Turning Employees to Social Advocates

Did you know that employee posts get 8x more engagement than when the same content is shared by the company? Content shared by employees doesn't just get more engagement but reaches 561% further than when the same content is shared on a branded channel. 

This is because customers are more likely to engage with content if it was shared by one of their peers, than if that same piece of content was shared by a brand. 84% of customers say they entirely or mostly trust referrals from family and friends. That means people trust what a person like themselves or a regular employee says on social media than what is coming directly from a brand. 

Employee advocacy is basically the promotion of your company online by your staff. This promotion can be recommending your product or service to friends and followers on social media to increase brand exposure, or represent the best interest of the company online.  

This approach to selling entails employees sharing carefully thought out content that reinforces your brand's key messages, are industry-specific, and aligns with their career trajectory.

Employee advocacy contributes to growing your brand awareness and engagement, building trust, and generating high-quality leads. For example - if your business has 100 employees and each of them has 500 followers on social media, if you multiply 500 by 100, that's 50,000 people that could be engaging, trusting, and becoming new customers for your business. 

Though your business will benefit enormously from employee advocacy, it's not primarily about your business, but your employees, and how it can benefit them. To get employees to become brand advocates on social media, you need to make them understand what they stand to gain.

Benefits employees can get from becoming brand advocates includes positioning themself as thought leaders among their peers, establishing their future career prospects, and allowing them to contribute to the company's growth.

So how do you turn your employees to social advocates?

Identify and reach out to potential advocates 

These guys would normally be those employees who are enthusiastic, visibly proactive and engage in company activities. These are the folks that attend company events, share company news on social, and volunteer their time to be part of company initiatives. These set of people would normally be first and most interested in joining your advocacy program.

Employee advocacy usually requires employee buy-in, so identifying, reaching out, and highlighting what they stand to gain can spur employees to join your program.

Once you’ve identified those who'll be interested in your program, the next step is to invite them to your program’s kick-off. This mini-event is an opportunity for you to enlighten your employees about the scope of your advocacy program and what it means for them. 

Here are a few things to mind when inviting employees to join your program: 

The best channel to get their attention? 

- Email 

- Intranet 

- Internal Social Network 

- Townhalls or company event  

- Team Huddles (led by managers) 

The best person to introduce the program? 

- C-level  

- Team leads  

- Hand-selected peers  

Is there a need to check in with anyone before you invite employees? 

- Talk to HR and legal

- People who know the ins and outs of these employees.

Train employees on best practices

Though your employees already have active social media accounts, it's possible they don't know the best practices for promoting the company on social media.

Coaching them on how to go about it will boost employee willingness to participate, especially for those who know little about social selling. Training employees will also ensure you get your desired result at the end of the day. 

Host social media workshops that highlight the best practices for each platform to boost employee morale and comfortability with promoting the company through their personal accounts. 

Consider offering guidance on:

- Potential topics and links to share

- Best days and times to post

- How often to post

- How to optimize social media profiles

- Appropriate hashtags

- Key differences between social networks 

Setting up a photo booth where employees can take new headshots for their LinkedIn profile will add to your workshop.  

Content creation & sharing

Employees already have tons of things to worry about, adding content creation to that list will only slow things down or make them completely uninterested. For your program to run smoothly, provide the necessary content employees need to get started.

To create ready-to-share content advocates will actually enjoy sharing, ask employees for their stories and content ideas. Talk to different heads of departments to understand initiatives their teams are currently pushing to identify content themes.

You'll need an employee advocacy tool or platform that will power your program. This platform will serve as a one-stop-shop for amplifying your program - where you can upload content, have employees share uploaded content directly to their social media accounts, and also monitor, track and measure performance on the go. I suggest you check out PostBeyond, Bambu by Sprout Social, and Amplify by Hootsuite.

Appreciate & reward employees

One thing that will keep your advocacy program going is your ability to appreciate and reward advocates who are performing well. 58% of employees feel giving recognition is one of the best ways to improve engagement. A simple thank you or lunch in some fancy restaurant can go a long way.

Employee advocacy is not a one-off social media strategy, rather it's a continuous internal communication strategy that evolves and grows with your brand - so keeping your team motivated is a must.

Advocates add considerable value to the brand. Their efforts have the ability to increase your brand's share of voice, drive web traffic, and even reduce spend on paid media. By rewarding them, it shows they are valued and can spur other employees to sign up for your program.

Consider gamifying your advocacy program just to make it fun for your team. Try making a leaderboard that shows the metrics of those employees getting the most impressions and engagement. 

Measure your program's impact

The best part of any labour is seeing the fruit it yields. It's important to know how well your advocacy program is performing and the impact it's having on your business. 

Also, apart from knowing the benefits, it's bringing to the business, employees need to know the results of their efforts. Monitor brand share of voice and sentiment to measure the impact your program is having on your brand's reputation.

Measuring and reporting results will help you stay on the right track, keep the momentum up, drive adoption by other employees, and highlight those areas in your strategy needing optimization.

Employee advocacy can yield tremendous results for your brand, but you can only achieve success when you can engage your team.