Pretty much any marketing executive will tell you how difficult it is to get employees, particularly non-marketing employees, to create content and for content marketing and engage in corporate social media efforts.
One undeniable benefit to having the entire team participate in corporate social media is that people engage with other people online at a much higher volume than they engage with branded corporate social media accounts. Additionally, the engagement is usually more genuine.
Set Reachable Goals
Think about what you want to achieve through employee engagement and envision what success might look like for example you might want employees to :
-share updates from corporate social media platforms
-create their own social media posts with the company/brand in mind
-contribute content for the company blog
During your content marketing planning phase, consider these 5 ways to turn not only your marketing team, but your product, sales and operations teams, into active content and social media contributors.
Create a Clear Strategy and Plan
Planning isn’t just critical to get the marketing department on the same page, but also to affirm and motivate other teams and departments. Since you’re asking other departments for contributions, the heads of those departments and potential contributors need to see a plan that includes a clear path to success. Since corporate social media and blogging aren’t their main role, they’ll need as much scheduling, preparation and updates as possible. Set clear expectations regarding what each author needs to produce, and when they need to produce it. For best results, an editorial calendar should be posted or sent out to serve as a guide for all content creators.
Make it Easy to Participate
There are so many ways to make content creation easier for your non-marketing employees. The first step is providing a clear plan. The next step is to create a simple process to follow, along with appropriate support from inside the marketing department. The sharing process must be extremely simple. When it comes to getting employees to share suggested social media posts, for example, it pays to minimize steps and make it effortless. Send out a list of suggested Tweets and Facebook posts that people can scroll through and choose. Other team members will be more likely to share when they don’t have to take time out of their day to come up with creative messages.
Provide Everyone with an Editor
When it comes to writing blogs, the fear of failure is very, very strong. Aside from that fear, there’s just a lack of time for anything besides the work each employee deem a priority. Assign someone from the marketing team to be an editor for non-marketing employees, so they know their work will be polished for publishing. When someone knows they just need to draft up writing materials, it’s easier to get the words flowing. Give them an editor, and let them know that this editor will not let them fail.
Share Corporate Social Media Data to Demonstrate Impact
Looking at data and stats for certain posts can be used to understand which types of posts resonate with audiences on each corporate social media platform. It’s also used to increase performance of posts by looking at what time of day and which days of the week have a greater impact.
Another benefit data can bring is when it is shared with the whole company and specifically highlights impact from a post from someone who isn’t on the marketing team. For example, show them the type of readership and traffic their material is generating. Let them know of any leads that have come through their material. Show them how popular their content is on social media platforms. When team members can see that an article they posted or a blog they wrote increased site traffic, they will feel pride in their contributions and will be more likely to continue to contribute and provide great content.
Make it Part of Job Descriptions
If engagement and contribution becomes a chore and it’s like pulling teeth, one way to ensure it won’t happen in the future with newer employees is to include it in the job description. Leave most individuals to their own devices, and they will only do the work that is required to keep their jobs. If it’s not in their job descriptions, they won’t make it a priority. As part of acquiring participation from other departments, managers need to make sure team members aware that social media and content contribution is part of their job and will be included as part of their annual evaluation.
If you follow some of the tips above, you will certainly get some non-marketing employees to create appealing content and engage with corporate social media.
How does your marketing team engage other team members in social media and content marketing? Let us know in the comments!
