What FINRA & the SEC Require from Firms
Use of social media platforms are growing exponentially in the business world. They are used to engage with customers, build brand recognition, and transmit information. These different forms of communication also offer potential pitfalls to the company, ranging from federal securities law violations, disclosure of confidential information, various tort claims such as invasion of privacy or defamation, and brand damaging. Record-keeping of all social media content is one of the primary requirements for all firms.
Under FINRA guidelines, companies are required to retain social media records related to all broker-dealer businesses, monitor the extent to which employees are complying with policy, and define their policy for pre-approval and post-approval depending on the risk profile. Erado’s social media archiving solutions takes care of these requirements.
Why Erado Addresses These Issues Effectively
Interactions on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and blog interactions are automatically captured with Erado’s social media archiving solutions. How Erado differs from its competitors is the content via social media platform is captured, converted into basic text, and delivered in email form to your current archiving system.
Once a firm defines their social media policy, they then can deploy compliance regulations, and defend their business practice with Erado’s solutions. A generality is that most users of Facebook and Twitter often access these sites from their mobile devices, iPods, tablets, etc. These options make it very difficult to preapprove messages sent by the broker-dealer or advisor. You cannot defend what you cannot control since profiles are highly interactive.
One important feature Erado allows is it captures all content, including status updates, “likes,” messages, picture posts, and IMs. If an user turns off the content capturing application, a notification to reinstall the app would be sent to both the user and supervisor. Firms must manage their employees use of social media, therefore if messages are continuously pre-approved, and content is captured, staying compliant should be easily attainable.
Customer Relationship Management
What easier way to enhance a relationship with your clients then through social media? Recent data from American Century Investments say that 86% of advisors have business or personal social media accounts. Of these advisors who use social media for business purposes, 55% do so several times a week, and 24% of them use it daily. Erado’s ability to capture social media content is the viable source to keep your company compliant with FINRA and SEC regulations.
