Validation is oh-so-sweet. About a year ago, I wrote about why I don’t think companies should use social media in employee benefit communications. Well, according to a new report by the National Business Group on Health – employees don’t want their employers to send them benefit communications via social media, either. Nearly 80% of surveyed workers said they don’t want to receive information about their employer’s health benefits, or tips on exercising, eating healthy, or saving money, via Twitter or text messaging (75% said they don’t want this information via Facebook, either).
Of course, you have to look at the source, too: the majority of workers who said they don’t want any of this information via social media tools are older and lower-income workers; those who wouldn’t mind this information coming to them via social media are younger and higher-income workers. So as the older workers retire and the younger, more social media-savvy workers flood the workplace, these numbers can be expected to change.
So what should employers do? For now, the tried-and-true method of sending information via email and snail mail is still the best route, as nearly all surveyed workers said they prefer those means of receiving the information. But employers can’t ignore the social media aspect completely; there will come a day, in the not-so-distant future, where more and more workers will be expecting health benefit information to come to them the same way they receive all the rest of the information they receive – through social media tools (of course, with the way social media tools are evolving and developing, the preferred source for information in that not-so-distant future probably doesn’t even exist yet).
I want to know: have you tried using social media tools in your employee benefits communication?
If so, what’s been your experience?
#1 by John Nail on July 9th, 2010
Interesting. What really is the solution is a private Twitter feed/s that employees can subscribe to if they want to.
This solves the generational issue. Same for Facebook make it an option the employee chooses.
Or a firm could create a set of RSS feeds that users subscribe to where and when they want…
#2 by working girl on July 22nd, 2010
I’m right on the fence – I use social media daily but prefer paper in hand when it comes to stuff I really need to concentrate on. I’m a scribbler.
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#5 by Total Compensation Statements on August 3rd, 2011
I think online is asking a little to much of lower to middle income earners and social media is way too out there for them. Besides, who’s to say these social media sites will be around forever? The Internet always will be, so why not just allow employees to see online benefit statements, OR the old fashioned method of PAPER statements?!
#6 by steve @ benefit statements on September 15th, 2011
I’ve seen it communicated by social media, but i think it’s as important to communicate it through as many channels as possible.
Obviously, the stats are backing me up on this one, and focusing on one channel to push your information through will only mean it’s not getting through to as many people as it should be getting through to.
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