You wouldn't believe how nervous I was when I finally mustered up the courage to walk into my boss's office, and pitch him the idea of changing my role at his agency based solely on my established and growing social media presence.
I explained to him how I wanted to leverage my own personal brand, and the reputation I had built over the last two years, to help extend the company's digital footprint and brand awareness.
My goal: Become an employee advocate.
To my surprise, he agreed, and seven months later we had the data below to show just how much of a positive impact one employee advocate can have at a company.
Huzzah! Another success story of employee advocacy that benefited a business. But were the benefits mutual? Though my experience was a positive one, in most employee advocacy articles I've read you rarely hear from the employee's point of view. Was it even worth it to them?
In short, no. Since this form of digital employee advocacy is still in its infancy, and as a previous employee advocate, here's my advice about why you should possibly rethink becoming one.
You Won't Care
If you spend the last hour in the office watching the clock tick by, then you're probably not going to be the best employee advocate. One of the very first things you need to do is ask yourself if you even care enough about your current employer to advocate for them.
Remember, advocating means using your personal social profiles to promote company related messaging like new product releases, white papers, or pictures of the company picnic to your friends and family.
If you don't care about the company, or don't plan on being there very long, it's going to become obvious and both parties will be left unsatisfied. More importantly, ad-hoc employee advocacy programs typically lack structure, rewards systems and defined metrics to gauge success, which can easily lead to a communication breakdown and personal discontent.
You Won't Have the Network
Rome wasn't built in a day and neither are relationships or personal networks. Think about it: How long did it take you to accumulate the Facebook friends you have now? How about 1000 Twitter followers? Or the coveted 500+ LinkedIn connections?
While it's true that everyone has some level of influence, businesses will always try to get the most bang for their buck and justify it by looking at Return On Investment (ROI). Unfortunately, your average employee won't have a big enough network to make that difference.
And not just any network will do. Your personal network will need to be highly relevant, industry aligned and engaged to work. After all, data speaks, and if grandma is the only one responding to your company related posts, that's not going to help anyone and especially not the companie's bottom line.
From my experience, the only way employee advocacy can work is if the individual has taken the time to develop their personal brand and cultivate an audience based on relationships around it. Realistically, this can take years to build and one misaligned company agenda to ruin.
Then what? You quit or get fired, your personal brand takes a hit and you forever lose the trust of your once loyal audience.
Is the juice even worth the squeeze at that point?
You Won't Have the Time
Have you ever seen the Great Gatsby? How amazing was it to watch that one dude single-handedly host a party where thousands would attend and enjoy themselves? Imagine the pressure to consistently keep everyone entertained and maintain each individual relationship.
Minus the bubbly champagne, fireworks and roaring 20's flappers, that's exactly who you should expect to become as an employee advocate. Remember, you're basically combining both your personal network and your employer's into one giant Gatsby shindig.
But if you're authentic about it, here's what it should start ot look like after introducing your companie's network to the party.
This takes time, time you don't have considering you weren't initially hired on as an employee advocate, but as a regular 9-to-5 worker with obligations to perform and a responsibility to justify your employment.
There's also a high likelihood that your boss won't consider an employee advocate as its own position, and will more than likely be opposed to putting the employee's personal brand before the company's.
If that's the case, good luck explaining to your boss that you need company time to work on your personal brand or on maintaining your precious digital relationships that you formed before you were even hired.
Employee advocates have allowed businesses to reach an entirely new and untapped audience by piggybacking on to their personal social profiles. While this can be a lucrative business opportunity, employers and employees alike need to recognize and appreciate the risks each one brings to the table, and ultimately develop a mutually beneficial advocacy program.
Until that time, you may want to keep your networks to yourself and rethink the idea of becoming an employee advocate.