Marketers understand the importance of social currency and word of mouth marketing in the present world. People trust their friends, family, or some random strangers on the internet more than the advertisements. You don’t need to spend millions to make sure people speak positively about you during a conversation.
It is all about consistency and the quality customer experience your business is willing to provide. Your employees will play a major role in building the social currency of the brand. Here are some tips for small businesses to build social currency with the help of an employee advocacy program.
Don’t Pitch, Use Conversations
You need to start a conversation with the customers or employees about the company and its products. You can start by asking them questions or answering theirs. It will help create a lasting image of the brand with some positive memories.
Use social media platforms to interact with your customers with open and transparent communication. Your employees represent your business to the outside world. Therefore, keep them informed about social selling and its benefits to the business.
Be a Part of Community
Small business needs to invest in creating a strong presence online. They can do it without spending a single pound by communicating with the other community members. Initiate a two-way communication with the other brands in the space.
You should remain polite and generous with the response. The customers will provide positive and negative feedback to your services, remain calm in both situations. You are there to listen to the audience and act so they feel empowered.
Invest in Advocacy
Advocacy is the authentic promotion of a brand by people, generally, without a fee. These include moments when we suggest to our friends something we tried in the past. The brands get the benefits of free promotion, where we acted as its advocate.
Now, the challenge is to promote advocacy without making it look like paid promotion. Many organizations use peer-to-peer advocacy with promotional offers such as coupons and discounts. Simultaneously, many others ask their employees to increase interaction with other customers on social media.
Create Content Worth Sharing
It will be impossible to promote your brand by social media advocates if the content is dull. Your brand should post engaging content worth sharing if you want people to discuss it. You need to stick to the audience requirement with personalization and localization of the content.
Your business might have to invest in content management strategies to increase engagement. If hiring a full-time employee seems a huge task, try outsourcing the job or hiring a freelancer for the tasks. You can cover the cost of content marketing with bad credit loans in Ireland from direct lenders.
Launch the Advocacy Program
Employees will hardly work towards building social currency if the online interaction is optional to them. They may never use their accounts to engage with the other members of the community. A formal advocacy program may help the cause by increasing employee engagement.
Use Employees as Ambassadors
Again, employees have a tremendous impact on the social currency of your business. Their interaction with customers will play a vital role in the campaign. Therefore, you should work toward streamlining the process to increase employee engagement.
Promote the employees to share the company’s content and news on their social media handlers. It is on you to encourage them with some benefits or praising words. They should feel a part of the company if you want them to share content on their account.
Your company’s culture is critical when it comes to empowering the employees. They should feel inclusive in decision-making and valued for their efforts. Only a satisfied employee will make an effort to promote the company’s content.
Measure the Impact
You can start the measurement and tracking once a company-wide policy is implemented. The employees will start to interact with the customers and potential clients on social media. Your business will become a part of the online and offline community of the targeted audience.
The results will help you to improve your efforts and get better with time. You may have to invest in the technology to be able to measure the impact of social currency.
Advocate Rewards
As mentioned above, you can promote the advocacy program by rewarding the advocates. The rewards can include some discount, cashback, or coupon code for purchase with your brand. The employees can receive some incentive as appreciation for the additional efforts they put.
Conclusion
To sum up, you need to create a brand reputation by consistently serving the audience with quality products. Your employees need to advocate for the brand on social media platforms. In the end, your brand needs to become a part of the community if you want to build social currency.