At TMA+Peritus, we have worked with clients across the country to create detailed social media strategic plans, which include identifying the needs of the consumer, creating a content matrix, leveraging public social media networks to distribute content, establishing corporate policies, and reviewing analytic data to measure and fine tune our campaigns.

It’s no surprise that we have encouraged our clients to leverage the world’s busiest social media channel, Facebook, as part of their social media mix. In fact, we set up our own page, as an example of how to use Facebook to distribute content and create real world, ‘analogue’ events.  Imagine our surprise when our Page disappeared. Let me repeat that, our TMA+Peritus Facebook Page disappeared.

At first, we thought it was some terrible mistake. Did one of our Admin’s simply unpublish the page? Was it accidentally deleted? Were we hacked?  We reached out to Facebook with a quick email that basically told them our Page had disappeared, would Facebook help us determine what happened?

Facebook replied with an automated statement that read:

“Your account was disabled because it was in violation of Facebook’s Statement of Rights and Responsibilities. Nudity, sexually explicit, and other graphic content is not permitted on Facebook, nor is any content that contains self harm, depicts violence, or attacks an individual or group. In addition, harassing others through unsolicited friend requests or messages is prohibited.

Unfortunately, we won’t be able to reactivate your account or respond to your email directly. This decision is final and cannot be appealed.”

What the heck are they talking about?   When it came to our Facebook page, we could only be described as conservative.  In fact, the vast majority of our posts were either reposts or original posts that were published by the likes of Gannett Newspapers, In Business Madison Magazine, Marketplace Magazine; and the videos and work samples that were shown have aired on television screens throughout the Midwest or are printed and distributed throughout corporate America.  Like I said, what the heck? Not even a cuss word found its way on to our page.  We are a business and used our Page as a tool to communicate with our clients, thus we were shocked at the implication that we had violated Facebook’s policies

We tried no less than four times to resolve this matter with Facebook, there were no further replies. Case closed. All our work, all our Fans (who now are called Likers) were gone.  Of course, we were shocked. Not only do we firmly believe that we did not violate Facebook’s terms and conditions, but we were alarmed at Facebook’s indifference and refusal to communicate with us regarding this situation.

Despite this event, we still believe that Facebook is a very useful tool, and we created a new Page (feel free to Like us on Facebook!). Although baffling, we suggest everyone take the time to regularly consider the following:

1. Read and understand the Terms and Conditions of Facebook. [Facebook Terms, Facebook Promotions Guidelines, Facebook Pages Terms]. There are a lot of rules on how you can use the page, how to create promotions, and the basic disclaimer that Facebook can and will delete any pages/posts it feels violates it’s policies.
2. When you don’t own a social media network, you are at the mercy of the provider. Providers come and go (remember Geo Cities, AOL pages?), thus it is important to understand that Facebook is part of your Social Media strategy, not your complete strategy. As with investing money, you need to have a balanced social media portfolio that includes several public social media services (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Four Square and the list goes on) as well as a company owned website/blog. By leveraging several services and owning your own site, you reduce the risk and increase social and search exposure.
3. Even though our Page was deleted, our employees continued to share information and network on behalf of TMA+Peritus by using their personal social networks. This is an important point; the ‘personal’ social networks of your employees can be a critical content distribution channel.

Take the time to review your social media plan. How would your business survive the event we experienced?