Among the reasons companies list for blocking employee access to social media is the fear that employees will disclose information they shouldn’t. This usually falls into two categories: compliance (such as posting private information about a customer) and leaks of a company’s intellectual property. This last type of disclosure often includes premature revelations of products that haven’t launched yet.

Most of these situations aren’t unique to social media. Whether their motivations are well-intentioned or malicious, employees have been leaking information for as long as there has been information to leak. On the other hand, the casual interactions that occur on places like Facebook and Twitter have made it easier for inadvertent leaks to occur.

While there’s not much you can do about malicious leaks (just ask U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates), the rest can mostly be addressed with good communication about policies. When Sun Microsystems experienced a wave of leaks back in 2005, CEO Jonathan Schwartz posted a public post to his blog explaining to employees why these leaks were hurting rather than helping:

The way news or media cycles work, if any information is ‘leaked’ to the marketplace, it radically reduces our ability to garner broad top shelf coverage - most media outlets won’t cover what’s already been leaked. So leaks actually have the opposite effect of what you might think - they dampen coverage, lessen interest, and complicate helping the field drive business. They also prompt customers to put decisions on hold, and put at risk the credibility of our salesforce to be ‘trusted advisors’ to our most important partners and customers.

Schwartz’s missive reportedly tightened the faucet as employees comprehended of the consequences of such leaks. But despite your best efforts, there will be some leaks as well-meaning employees enthuse to their communities before they should. That’s not an excuse for blocking access to social media unless the cost of the leaks outweighs the value the company accures from having employees engaged online. (It should be somebody’s responsibility to assess the cost-benefit ratio.)

But what about those leaks that do happen? What should organizations do about them?

I was speaking with representatives of an organization that recently experienced a leak about a highly-anticipated new product. The company worked feverishly to get information removed, but given the number of media outlets that had picked up on the story, it was a futile effort. I was discussing this with a colleague, who said he’d been trying to convince his own organization that once information has been leaked, the best strategy is to embrace it.

I couldn’t agree more. There’s little chance you’ll be able to contain the premature release of product information, particularly if there’s an audience hungry for whatever they can learn and websites that cater to those audiences. (Think Engadget and Gizmodo reporting leaks of new technology products.) By trying to get the sites to pull the stories they’ve already run, companies appear desperate and uncoordinated. Even if they succeed in getting the stories yanked, the genie is still out of the bottle. (I’ve always liked the analogy that declares getting information off the Internet is like trying to get pee out of the pool.)

As long as the public has the information, the best response could be—depending on the specifics of the product and the information released—to sheepishly confirm accurate information, point out anything that’s inaccurate, and then ask, “So what do you think? Pretty cool, huh?” Take advantage of the leak to build additional buzz and generate more interest.

Ideally, of course, the leak wouldn’t happen and companies would be able to adhere to their launch timetables. The problem is that most organizations don’t build the potential for a leak into their marketing plans. The “what-if” scenario should be included so organizations don’t jerk their knees and respond in ways that make them look silly and disorganized. Instead, they’ll be able to turn a bad situation to their advantage. (None of which is meant to suggest that companies shouldn’t do all they can to mitigate the risk and identify and deal with employees who break the rules.)

Does your organization plan for leaks in their marketing strategies?