In this episode of AMP Up Your Digital Marketing, Glenn Gaudet speaks with Stephen Spector, who’s spent more than 20 years doing digital marketing and social media in the IT space. Stephen discusses strategies he’s used to successfully implement employee advocacy programs.
You’ll learn:
* Employee advocacy platforms can reap a number of benefits, including an increase in brand engagement, product feedback, and sales leads.
* Getting buy-in from executives and employees isn’t always easy, but start with a “pilot program,” a small group of people who are already social media savvy.
* It’s essential to prove the value of an employee advocacy platform, especially to executives, by presenting them with backend reporting and metrics.
It’s no secret people are naturally resistant to change, and this is often magnified at work.
So when you approach management and employees with the idea of an employee advocacy platform, you might be met with indifference, or even get some pushback.
After all, those outside the marketing and social media world might not understand the perks of these platforms — how they can establish employees as social media thought leaders, increase brand awareness and engagement, collect product insights, and boost sales.
So how exactly do you get executives and employees to buy into employee advocacy?
It’s not always an easy task. Take it from Stephen. When he joined the Edge Gravity team as the senior director of digital marketing, he discovered the company had already invested in our very own solution for employee engagement — GaggleAMP.
That’s great, but the only problem? No one was actually using it.
Stephen joined the AMP Up Your Digital Marketing podcast to discuss how he got the company’s executives and employees on board and ultimately reap the benefits of the platform.
How to Generate Excitement Around Employee Advocacy Platforms
Stephen, a self-taught marketing and social media pro, is a big proponent of employee advocacy platforms, so he understood the value of implementing an employee advocacy platform like GaggleAMP.
Unfortunately, those outside the realm of marketing and social media weren’t quite so excited.
But that’s where you can work your magic. Here’s exactly how Stephen was able to generate excitement around the program and get buy-in from both company executives and employees.
1. Pick up the Phone
Stephen was familiar with GaggleAMP, but he wanted to understand how it could specifically benefit Edge Gravity, an edge-computing company.
So he simply picked up the phone and connected with GaggleAMP reps, who walked him through the ins and outs of the tool. He had multiple calls with the team and spent time discovering new features and also gaining insight into how his company could implement the tool.
“They’re there to help you,” Stephen says. “I know sometimes we think we know everything. It’s OK to say, ‘I don’t know the answer.’”
After he gathered that intel, he was ready to share it with other employees at his company.
2. Launch a Pilot Program
Before he began trying to appeal to the masses, Stephen knew he needed buy-in from a select few, so he launched what he called a “pilot program.”
He selected a handful of people at the company who were already social media savvy and hosted training sessions. Because this group of employees already understood and used Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, it was much easier to train them and get them excited.
He spent a few months working with this pilot group before branching out.
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