By Victoria Stoklasa, CEO

When employees speak well of their workplace, it is an indicator to others that their company is good. After all, don't we all want to work at an awesome company? (I mean, I already work at an awesome company, but that's beside the point.) A business that uses employee advocacy on social media can promote a company culture of open communication, cohesiveness between employees and management, and satisfaction in the workplace. Here's how you can develop employee advocacy in your own agency.

To develop an employee advocacy campaign, a company should first approach their employees and address the importance of sharing via social media. Express that social media is an easy and fun way to connect with potential customers, and how employees can change how the company is viewed. You can also include case studies of successful employee advocacy in other organizations--for example, this case study about Microsoft--to show how your employees' efforts can make a difference. Consider developing incentives as well, such as promising that any employee who brings in a new client via social media receives some sort of finder's fee. 

Once your employees understand why you want them to advocate for the company on social media, it is important to give them the "how" behind the "why". Communicate with your employees what outcomes you expect from employee advocacy. The best way to do this is by developing a written policy on employee use of social media. Answer question your employees might have: How often should they post? What is acceptable content to post? How should they respond to any replies?

Launching an employee advocacy strategy on all your employees at once can be overwhelming on both sides--you have too many posts to monitor, and your employees have no examples to base their work on. Before thrusting your strategy on your organization as a whole, identify employees who are active on social media and have a pattern of being early adopters. Run a soft launch with these "rock stars" and allow some trial and error as you perfect your plan. Then, you can safely present it to the rest of your employees.


Has your company tried employee advocacy? What advice do you have? Leave a comment and let us know!

By Taylor Torossy, Social Media Management Intern, Spring 2015

“Did you see her tweet last night?”

“No.” Checks Twitter. Gasps. 

“Did you see his Snapchat story from last night?”

“No.” Checks Snapchat. Gasps. 

Social media and drunken college kids go hand in hand--last night's mistakes are now public information. But this stereotype isn't all there is to understanding how college-age consumers use social media.

College kids have a constant craving of learning about new people. The whole phenomenon has even gained the infamous term “creeping”. We sit behind someone in a lecture hall who is on their computer searching Facebook. They are scrolling through someone’s pictures, and we cannot help but creep on the person they are creeping on. Creeping is how we secretly look up that cute guy we sit next to in math, or how we look up that girl to show our roommates a picture of her and say, “Ugh I wish I could do my hair like hers.” We are creepers and proud of it! 

However, social media is not only used for creeping. It keeps us connected. We travel miles from home, and our friends from high school traveled even further to their own colleges. Through social media we are allowed to reconnect with these comforting relationships. Our moms are allowed to embarrassingly check in with us by posting some random picture she found funny...and even though we may roll our eyes, it still connects us to home. 

Along with creeping on strangers and connecting with old friends and family, college students also communicate with their new friends on campus. When we wake up in the morning, we turn to our phones to see what the hype is for the day. What are people talking about? What is everyone else doing? We post pictures of us posing with our new friends, Snapchat the gross dining hall food, and post statuses about our frustration from studying all night at the library.
 
Creeping, connecting, and communicating--there is so much college students do with social media. It is our outlet and our escape.

By Victoria Stoklasa, CEO

This week, rather than our usual how-to style of blogs, I want to share a story with you...

Let me preface this story by explaining that, when I'm not managing social media, I spend my time being a giant dork. (Okay, honestly, I'm a giant dork at work, too.) Last week, my dorky demeanor ended up being to my advantage.

One morning, while working on a couple of projects for clients and growing hungry, I tweeted this:

"I'm not sure what I'm hungry for: leftover margherita pizza...or ADVENTURE!"

See what I mean? Incredibly dorky. I published this silly, harmless tweet and moved on with the rest of my day.

Later, when I checked my email, I saw that my pizza tweet had gotten a response...from Papa John's.

@vickystoklasa Get fresh pizza, Victoria! Get half off your entire order with online code #TWEETDCT50: papa-johns-20.centive.me/280984854"

Wait, what? Had I seriously just received a 50% off coupon for a dumb tweet about leftover pizza? Apparently, yes. Papa John's decided that my inane post was worth a response, and they wanted to make my situation better by offering me a fresh pizza rather than a leftover one.

Well, when people are kind enough to offer, I am kind enough to accept. My husband and I ordered a large "The Meats" pizza with garlic dipping sauce and, with the coupon code, only paid 50% of our bill.

This online encounter was a solid reminder that social listening is not only ideal for a business--it is essential. Obviously, it pays (literally) to listen to chatter beyond a business's immediate sphere. Branching out to key words and phrases on social media can help a company address issues, solve problems, and build a tribe. 

My advice to Bon Visto Media's blog readers is this: Try, just once, branching out your social listening. You don't have to go as far as developing a coupon code, the way that Papa John's did. Just respond to some posts that are relevant to what you do. Then, watch and be amazed by the response. 

What are your results of this social listening experiment? Let us know in the comments!