotional content. This helps to build relationships with customers.

Stick to the point – Be concise with your captions and text. Overloading information on a customer can be off-putting for them and they often scroll straight past. Ensuring your text is short and clear reduces the risk of losing your audience’s attention.

These rules and expected etiquettes can be crucial to the way you market your business on social media, so we hope these tips helped.

If you have any questions about how to get the most out of your social media for your business, or would like any training, please do not hesitate to get in touch with us. Why not drop one of the team an email on info@buy-from.com.