Social Media Content Creation and Legal Issues
More and more business owners are migrating their marketing strategy to social media to reach a wider audience. For an efficient content generation, companies will form connections with social media influencers. These partnerships can be symbiotic when functioning properly. However, such partnerships might lead to legal complications. To avoid this, be prepared by reading up on the topics below.
Contracts
Some influencers use a standard contract for all transactions, while others want the company to draft the contract terms. In any case, business owners must carefully analyze the legal implications of contracted work of this nature. Clear terms written into an enforceable legal contract can prevent many contractual relationship problems. The following is a list of some of the terms to consider before engaging in this sort of contractual relationship:
- Date of delivery
- Whether the influencer will be asked to share and/or repost the content (on their own or through the company’s channels)
- Specifics about the content that will be delivered and rights to intellectual property
- Compensation structure (per delivery, per post, etc.)
- Intellectual Property Rights (IP)
Intellectual property law may apply to content created for social media or marketing strategiesBoth the content producer and the commissioning party must be clear on all areas of intellectual property rights regarding the commissioned work. Independent l icensing is available for images, videos, and captions. The majority of business owners will want to retain full ownership of any intellectual property developed for their business. If this is the case, the company must lay out the ownership conditions in a documented, enforceable contract. eThe contract should also specifically prohibit the author from repurposing, recycling, or otherwise reselling the original content commissioned for the company.
Compensation
Influencing and content production are two areas of marketing that are still relatively new and t here may not yet be an industry standard for pay scale. Before anything, it’s best to become familiar with what other influencers charge for content development. If no similar transactions are accessible, the creator can set any price they like. Before you start negotiating, you should have a good idea of what the content is worth and how you want the payment to be structured. If the content creator has a typical pay scale, review it before discussing compensation.
