Employees are the most important part of any business, yet far too many companies fail to include employees in their marketing plan. In fact, highlighting your team members is one of the best ways to make your business seem more personal and relatable.
In this article, we’ll explain the basics of employee spotlight posts and how to successfully implement them into your campaigns. We’ll also go over some of the best employee spotlight posts we’ve seen to show you what they look like in practice.
Quick Jump
What Is an Employee Spotlight?
Employee spotlights are posts about your team members with details like their accomplishments, personality, and interests outside of work. While employee spotlights generally focus on individual employees, they may also include information about an entire team.
This type of content can be posted everywhere, but it’s most common on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Some companies also post employee spotlights on internal channels to help build a positive culture and develop stronger relationships between team members.
5 Best Practices for Creating an Employee Spotlight
Every employee spotlight is different, but it’s a good idea to come up with a basic structure or template to help create your posts. This will make it easier to create high-quality content while hitting the key points you want to make. After working with so many different companies, we’ve found that these five best practices are crucial for successful employee spotlight posts.
1. Think about your format
Format refers to the specific form of content you want to create. The most basic example would be a simple text post, possibly with a picture of the employee or another relevant visual. However, we’ve also seen successful employee spotlight posts with many other formats.
For example, interviews and other videos can be a great way to get beyond the surface of a conventional text post. They will give viewers more of a personal feeling and help create a more unique impression.
On the other hand, videos aren’t always the right choice. If you think most viewers will be using a mobile device, then they may not be able to hear the accompanying audio. Format needs to be considered in connection with the way you expect the content to be delivered.
2. Which employees will you highlight?
Next, you should think about the specific employee (or employees) you want to focus on in your upcoming spotlight. The goal is to find someone who aligns with your brand style and offers exceptional qualities that will captivate your audience. Ideally, you want to spotlight a variety of different employees to show diversity and thus attract other diverse talent to your company.
Do you want to give off a young, cutting-edge image? Spotlight an employee under 30 and highlight how their creative thinking adds value to your business. Start by asking team members if they’re willing to participate, and then going over any unique or interesting qualities. Be sure to plan your highlights around a variety of different roles from within your organization, especially in sectors where you’re currently hiring.
Depending on how many employees you have, you might be able to plan and highlight all of them equally.
3. Questions to ask your employee
Employee spotlights should focus on the employee themselves, but it’s a good idea to start with a set of questions to move the conversation forward. Make sure to ask questions that give the employee a chance to talk about your brand and work culture. This list of questions is a good starting point:
- What is your role at [company name]?
- How did you find out about [company name]?
- What’s something most people don’t know about you?
- What are your professional goals?
- How does [company name] help you achieve those goals?
You can always adjust your questions later on. Of course, you should also edit each employee’s answers into a form that’s clear and concise for readers, while maintaining their unique voice. However, keeping a consistent format will maximize engagement by letting audience members know what to expect from your content.
Don’t hesitate to ask some less profession-focused, fun questions. Employee spotlights offer a human aspect to your brand – focusing on who your employee is outside of work can help you celebrate them properly.
4. How to promote your employee
Next, come up with a promotional plan in order to maximize visibility and engagement on your employee spotlight posts. Make sure to have your employees like and share your spotlight content with their own networks.
Boosting is another straightforward, low-effort way to increase social media traffic. LinkedIn, for example, enables users to boost regular posts without changing the format. Boosting on LinkedIn and other channels could substantially increase your ROI, particularly for posts that you expect to generate strong engagement.
You can also create content on your employee advocacy board for your other employees to share and celebrate their colleagues. This is a great way for each of your employees to share what they appreciate about their colleague, not only fostering a powerful work culture built on lifting up your employees, but you’ll amplify that healthy work culture across your social networks.
5. How to measure engagement on an employee spotlight
Finally, consider how you’ll measure the success of your employee spotlight posts. Employee advocacy campaigns can be tracked by a variety of metrics such as brand visibility, lead generation, and more.
Here are a few things you should expect from employee spotlight posts:
- Engagement: Everyone loves a celebration – and that’s exactly what your employee spotlights are meant to do. These posts get great engagement from other employees who want to celebrate their colleagues as well.
- Reach/Impressions: While this isn’t necessarily the most actionable, concrete metric, the engagement you get from employee spotlight posts can help propel your brand before many more eyes. This means improving both brand awareness and employer branding.
- Clicks: Combining employee spotlights with a CTA to join your team can be especially powerful for attracting lead talent. What you highlight in those posts might be a potential candidate’s first impression of your brand – make it count! Pro tip: On LinkedIn, include a link to your careers page in the first comment of the post, rather than within the post itself. You can even pin the comment to the top of your post to make sure it’s not lost in the shuffle.
Of course, you should also consistently evaluate your performance on all other social campaigns. Use a social media analytics platform to see exactly how your employee spotlights are performing.
3 Examples of Strong Employee Spotlight Posts
Now that you understand the key elements of employee spotlights, let’s take a look at 3 of the most effective posts we’ve seen in the last few years. Remember that competitor research is one of the best ways to identify weaknesses in your own strategies.
1. Oktopost
This short video from Oktopost is a perfect example of employee spotlights on Instagram. Introducing a new employee is a great way to welcome them and make sure they feel like part of your team. The video covers her professional interests and goals while also highlighting her personality and sticking to a casual, approachable tone.
2. Corel Corporation
Like the video above, this LinkedIn post is short and concise while still demonstrating a positive and conversational style. The picture at the bottom puts a face to the name, and the employee’s quote gives viewers a preview of what to expect if they click through to the blog. Learn more about how employee advocacy helped Corel develop their brand community.
3. Contentsquare
Finally, Contentsquare shows exactly how to leverage the synergy between an employee’s personal goals, their professional skills, and your own brand image. This post highlights the incredible trip one of their employees was able to take due to the company’s flexible remote work policy.
In 2022, workers are often hesitant to join businesses that they perceive as too rigid or top-down. Contentsquare’s employee spotlight proves that perception wrong — if you’re working for them, you can still travel the world and pursue your own interests. Note the link at the bottom of the post inviting readers to check the company’s open positions.
Final Thoughts
Social media marketing can be tricky, particularly for B2B brands that need to create an image that’s professional and relatable at the same time. Employee spotlight posts are an ideal tactic for B2B marketing because they allow you to highlight both sides of your brand style in a cohesive way. A strong employee spotlight can appeal to both customers and potential candidates at the same time.
These tips will help you ramp up your employee spotlight campaigns and generate the engagement you’re looking for. Employee advocacy helps you elevate all of your employees to thought leaders and experts in their industry. Combining your new employee spotlight tips with advocacy can be the trick to amplifying these messages even further. Learn how employee advocacy can transform your employees into brand advocates.
