Social media moderator: Maintain a healthy online presence

As many people can agree, social media is one of those things that you can easily get swept away with. It is over-saturated with users, posts, hashtags and not to mention, other businesses trying to get their brand noticed. 

A presence on digital channels is crucial to increasing brand awareness. However, with social media comes a lot of risks that need to be managed. Moderating on these platforms is all about understanding your demographics’ wants and needs, with diplomacy and grace. It’s undeniable that these days brands need to take advantage of an online space to better connect and interact with their consumers but it takes more than posting an update now and then. 

If you have happened to read any of our previous blogs you may understand the importance of User Generated Content. Platforms like Facebook, Instagram and are a gold mine of gorgeous content and potential, available to your brand to manage and utilize, it gives you so much creative freedom. Social media moderation is the only way to raise your brand’s standards and maintain a robust online presence. So, where do you start?

Types of social media moderation: a guide to comprehensive content moderation

In short, a social media moderator must be able to organize and manage posts, tweets, photographs, videos, monitor your brand’s online presence, and interact with all the comments and feedback from your consumers. 

In order to be an effective content moderator, there are four different types of moderation that need to be taken into account, and they are as follows;

1. Pre-moderation – As the name suggests, this is User Generated Content that is reviewed by a moderator before being posted on display for thousands of people to see. This process, although lengthy and a little tedious, is utilized so your brand’s reputation is preserved. It also prevents cyber-bullying and harassment, which in our current climate is very important for brands to uphold. 
2. Post-moderation – This is the more typical way to go about content moderation. Users can post whatever they want and when they want, this content is then put into a review queue where it is eventually reviewed and taken down if it goes against the community or your brand’s guidelines. 
3. Reactive moderation – This is mostly down to users clicking the infamous ‘report’ button when they see posts that are harmful or inappropriate. This allows for the necessary actions to be taken to stop the content from spreading and potentially harm a larger audience. This is normally seen in comment sections where a conversation can be monitored. It is an effective method of moderation but also instills a sense of community within your users. 
4. Automated moderation – With how saturated the internet is with content, brands rely more on technology to help ease the workload. You can do this by employing tools such as AI-powered algorithms to analyze content faster. These kinds of tools can screen for keywords, or conversational patterns that are problematic. Some can even identify harmful images. AI has been a game changer for moderation, 99.2% of comments removed on YouTube were flagged by AI systems.

What is a social media moderator? The modern-day wizard of content management 

As a moderator, you have to manage the activities made on the online community. You must uphold rules and regulations all the while keeping your brand’s feeds interesting and interactive. There are quite a few roles under the umbrella of a ‘social media moderator’, let’s dive into them, shall we? Here are the three most important roles you need to know about. 

Social media managers	These are responsible for moderating uploaded online content by upholding regulations and policies for users.
Community managers	Responsible for managing overall activities within social platforms and the online community itself.
Social media platform specialists	Screens for inappropriate or harmful posts within a social platform.

How do you become an efficient social media moderator?

It’s all very well knowing what types of moderation and moderators there are, but how can you use this information to its full potential? Luckily, we can give you a step-by-step manual to kick start your content moderation. 

• Determine and define clear rules and guidelines 

As a moderator, you must apply restrictions to set the tone for your brand and online community. Discourage abusive and harmful behavior and promote a healthy and conversational narrative. It is one thing to establish this but you must also be proactive in implementing it. People want to feel safe on your pages and your consumers deserve that. 

• Consider all feedback perspectives

Whether it be positive or negative. Positive is great! But, negative is where the real juice is. It tells you what your users want from you. At the end of the day, consumers want to feel heard. Hear them!

• Keep all your posts from your social media pages 

This is mainly for legal purposes, by archiving all your content, you can use it as legal proof of anything that has been posted at any point in time. 

• Train your moderators 

This may seem obvious but it’s often not thought through enough. Platform management is a huge task to undertake and it’s not something a single person can manage. Utilizing extra people can maximize your efforts to keep your online community safe. Make sure you train your moderators to uphold your specific guidelines!

• Be friends with your users 

Your brand and your online presence solely rely upon consumers and followers, so you’d be insane not to listen to them. Good content management comes from respecting your audience’s wishes. 

• Assign community pages 

If you tend to get a lot of content to manage it’s worth distributing the workload for example, by hiring a community manager for each online community. 

It is worth noting that excessive moderation can also make you lose too much content to the point where you lose followers. It is important to fully understand the intricacies of social media and be able to use a full set of comprehensive skills to manage your online environments. 

Why is content moderation important? Keeping your brand squeaky clean and caring for your consumers 

The importance of an online presence speaks for itself, it is the top tier means of networking, and increasing brand awareness as well as communicating and connecting with your users in a simple and effective way that feels safe and familiar to them. 

Research has shown that 34.5% of consumers prefer to communicate with brands through social platforms, which outperforms other means such as live chat, email, or telephone.

As the online world continues to grow it is inevitable that there are risks, which a content moderator can combat. You have a responsibility as an eCommerce brand to protect your online community and prove your online reputation. It is common knowledge that the internet can be a very toxic place if put in the wrong hands therefore it is critical to help your users feel safe and keep them protected from harmful content. 

With these types of moderation mentioned above as well as multiple people on your team, you can help keep your online community secure in a marvel avengers’ like fashion (somewhat). User Generated Content is amazing for your brand, but unfortunately, it is a little unpredictable. Filtering it out with an effective content moderation system is the solution to keeping your online space safe and preserved in a time where it can be quite erratic. 

It’s time to up your social media moderation game!

As users continue to flock to digital platforms, it is becoming increasingly imperative to keep your online presence organized and managed properly. Where human review is still important, technology has replaced a lot of tedious tasks and can speed up the content moderation process immensely. 

Flowbox’s social media moderating solution

At Flowbox we offer a range of leading tools to help ease the workload of User Generated Content moderation. Primarily we offer an advanced dashboard that boasts multiple filters to help you better organize incoming content and take advantage of multiple layout options for moderating your content. Take a look at the advanced dashboard of our User Generated Content platform below. 

Your filters which are mostly used for organizational purposes consist of status, media rights, products, sources, how the content was collected, type of media, dates, and even likes and comments. Being a content moderator requires you to hone your organizational skills and having these tools in your back pocket is an effective means of upgrading your utilities. 

In terms of your legal responsibilities, we also offer tools that cut out a lot of the heavy lifting and improve your efficiency. For example, with our media rights framework, you can request permission for content easily, in different languages, and in bulk using templates. This appears as a small friendly comment on the user’s post. Speaking of efficiency, our image recognition product linking system makes the process of connecting a photo to a product that much easier. 

The power is in your hands…

Choosing a digital moderation tool or platform to help you with what seems like a momentous task is essential to maintaining your online presence and keeping afloat atop the tsunami of media content. If you want to keep your consumers engaged, safe and maintain your social presence to the highest of standards, then Flowbox’s advanced dashboard is the solution for you. Want in? Request a Flowbox demo!

FAQS

How much do social media moderators make?

Although it does change with each company, the average salary of a social media moderator comes out at an average of $44,000 per annum. 

What is the role of the moderator?

A content moderator must be able to organize and manage posts, tweets, photographs, videos and monitor your brand’s online presence, and interact with all the comments and feedback from your consumers. 

How do you moderate social media?

Here are 6 steps to get you started on moderating platforms

1. Determine and define clear rules and guidelines 
2. Consider all perspectives of feedback, especially negative!
3. Archive all your posts
4. Train your moderators on your specific rules and guidelines
5. Prioritize your users
6. Assign community pages to different managers in your team

For more information, read above!

Do site moderators get paid?

Yes! Although they are typically paid by the hour. Your pay will also depend on how much experience you have and what platform you will be moderating, but you can usually find yourself sitting around $15-$20 an hour.