What does GDPR Mean for Social Media Strategies?
What is GDPR?
The General Data Protection Regulation, or GDPR, is a legal framework that sets guidelines for the collection and processing of personal data from individuals who live in the European Union (EU).
GDPR is one of the world’s strictest security and privacy laws that imposes obligations onto organizations anywhere, so long as they target or collect data related to people in the European Union. The GDPR will levy harsh fines against those who violate its privacy and security standards, with penalties reaching into the tens of millions of euros.
Why the GDPR is beneficial to your business?
If you have read the regulation or started preparing for it, you might notice that it requires some effort to be fully compliant with the regulation. But I think there are several potential wins for your marketing business:
- Greater trust: Your customers will know what data of theirs is collected and how it will be used.
- Better email engagement: Only people who are interested in and who choose to opt-in to your email will receive your content.
- Improved marketing experience: With stricter regulation on the use of personal data for marketing and advertising, consumers will likely have a better experience while surfing the internet (and hopefully become more receptive). This will benefit all businesses that do online marketing.
What Is the Impact of GDPR on Social Media Marketing?
GDPR impacts social media marketing in three critical ways:
Remarketing or Retargeting Ads
Retargeting or remarketing advertising is a digital marketing strategy of reaching out to previous visitors of a website or social media page with highly targeted ads. The ads attempt to recapture the user’s attention and improve conversion. For this kind of social media advertising to work, consumer data about browsing patterns, purchase history, and demographics is essential.
To comply with GDPR requirements, you must get users’ consent to collect and process their data before running a remarketing campaign. For this, you must implement a sign-up page or create an opt-in disclaimer about data usage within the ad.
Social Media Traffic, Double Opt-ins, and Privacy Policy
GDPR makes “double opt-ins” mandatory, which means that before you can use the data of EU consumers, they must opt-in twice. With the first opt-in, they accept your privacy notice which explains how you will process and protect their data. With the second, users accept your offer — say, to subscribe to a newsletter or download a guide or whitepaper.
To achieve GDPR compliance, you should also implement a pop-up message on your website requiring first-time site visitors to accept your cookies and privacy policy.
Social Media Behavior Tracking
In fact, analytics tools like Google Analytics enable marketers to gauge and optimize their social media and advertising ROI. Fortunately, Google Analytics is itself GDPR-compliant, so you can still gain the necessary insights about users. As long as users have accepted your privacy policy.
Still, test your cookie opt-ins and review your privacy policy if you’re seeing a drag on your EU traffic. Issues like a clumsy opt-in user experience may cause users to drop out before they accept.
Best Practices for GDPR Compliance on Social Media
Build Trust and Relationships
Don’t send irrelevant information or information users didn’t request. Post free content like ebooks, digital videos, and so forth, that users will find valuable, informative, or simply entertaining.
Respond to all comments and criticisms on your social pages to show users that you are “listening” to them. And are willing to invest time and effort in building a relationship with them.
Keep Track of Permissions
If someone asked that you not contact them or has unsubscribed from your marketing content, make sure you track this information. Thus, make sure that you adhere to these user requests.
Strengthen Social Media Security
The GDPR is meant to address EU users’ privacy concerns. So if your social media security is lax, you defeat the GDPR’s purpose. Tighten security by limiting access to your digital social media accounts to only a few authorized users. Set up two-factor authentication for additional security.