How Chewy activates employees to tell its brand story
Insights from Ragan and PR Daily’s Social Media Conference.
A great employer brand makes people stop and say, “I wish I could work there.” And there are few messengers better in that pursuit than people who already work there.
Wednesday, during preconference workshops for Ragan and PR Daily’s Social Media Conference at Walt Disney World, Chewy.com associate director of employer branding and employee engagement Kara Hendrick shared deep insights on putting employee storytelling at the heart of employer brand building.
“Employees are the most trusted voice in the company. Who knows it better, right?” Hendrick said. “When they share their experiences, it naturally reinforces what the company’s vision is.”
Through real-life case studies, Hendrick shared her insights into what it takes to activate these built-in influencers to build an employer brand that attracts and retains the best talent.
It’s a team effort
Employer brand is a cross-collaborative effort. It touches on so many different aspects of communications and management that not only should the employer branding team be involved, but internal comms, PR, HR and legal must be strong partners as well.
The employer branding team is responsible for defining the purpose and objective of the initiative — what are you going to do and why are you going to do it. But here’s how each of these other teams can get involved in activating employee advocates:
- PR: Provide key messaging for employees, prepare for crisis scenarios and public scrutiny, and monitor and handle reputation management.
- Internal comms: Ensure message consistency internally and embed advocacy into internal comms channels, such as newsletters and intranets.
- HR: Provide toolkits to employees with best practices and sample posts, keep employees engaged about opportunities for advocacy and identify culture champions throughout the organization.
- Legal: Understand the impact of data privacy laws, intellectual property rights and employment policies on what employees share, internally or externally.
One pro tip Hendrick shared was to bring these partners along on your journey. Tap ambassadors from these departments so they can lend their expertise to the process, but also so they can become advocates for the program.
Create a strong policy
Employee advocate programs shine when the workers’ voice melds with the overall brand voice and vision to create something that feels authentically human while still progressing the company’s goals. In order to achieve that, workers need to understand what they can and can’t do.
Hendrick suggests clear do’s and don’ts — and both halves of that equation are important. People need to have guardrails around appropriate behavior (“You’d be surprised what people think it’s OK to share,” she said) and also to feel empowered by what they can do.
And employee advocacy can be small steps. Not everyone has to be the star of a video right away. Small actions such as liking, sharing or commenting on a LinkedIn post can also play a big role in helping the company overall.
This policy should also have provisions to ensure brand representation is in alignment with overall messaging goals and that actions comply with FTC guidance, disclaimers on personal opinion and other legal considerations.
A case study of success
Hendrick shared a video with a simple concept behind it: ask employees to “Describe #LifeAtChewy” in three words.”
The employees that responded ranged from top company brass to fulfillment employees and everyone in between, each shown in their own work clothes and environment.
While each response is unique, there is considerable overlap that begins to tell a cohesive brand story: words like fun, fast-paced, passionate and exciting crop up over and over.
“And I did not have to pay anyone to do that. They literally wanted to do that,” Hendricks said wryly.
While this particular video is slickly produced, Hendrick emphasized that not all employer brand content need be. She noted one of their top-performing pieces of content in the last year was when someone’s Goldendoodle jumped in front of a Zoom screen. A simple lo-fi photo yielded big results.
Chewy has the advantage of having lots of cute animals to help tell their story. Not every organization can rely on the power of Goldendoodles.
Here are several other companies Hendrick says are sharing employee stories in a compelling, meaningful way.
Other advice for smooth campaigns
One of the simplest ways to make a campaign shine is by making resources readily available to employees. At Chewy, this means a SharePoint site with prompts, information and templates that employees can easily use, such as social shareable for new hires or anniversaries.
It’s also important to use this employee advocacy content internally and externally: the same story might work great on LinkedIn for prospective employees while also helping build internal culture when spotlighted during an all-hands meeting.
And that simple recognition can help beget more action. A bit of swag or a leader congratulating a worker on their advocacy can spark an eager, engaged employee base ready to tell your organization’s story.
Allison Carter is editorial director of PR Daily and Ragan.com. Follow her on LinkedIn.
