Sell Your Company on Employee Advocacy

HOW TO

Sell Your Company on Employee Advocacy

Everything You Need to Get Internal Buy-in for Your Employee Advocacy Program

1

2How To Sell Your Company on Employee Advocacy

Table of Contents

Introducing Advocate Marketing 3

The Power of Employee Advocacy 5

Achieving Top Level Support 8

Employee Advocacy is Happening Now 11

Proven Results: Advocate Marketing Benchmarks 14

Your Company’s Employee Advocacy Revolution 20

Connect with Advocate Marketing Pioneers 23

Employee Advocacy Training & Compliance 25

Employee Advocacy Launch Breakdown 31

Conclusion: Employee Advocates: 33

Your Most Powerful Marketers

Key Takeaways 34

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3How To Sell Your Company on Employee Advocacy 33

Introducing Advocate Marketing

Companies can no longer communicate in a vacuum. Consumer communication networks have vastly changed since the days of TV, print and banner ads. With social media, the barriers to access have been removed and consumers now can not only talk directly to brands — they prefer it. A new kind of marketing has emerged that places value on quality interactions with consumers. Conversations matter. Marketing no longer happens in isolation.

What’s Employee Advocacy?

It’s taking the passion and expertise of your workforce and using it to fuel interactions with your prospects and customers online.

How Does Employee Advocacy Work?

The average consumer on social media is able to connect and influence more people over various social networks than ever before. Your employees are a part of those networks. By giving them the opportunity and the right tools, they can shape conversations with their connections about your brand. Social media and communication professionals already know the value of employee advocacy. And as experts, they’re in the best position to rally support within their organization to launch an employee advocacy program to drive business goals.

How Do You Get that Support?

This ebook will give you everything you need to get internal buy-in for your employee advocacy program.

4

EMPLOYEEADVOCACY

Empowering your employees to connect and engage

their social media networks with your brand.



The Power of Employee Advocacy

Advocate marketing is the #1 way to engage and communicate with stakeholders online.

Social Media is trapped with a small group of professionals. They are limited by their size and network reach, both of which are dwarfed by the sheer volume and reach of employee networks. Enabling hundreds and thousand of employees to share content will increase awareness, engagement and sales.

5

Intel Employee Advocate

“I have been at Intel over 15 years and for the first time I felt really connected to driving our product in the market.”

Social Media Team

All Employees

66

MORE POWERFUL135 brand advocates are more powerful

than 1,000,000 fans.

{ Tweet This }


77

YOUR EMPLOYEES’

PASSIONis greater than your

sponsored message.

How To Sell Your Company on Employee Advocacy


Achieving Top Level Support

This all sounds great, but the most successful social enterprise programs all have one thing in common: Top level support. Regardless of industry size or marketing budget, selling a new program internally can be a challenge. To date, difficulty with measuring ROI and compliance issues have made business leaders skeptical. Results have been difficult to measure. Negative press has been a challenge to contain — and that’s why an employee advocacy solution is so important.

Micho Spring, Chair, Global Corporate Practice Weber Shandwick 1

In today’s environment where there is an alarming lack of trust in all institutions, employees are increasingly the key prism for brand credibility and trust. Engaging them can provide companies the best way to humanize and unify their enterprise voice — a strategic imperative in today’s environment.

1 Weber and Shandwick, Employees Rising: Seizing the Opportunity in Employee Activism


What Business Leaders Want to Know

However, just because social media isn’t their strong-suit doesn’t mean that they won’t be able to see the value in it. Most executives — from sales to marketing to finance — got to their position by making smart calls and balancing priorities.

There are a number of reasons why your executive team may push back on an employee advocacy initiative:

Many Questions: One Answer

Company time and resources are a valuable commodity. Any new program that an organization invests in must be able to stand up against these commonly cited questions and concerns. To sell an employee advocacy solution internally, you’ll need a solution that can solve these key pain points. Not to mention, organizations that have seen the most success with employee advocacy and the highest increases in employee engagement all have had support from company leadership.

The C-Suite Doesn’t “Get” Social Media

“We don’t see the value in employee

advocacy.”

“Social media ROI isn’t measurable.”

“Our company social media

policy wouldn’t allow it.”

“Our employees aren’t trained to represent our brand on social media.”

“I don’t have time to run an employee advocacy program.”

1010

SOLVES THE SOCIAL DILEMMA

On Facebook, brands can onlyreach 1-2% of their networks organically.2

{ Tweet This }

2 Valleywag: Facebook Is Ending the Free Ride


1111

Employee Advocacy is Happening Now

Employee advocacy is already happening. Research shows that employees not only want to advocate for their company online — most are already doing it. According to research, 39 percent of employees have shared positive comments about their company online3, most without training or tools from their company.

Of consumers are more likely to buy a product when they hear about it from someone they trust.4

77%

11

3 KRC Research 20134 Nielsen 2013



Marketing and human resources professionals alike can recognize the risk of this situation. Most organizations don’t have the resources to manually track employee activity on social media. To attempt to counter this, many companies don’t allow social media at all — which is a huge missed opportunity. Organizations that embrace employee engagement on social media rank higher among consumers.

Employee Advocacy is Happening Now

4 Businessweek: How Jack Welch Runs GE5 Based on actual SocialChorus program implementations.

Branded Content Content Shared by Employees

There are only three measurements that tell you nearly everything you need to know about your organization’s overall performance: employee engagement, customer satisfaction, and cash flow.

Jack Welch, former CEO of GE4

Content shared by employees receives 8X the engagement of content on branded channels.5

1313

EXTENDS REACHEmployees have 10x more followers

than corporate social accounts.6

{ Tweet This }

6 Cisco Employee Social Media Study



Proven Results: Advocate Marketing Benchmarks

Once your executive team recognizes that need for change, they’ll want to see the vision and details for your plan. To get started, you’ll need program benchmarks and a timeline for implementation. To do this, look to top brands from around the world that have already leveraged employee advocacy platforms to raise brand awareness and drive sales leads and conversions.

Results from employee advocacy programs leveraged by leading brands across all industries show that an effective solution requires these six elements:

+ Initial 90 day program

+ A proven plan and strategy

+ Employee training and guidance

+ A network of employee advocacy experts

+ A partnership dedicated to your success

+ A plan to scale beyond the first group of employees



Employee Advocacy Benchmarks

Based on data from employee advocacy programs across industries, here’s what the advocate adoption rates for the first 90-180 days of your program should look like:

EMPLOYEE ADVOCATES

EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENTS

0 30 60 90 120 150 180

30Advocates

100Advocates

250Advocates

500Advocates

1000Advocates

0Engagements

4000Engagements

12,500Engagements

17,500Engagements

24,000Engagements

Days



Engagement Benchmarks

Based on actual implementations this is how your audience will start to engage with your brand’s content.

Advocate Marketing Value (AMV)

In the employee advocacy platform, all actions taken by an advocates produce marketing value for your brands. This is measured through advo-cate marketing value (AMV), a KPI based on 3rd party industry averages for the estimated value of social media interactions. Audience engage-ments or actions on social media from those in your employee advo-cate’s network also delivers marketing value to brands. The majority of employee advocacy programs need just 30 active employees to achieve positive ROI.

Employee Advocates drive marketing value through actions taken in the platform, such as:

+ Consuming content published on the platform

+ Sharing company content on social media

+ Motivating their network to engage with company content

Friends, family, and other audience members in your employee’s network drive marketing value by:

+ Resharing brand content.

+ Interacting with brand content through comments, likes clicks and more.

+ Downloading marketing collateral.

+ Responding directly to the brand about new initiatives



Many brands who have invested in employee advocacy programs have also found benefits to their brand that can’t be captured by AMV. These brands have seen huge value in being able to leverage their advocacy program to:

Increase reach and social media

engagement

Amplify marketing campaigns and drive

website traffic

Establish their employees as

thought-leaders

Power social selling initiatives

Increase employee

engagement and attract top talent

18

DISCOVERNEW AUDIENCES

90% of an employee’s social audience is new to the brand.7

{ Tweet This }

7 DELL Study


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Case Study


How One B2B Tech Company Generated 12X Their ROIWhen the principal social media engagement manager at an enterprise technology company needed to get her employee advocacy program off the ground, she sought out a solution that would provide a platform and a partnership. What she found was SocialChorus and together their partnership has advanced her brand’s employee advocacy program — generating 12-times ROI in one month.

The brand’s employee advocates generated over 10,000 social media audience engagements at the company’s largest annual conference — driving new leads for sales as well as amplifying their marketing campaigns. The popularity of the program was widespread. Many of the other divisions at the company saw the success of the employee advocacy program and want to start their own programs as well.

PROJECTED MONTHLY RESULTS

290K

Audience Engagement

Active Employees

1.5K

INITIAL MONTHLY RESULTS

97K

Audience Engagement

Active Employees

500+

500

ACTIVE EMPLOYEE ADVOCATES

400

315

30

First 90 Days

BeforeSocialChorus

To hear more from Jennifer Kirk go to: socialchorus.com/JenniferKirk


Your Company’s Employee Advocacy Revolution

Inside-out marketing doesn’t impact just the marketing department — it affects the entire organization. Employees who are engaged with their company are 2x as productive and are responsible for up to 80 percent of customers’ overall satisfaction — and not just sales and marketing are impacted.8 While all departments can benefit from stronger employee engagement, human resources initiatives to attract top talent are reinforced by employees advocating for their brand online.

8 Engaging for Success: enhancing performance through employee engagement, David MacLeod and Nita Clarke

2121

Your Company’s Employee Advocacy Revolution

ROI Accross Your Organization

DEPARTMENT EMPLOYEE ADVOCACY VALUE

Marketing Leader Drive Revenue

Social Media Manager Increase Social Engagement

Digital Marketing Manager Drive Website Traffic

Sales Power Social Selling

Communications Increase Brand Awareness

Talent Aquisition Attract Top Talent

Internal Communications Engage Employees

With the right training and platform, employees can develop their personal social media brand to present themselves as thought leaders in your industry. From sales to product teams and more, having employees who are engaged with sharing your company news and culture gives an authentic voice to your brand’s message online. When consumers and job applicants research your company, they’ll find a multitude of well-informed and passionate employees who they can trust.


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INCREASES REVENUE

12% increase in Brand Advocacy generates 2x increase in revenue growth.9

{ Tweet This }

9 The Ultimate Question: Driving Good Profits and True Growth, Fred Reicheheld, fellow at Bain & Company



Finding the Right Partner:

“Like most social teams, our team is scrappy and small and it’s important to us that we have partners who are in the project with us for success. We believe that SocialChorus is a strong partner for us.”

Natanya Anderson, Director of Social Media and Digital Marketing at Wholefoods

Creating Content:

“We’re pulling content for our employee Advocate Marketing program from upcoming events, product launches and marketing activities. Look at what you already have planned on your social calendar and pull the most engaging topics and posts and ideas for your employees to share.”DeShelia Spann, Digital Marketing Strategist at Eaton

Motivating Engagement:

“Our advocates are sharing what they love about our brand through blog posts and photos on their social channels. What’s really amazing to see is the amount of engagement and conversation that is happening around the unique pieces of content that is being created.”

Jencey Keeton, Global Marketing Manager, Social Media at FossilFo

ssil

Eat

on

Wh

ole

Fo

od

s

24

of employees are posting messages, pictures or videos in social media about their work.11

50%of them are doing so without any encouragement from their employer.12

1/3

Your Employees are Already Talking About You Anyway.

11 KRC Research 201312 KRC Research 2013


25

INCREASES PRODUCTIVITY

Engaged employees are 2x as productive and responsible for up to 80% of customer satisfaction.10

{ Tweet This }

10 Engaging for Success: enhancing performance through employee engagement, David MacLeod and Nita Clarke



Employee Advocacy Training & Compliance



PHASE ONE PHASE TWO

Training for Individual Departments

Tie training initiatives to business goals (ex. social selling)

Build program off of Phase One training

Basic Training for All Employees

Ensure smooth access to advocacy platform

Teach social media and platform basics for quick and easy adoption

Executive Training

Highlight social selling benefits and strategy

Show how executive participation drives advocate marketing

Subject Matter Expert Training

Identify experts and train on leveraging thought leadership

Begin after phases 1, 2, & 3

PHASE THREE PHASE FOUR

1 2 3 4

PRIORITY





Leanne Carmody, Head of Internal Communication at Heineken

I’ve heard all kinds of reasons why we shouldn’t be doing employee advocacy. You need to remain focused on what you’re going to achieve and remember that people are already doing this. The bigger risk is doing nothing at all.

30

ATTRACTS TOP TALENT

Socially engaged companies are 58% more likely to attract top talent.13

{ Tweet This }

13 Cisco Employee Social Media Study



Launch Breakdown

The activation and launch timeline of your employee advocacy program shouldn’t be a mystery. An employee advocacy solution should come with a launch plan customized to fit your brand’s unique requirements. When presenting the program timeline to an executive team, here’s an example of what your employee advocacy roadmap might look like:

2 4

1 3 5

EMPLOYEE SOCIAL AUDIT

Show how employees are already sharing

content

ONBOARDING PLAN

Recruiting and training beta and full program

participants

OPTIMIZATION PLAN

Outline program KPIs and leverage them for the highest results

IMPLEMENTATION PLAN

Step-by-step strategy for integration

ENGAGEMENT PLAN

Leverage content that drive engagement and

enable sharing from any device

32

FAST ROIEmployee advocacy programs need

just 30 active employees to acheive ROI.

{ Tweet This }



Conclusion

Employee Advocates: Your Most Powerful Marketers

No one knows your brand experience like your employees. They’re experts, not only in your products and services, but also in your industry. Top brands around the world are already getting started with inside-out marketing to create connections between consumers and their most passionate brand advocates: their employees.

SocialChorus’ platform is a proven solution for brands to leverage employee advocacy within their organization. Curious to find out more? Check out our demo at socialchorus.com or give us a call at 415-780-8812.

10 of the Fortune 50

15 of Fortune’s

Most Admired Companies

3 of the 5 Largest

U.S. Retailers

5 of the 12 Fortune 500

Software Sompanies

4 of the 5 Largest Consumer Packaged Goods

Companies

3 of the 4 Largest

Telecommunications Companies


Key Takeaways: Your Internal Buy-In Toolkit


More Powerful

135 brand advocates are more powerful than 1,000,000 fans.

Solves the Social Dilemma

On Facebook, brands can only reach 1-2% of their network organically.

Extends Reach

Employees have 10x more followers than corporate social accounts.

Discover New Audiences

90% of an employee’s social audience is new to the brand.

Increases Revenue

12% increase in Brand Advocacy generates 2x increase in revenue growth.

Increases Productivity

Engaged employees are 2x as productive and responsible for up to 80% of customer satisfaction.

Attracts Top Talent

Socially engaged companies are 58% more likely to attract top talent.

Fast ROIEmployee advocacy programs need just 30 active employees to achieve ROI.

{Tweet This}


Phil Jackson, Head Coach, Chicago Bulls

The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.

© Copyright 2014 SocialChorus, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Sell Your Company on Employee Advocacy