Engage Me!

Successful social networking with in a company is all about engaging your “community.”

By community I mean, your employees, your target audience, or simply your brand.

Engage Through the Right Informaiton

After reading a few short articles about social media, the most apparent way for companies to engage employees is by providing the correct amount of communication and company news to its employees in an effective and appealing manner.

Employees must be engaged to participate and share their opinions to become connected with each other and therefore the company and its brand.

When company newsletters and emails barrage employees with full on company jargon, and as Anne Sauve calls it in the article Brand Building: Why Employee Communications Matter, “the infamous Management Speak” turns employees off and makes them feel even more disconnected by sifting through large amounts of information that essentially does not pertain to what they do individually on a daily basis.

According to The Public Relations Strategist, in the article by Alison Davis, “They’re Just Not That Into You: Can Social Media Revitalize Employee Communication” Davis provided statistics and examples proving that forming a sense of community and belonging is what drives employees to become active participants in the company and gain overall company success.

Employees were engaged thought social media outlets to participate in company discussions, share experiences and essentially build internal networks within the company with news that pertained to them individually.

This helps internally build a brand and there for help retain employee loyalty.

Social media sounds great for companies: Leading debate

Social Media sounds great for companies but the leading debate is how to maintain credibility and make it safe for executives to want to employ.

In the article “Social Meida Within Your Walls” posted by Idil Cakim from Social Media Marketing Insights from GolinHarris, great key points are mentioned on how to slowly introduce a sense of community with social media.

Specifically initiating a social media policy by setting down rules for what types of information should be and should not be exchanged is a great way for companies to protect themselves.

Engaging employees can be simple.

By safely creating a solid work community with social media overall all, allows employees to share company information, communicate with each other and essentially teaching each other best practices to enhances overall professional knowledge.

Like IBM, “Try it and see what happens”, what’s the worse that can happen? Your employees will increase internal branding, production and open up new opportunities for your company to take advantage of?

- Kelly Duncan

#Kean University Marketing for Social Media