Employees are the newfound spotlight for brand promotion. Employee generated content in the forms of social media posts, articles, or testimonials, elevates brand visibility, organic reach, as it provides social proof of organizational culture, values and credibility. The insider view into a company reinforces audience trust, making the organization a recognized authority among the crowd. EGC not only affirms authentic customer experiences but also helps to attract top tier talent, peer partnerships as well as lead generation across multiple platforms. This blog explores how employee generated content translates into increased brand visibility and long term success.
What is Employee Generated Content (EGC)?
Employee generated content (EGC) is any form of media (text, social media post, articles) generated by the employees regarding the organizational culture, brand values, or experiences. It follows a unique way of brand advocacy, through humanized brand messaging, audience engagement through sharing real world stories and social proof of the internal culture and company accomplishments. In contrast to the user generated content (UGC) or AI content creation, this implies the promotional activities by company employees.
Why Employee Generated Content (EGC) is Gaining Traction?
- EGC builds customer trust
Employee generated content establishes the company culture and reputation in a most reliable way. As it is created solely by the employees, it resonates with the audience relatively more effectively, leading to building more genuine connections and trust toward the organization.
- Behind-the-scene-insights drives connection
Employees publishing exclusive project insights and behind-the scene visuals, provide the audience the trustworthiness and transparency about the company. In this evolving business landscape, people not merely seek astonishing web content or thought leadership on social media platforms, they expect realness. A candid brainstorming session will win over the audience than just posting a product launch picture. Behind the scene footages indicate authenticity, essential to gain credibility among the target audience.
- Employees as micro influencers
Employees as brand advocates can significantly impact an organization’s reach and organic traffic. As employees already have a niche oriented wide audience circle, micro influencing by promoting professional insights or organizational culture, will help attract potential customers, recruit top tier talent or expand reach though industry leading figures.
- Cost efficiency at scale
Through promoting behind the scene footage or real world stories, employee generated content facilitates reliable reach improvement efforts without heavy marketing spend. Compelling and scalable employee content attracts potential customers, industry peers, potential prospects regardless of resource richness or advocacy platforms. This efficiency helps brands to significantly reduce cost required for marketing and overall development initiatives.
- Audience demand for authenticity
In a digitally pioneering era, people are massively exposed with huge amounts of information daily. With the rising influence of numerous social media platforms, the audience often prefers content that is relatable and trustworthy. EGC bridges this gap, as it concentrates on endorsing company culture, project highlights, genuine workforce sentiment and success stories of their accomplishments.
- Expanding organic reach
Employee generated content increases the organic reach by publishing company related content or behind the scenes on personal social media platforms, it elevates brand visibility. When sharing their positive experiences, how the company values employees or project insights and achievements, it becomes an interactive hub to boost visibility and interaction naturally across diverse networks.
Types of EGC
- Project highlights or behind the scenes: These are typically the insights about employee’s day-today activities. It includes a photo of a product launch or footage of solving a client issue, or any challenges. Highlighting such brand insights translates transparency of the organization, boosting credibility.
- Employee-led thought leadership content: Apart from the corporate insights, employees often share their personal expertise in the form of articles, blog posts, participation or engagements in the organizational activities.
- Customer success stories: When employees share insights or achievements of converting a lead or solving a client problem, it not only implies the company efficiency but also a social proof for the audience.
- Culture or event photos/videos: It includes photos or videos regarding team outings, company offsite, or highlights of CSR programs, contributing to attract talented candidates, fortifying the internal culture.
How EGC Supports Key Business Functions
- Humanising brand messaging: Unlike with the brand promotional content, ESG increases organic reach and customer engagement through promoting success stories, niche driven thought leadership, and promoting organizational values and ethical governance via storytelling.
- Enhancing engagement: Employee generated content is channeling higher audience engagement through promoting real world experiences, values, insights from daily activities. This indicates the authenticity and reliability of the brand, manifesting genuine connections and authoritative presence.
- Social proof of company culture: Employee generated content not only translates to brand credibility but a tool for social proof. When employees share inside stories of a brand, internal culture or accomplishments through storytelling, it stands as a social proof of real and authentic company review. Highlighting brand values in a humanized way, resonates more with stakeholders, employment seekers and potential customers.
- Real world use case stories: Real world stories stated by the employees are more credible than employer branding initiatives. EGC is a strategic asset for companies, as it adds value across functions from brand visibility and sales success recruitment and partnerships, strengthening industry credibility.
Conclusion
EGC unlocks as a strategic enabler for generating authentic connections, positive brand social proof, and establishing credibility among the audience. By showcasing a brand’s internal culture, employee experiences and behind the scenes of a project through employee influence, attracts genuine engagement and increases trust. ESG can be various types such as project highlights, customer success stories, and employee-led content of thought leadership. Investing in ESG or employee influencer campaigns will help businesses build audience trust, organic reach and authenticity in a cost effective manner.
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