How to mobilise employees to become brand ambassadors

One of the most common questions we get asked is how do we get employees to become employee brand ambassadors. 

It all comes down to the offer. 

It’s important to spend the time on this bit and get it right.

One thing that can cause a lot of confusion with an employee advocacy programme is whether you see it as something colleagues should join without question as part of their job or whether you need to sell the benefits to them to encourage them to sign up if they want to.

The best approach is almost certainly the latter.

You need to treat communicating about an employee advocacy programme as an internal sales activity.

You need to:

• clearly demonstrate the benefits and value to the employee for getting involved
• answer common questions, deal with objectives and overcome barriers
• share testimonials, feedback and reviews. You need social proof
• demonstrate what you’re asking them to do.

What are the benefits for employees?

They could include: 

• improving their skills at work
• Learning a new skill, such as using social media for professional purposes
• doing their jobs better, including customer service 
• increasing their chance of promotion or have better review
• helping and being seen to help the company’s goals, for example getting more customers
• feeling part of something bigger, for example the company purpose.

It’s important to note that the needs may be different for different businesses or different groups. For example, people in sales or customer facing roles will be interested in supporting their customers, eg with recommendations and making sales. Whereas people who offer individual specialist services to customers will be keen to share their expertise to stand out against the competition.

When creating your employee influencer team, put your employees’ expertise and experience at the forefront. As you help them to grow their influence, you’ll grow your influence as a brand as well.