Know Your Assets

It seems an obvious one but do you know your business assets?  Really know them?  You and your teams will be vigilant about security, passwords, statutory records and regulatory submissions, but do you know all your digital assets?

Time and again when we start to work with new clients, they just don’t have a handle on their digital assets and it can take a lot of executive time, and sometimes money, to track them down.

It’s most common with social media accounts, many of which were set up before senior management recognised that they could be valuable company assets.  A bright youngster interning in marketing set up Facebook and then left. Years ago.  The problem then crops up when the decision is taken to work with an outside agency to drive social as an essential marketing channel – but no one can find who is the owner of the page or the principal admin, in order to transfer management of the page or profile.

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This is can lead to great difficulty in transferring or getting control of the right pages in order to move things forward, with the social channel, quite rightly, needing proof of identity, proof of business incorporation, sometimes bank statements or even a declaration from a Notary Public.  This takes, time, money and a great deal of effort.

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Another frequent issue is tracking down who has registered a domain name and where the site is hosted – again because many changes can take place over the years the original registration can get lost in the annals of time. But is critical that you do have a record of these things, particularly if your emails are also hosted with the web server – as failure to renew the domain name can sometimes leave you without any emails – and no business should be in that position.  Some companies don’t event know if this is the case or not.

So to safeguard your social assets and ensure you are never in this position, here is our check list of what you need to know and have a record of.

? We recommend that this list is shared internally and a senior management gatekeeper nominated.?

Social media is a value and tangible asset of your business – so make sure you keep it safe!