EMPLOYEE ADVOCACY: WHERE TRUST BUILDS BOTTOM L INE 1

Employee Advocacy: Where Trust Builds Bottom Line

How to turn your workforce into a marketing force.

www.postbeyond.com

EMPLOYEE ADVOCACY: WHERE TRUST BUILDS BOTTOM L INE 2

PG 3 Employee Advocacy

PG 6 The Model

PG 7 The Right Way

PG 8 Social Media Policies

PG 9 Let’s Talk Content

PG 11 Measuring Success

Contents

EMPLOYEE ADVOCACY: WHERE TRUST BUILDS BOTTOM L INE 3

THE CONTRAST IS STRIKING

97% of marketers are using social media. But only 36% of people trust ads they see on social networks.

However, 92% of consumers around the world say they trust recommendations from friends and family above any and all other forms of advertising.

Furthermore, a recent study has demonstrated that when potential consumers or clients receive corporate information, “regular” employees have three times the credibility of the company than the CEO.

Talk about a good news/bad news scenario.

The good news: Everyone uses social media.

The bad news: Most people don’t trust advertising messages they receive via social media.

The really good news: Those same people DO trust consumer information they receive from friends and their peer networks.

1. Employee Advocacy

TRUST IN ONLINE, SOCIAL & MOBILE ADS

Personal Network Recommendations 92%

Branded Websites 58%

Search Engine Ads 40%

Neilsen Global Trust Survey in Advertising Survey, April 2012

Social Network Ads 36%

Online Banner Ads 33%

Mobile Display Ads 33%

92%of consumers around the world trust personal recommendations above all other forms of advertising

!

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And that is why you need to leverage your employees’ relationships – while maintaining the highest level of integrity – to get your true message out to the maximum number of people.

That’s what “employee advocacy” is all about.

“Employee advocacy” depends on one foundational truth: that your employees believe in your brand. If your people don’t respect your product, you need to step back a few paces, right now, and address those key internal issues. Because if that is the case, your marketing efforts are perhaps the least of your problems.

However, odds are very good your employees do believe in your brand; that’s why they came to your organization, and that’s why they are staying.

As members of your team, your employees are committed to the success of your company. All of these things are true:

_ Every day, they are investing time, energy and ideas in your company.

_ They understand that when the company succeeds, they succeed.

_ They want your organization to grow. _ BUT: apart from doing their assigned job, they

aren’t sure how to make that happen. And no one has told them how – only about one third of companies have ever offered their employees any training at all in social media strategies. So, unless their assigned job is in the marketing department, employees are not able to spread the word about the great things your company is doing.

But they could be doing exactly that. Here’s how:

Let’s think, for a moment, about how successful your company would be if all of your employees were telling all of their friends and family about the terrific products and services their company provides.

Odds are very good your employees do believe in your brand; that’s why they came to your organization, and that’s why they are staying.

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Remember the old “she told a friend, and she told a friend, and” ads? That was linear communication. Today, though social media, that principal can be applied to exponential communication. The potential is unlimited. One recent study suggests that your employees together have 10 times more social media contacts than your corporate entity does.

Imagine, if every day, all of your employees – not just the marketing department – were promoting your organization, recruiting top-notch new members of the team, communicating all the good stuff about their jobs and their organization.

And they were doing that to all of their social media contacts – through Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Google+, and all of the others.

Let’s imagine, too, that the messages they are sending out are not hard-core marketing, but personal, real, engaging – and completely supportive of your brand, your corporate goals, your plan for success.

And what if this exponential outreach could be accomplished at a tiny fraction of the cost of any other media marketing campaign?

Peer-to-peer sharing is becoming a disruptive economic force, utterly changing the marketing landscape. The possibilities are astonishing.

Now, let’s make them reality.

Chances are your employees together have 10 times more social media contacts than your corporate entity does.

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THE CONCEPT IS SIMPLE. SO IS THE MODEL.

As their trusted employer, you have credibility with your employees. Your employees have credibility with their friends who are part of their social networks.

Studies are showing that consumers are focused on finding authentic, genuine, ethical, responsible companies with which to do business.

When your employee shows that he or she trusts your brand, that trust is contagious.

You know that you have invested a lot of money and time in every one of your employees; now is the time to leverage that investment in a new way, by activating those employees as “brand advocates”, partners in marketing outreach, and by rewarding those who contribute to your success.

This is not simply “feel-good” stuff – when it is supported by the right system and the best technology, employee advocacy can make a huge contribution to a company’s bottom line.

2. The Model

When your employee shows that he or she trusts

your brand, that trust is contagious.

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IT’S CRUCIAL THAT YOUR COMPANY GETS EMPLOYEE ADVOCACY RIGHT, FROM THE GET-GO.

And that’s why a company like ours, PostBeyond, is a vital partner in this new age of social media marketing.

It’s not enough to offer rewards to employees who communicate on social media – the message has to be the right message to support your brand.

It’s not enough to craft a message that supports your brand – the message has to be appropriate to social media communication, and it has to be one that your employees feel comfortable with, or they won’t communicate at all.

It’s not enough to have the right social media message – you need to be able to track the engagement level of your people, and the effectiveness of this new social media marketing effort.

Your employee advocacy roll-out must be: _ Easy for your employees to use. _ Easy for your administrators

to implement and track. _ Always on message for your brand. _ Always authentic and credible. _ Always have an effective reward

system to recognize employees who are making a difference for your company

THE RIGHT WAY

PROFESSIONAL USES BY EMPLOYEES FOR SOCIAL TOOLS

Communicating with clients and customers

47%

Promoting a work-related initiative

31%

Researching job candidates and new employees

20%

Microsoft Survey on Enterprise Social Use and Perceptions, June 2013.

3. The Right Way

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QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER

Does your company have a social media policy? That should be in place for your employees, even before you implement your new employee advocacy program.

Here are some of the questions you should consider when crafting a social media policy:

_ Do you allow employees to use social media in the workplace for personal use?

_ Do you need a policy prohibiting anonymous use of social media by your employees?

_ Do you have a clear statement prohibiting the sharing of corporate information not intended for the public?

_ Do you allow ask employees to state that opinions they express on social media are their own, and not related to your company?

_ Do you see value in allowing free and open debate on social media?

_ Does your social media policy encourage employee engagement, or stifle employee enthusiasm?

_ Do you need a policy specifically focused on prevention of bullying or personal attack?

Your social media guidelines lay out a framework for all social media use by your corporate team, but by implementing PostBeyond, you have the ability to show them what type of content they should post and you make it as easy as clicking a button. You are reducing risk and educating your employees along the way.

What do you want your employees to say about your company? What will be effective, communicated by them to their social media contacts? You will need to provide the content; you will also need to allow your

employees to opt in and out, according to their level of comfort with particular messages.

You will also need to clearly assign the responsibility for generating the content: this cannot be left to chance. You need a social media coordinator. It’s an assignment that, in the right hands, will pay for itself many times over.

4. Social Media Guidelines

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CONTENT MARKETING

Content Marketing is growing in importance; in fact, it has become a $118 billion dollar market!

So how do you create content that: _ Promotes your brand _ Engages your employees so that they want to

share that content _ Interests their social media contacts _ Has the chance of going viral

Let’s start with a negative: Don’t try a hard sell. That does not work well in the social media environment.But here is a partial list of things that do:

_ Trends. People love trends, so give your employees content that reveals current trends – and places your business in a positive light as a trend-setter. (Example: a travel company’s employees could comment on the most recent trends in travel, and make it personal by referring to the number of clients who are following those trends)

_ Successes. Your employees are invested in the success of your company. If you have won an award or achieved a significant accomplishment, give them content that reflects their personal contribution to this.

_ Lists. Who can resist a “top ten…” anything? Soft sell it, simply supply a “top #” list related to your industry. (Example: employees of a car dealership could send the Top Five Reasons People Prefer SUVs.)

_ Trivia. Readers always enjoy trivia. Note any trivia you find related to your industry, and use it from time to time. Soft sell, but attention-getting, and always well received.

5. Let’s Talk Content

Content Marketing is a hugely important environment; in fact,

it has become a $118 billion dollar market

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_ Humour. Care is needed here, of course, but depending on the level of self-confidence your corporate structure enjoys, sharing a Dilbert or other cartoon will heighten the level of receptivity of your growing social media audience.

_ Insider Offers. Give your employees the opportunity to tell their social media contacts about an exclusive offer or sale.

_ Contests. Generate a contest that is offered through social media. A retail chain could offer a gift certificate; an IT company, one free tech consultation.

_ Testimonials and reviews. If your company has been well reviewed, has been featured in a news article, or has received positive feedback for a client, share the information – and the credit – with your people, and give them content to share with their contacts.

_ FAQ’s. If yours is a business that generates a lot of questions from clients or users, let your people be pro-active… if there is a known issue, send out the answer before everyone has to ask the question.

_ Real-time updates. Give your employees the means to contribute to your social strategy by enabling them to suggest content and images from live events, sent or streamed back to the social media team in real time.

This is clearly not an exhaustive list, but simply using those categories, your company can provide meaningful, comfortable content for your engaged employees for months to come.

27 Mpieces of contentare shared each day1

1 AOL Research: Content is the Fuel of the Social Web. 2012.2 Consumers’ Attitudes Toward Custom Content. Custom Content Council, April 2011.3 State of the Media: The Social Media Report. Neilsen, 2012.

65%of consumers learn more about brands through social media3

67%of consumers say custom content help them make purchasing decisions2

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It is important that you measure the outcomes of your new employee advocacy social media program. It would be a very complex undertaking without the right systems – system to measure:

_ Employee engagement – who among your employees are participating

_ Employee effectiveness – how widespread is their communication; how many are being re-communicated (re-tweeted, shared, etc.)

_ How many employee communications are resulting in responses?

_ What is the level of ROI impact from your program – new customers, increased sales, new leads, etc?

_ Are you attracting desirable new hires through employee advocacy?

These are key questions. The answer to obtaining the answer is an effective, proven employee engagement program like PostBeyond.Implementing your employee advocacy program through PostBeyond will allow you to:

_ Increase visibility & brand reputation

6. Measuring Success

_ Drive employee engagement _ Track social media ROI _ Increase retention by driving deeper

relationships with customers _ Easily share content across business

units & educate advocates _ Generate insights to determine

content effectiveness _ Strengthen the employer brand and culture _ Manage Messaging control and consistency _ Quickly obtain content and success stories

directly from employees & advocates

We’ve shared the basics, and underlined the advantages. Now, for all the answers – and to kick-start your own employee advocacy marketing program, contact us now!

The answer to obtaining the answer is an effective, proven

employee engagement program

EMPLOYEE ADVOCACY: WHERE TRUST BUILDS BOTTOM L INE 12

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