Employee advocacy is just starting to hit its stride. With tech and collaboration tools that make it easier for employees to share content, a workforce that is becoming increasingly savvy on social media and execs who are becoming more aware of the importance of employee advocacy, this may be the ideal time to start an employee advocacy program. Here are the reasons that employee advocacy matters in 2023:
Reduced Advertising Costs
Advertising can be expensive, but when you have a team of employees sharing your content for free, it's like having an army of low-cost (or even no-cost) marketers working on your behalf. With increased scrutiny placed on marketing budgets and past performance of paid advertising, employee advocacy can be a very effective and cost-efficient marketing strategy.
Credibility and Core Values
When potential customers see that your employees are sharing your content, it adds an element of trust and credibility that can’t be duplicated by your company. After all, people trust people, not brands.
And brand trust is just the beginning. Today’s audiences, especially Gen Z audiences, are demanding that companies that they do business with not only show trustworthiness but also act on their core values. Employee advocate content that reflects these core values and humanizes the brand will go further with this more demanding and sophisticated audience.
Increased Reach for Content
When your employees share your content, they are essentially giving you a megaphone to amplify your message. When combined, their networks are more extensive than your brand's reach, which provides you with access to a whole new, larger group of potential customers. In 2023, the marketing content with the highest growth is short-form video and a well-executed employee advocacy program can do much to extend the reach of this type of content.
Improved SEO
Expertise, Authority, Trustworthiness (E-A-T) will continue to be used by Google to evaluate the quality of your website. As we’ve discussed in past blog posts, sharing content through employee advocacy boosts results for this metric and in turn improves your search engine ranking and drives even more traffic to your website.
Higher Employee Engagement
With volatility in the labor market, companies are looking for creative ways to retain top talent, including keeping employees happy via employee engagement. By empowering employees to share content in easy ways, ensuring that they are informed of important marketing initiatives and rewarding them for their social media efforts, employee advocacy is a key element of employee engagement. In 2023, savvy marketers will work with their HR teams to boost employee engagement and gain all the benefits of an employee advocacy program.
Final Thoughts
If you're not already using employee advocacy as part of your marketing strategy, now is the time to start. With its ability to increase reach, build credibility, improve SEO, reduce advertising costs and improve employee engagement, employee advocacy matters greatly and should be a key part of your 2023 marketing plan. So start harnessing the power of your employees' social media followings today and watch your business grow!