Want to Boost Conversions? Get Employees Involved in Content Creation

Your content. You know it has to be the right mix to not only attract visitors, but convert them as well.

You may be writing content for your website, newsletter, landing pages, or email campaign and almost immediately you notice that it’s not converting the way you hoped or thought it would.

Could it be that your marketing department has too much power?

If your content is not converting and producing the results you want, keep reading this article. Removing some of the power from your marketing team and giving it to employees in other departments could impact your ROI, in a good way.

Here are the top 10 ways to get employees involved in content creation that will boost conversions.

1. Ask for and share awesome client or customer stories

Many people ask family and friends and business associates to refer products and services. After all, if a member of your networking group hired a web design firm to create a responsive website that has provided a 47% return on investment, wouldn’t you want to work with the same company?

Start asking your support and success teams for video and written testimonials from customers and turn them into great stories. For example, you could create a couple of blog posts from one testimonial. You could also feature a customer in your monthly or weekly newsletter. Don’t forget to send out emails showing a customer who did something significant, like reaching $1 million in sales.

The key here is to make it an initiative. By getting your other teams involved in this form of content creation early on, you’ll create a system of great content generating opportunities.

2. Show employees what’s in it for them.

Like it or not, employees (and most people) want to know what’s in it for them. They won’t voluntarily ask for more work. It’s up to you to show them how content creation benefits them in the short and long run. Here’s how you can do that:

Encourage salespeople to search for themselves online. Why? Because most clients and customers research companies before calling or sending an email – they want to know if you and your staff are a trusted source. Keep in mind that online reputation management can present your company in a positive light. Furthermore, presenting content that adds value is a great way to look good.
Incentivize employees! You do know what motivates your employees, right? Some may prefer money, so give them a bonus when their content reaches a certain number of shares or likes. Others are driven by status, so give them a certificate or plaque, take their picture and feature it the company newsletter. Or you may consider giving them a prime parking spot for the month.
The power of personal branding. Helping your employees improve their own personal branding by helping them become industry thought leaders provides a huge boost in their career potential (not to mention it can be quite an ego boost as well). We’ll discuss this more in #6.

3. Include content creation in job descriptions.

When is the last time you reviewed your business’s job descriptions? If it’s been a few years, you may want to rewrite some of them and include content creation.

If you need to hire an account executive, developer, etc., include the creation of blog posts in the job description. You may consider giving incentive pay, so you can tie it into the compensation package. Your employees will work harder to get extra bonuses for submitting content that converts.

Implementing content creation into employees daily work-flow can increase your internet marketing success and lead to more sales. It’s a great way to boost traffic (SEO), conservation, and engagement.

4. Accept different forms of content

Have you heard the saying, “Trying to fit a square peg into a round hole?” It means something that is not possible or practical. Forcing employees to create content, for example, infographics, when they’re strength is writing blog posts, is a recipe for disaster – your content will not convert!

You’ll find that some employees are better at creating whitepapers than writing articles. Some are skilled at creating images with text overlay, videos, or SlideShare presentations, while others may prefer to write social media content.

Allow employees to create content that plays to their strengths instead of forcing them to do something that isn’t natural; otherwise, your content won’t be authentic. Your customers will sense the inauthentic vibe and ignore your content. If this happens, you can expect low conversions.

5. Make the content submission process easy

Consider that some employees may not be tech savvy, even though they can write content that converts. To streamline the submission process, create policies and procedures that are easy to follow. You may consider (if you’re not already) using the following platforms:

WordPress. Create multiple admin logins for employees and set them to Editor status.
Email. Create an email address for submitting content, for example, [email protected]. You may consider setting up parameters around subject lines, i.e., January 2016: Social Media Content, to ensure that content is forwarded to the right person.
Dropbox. Create a folder for content. You may want to create subfolders, e.g., podcasts and case studies. The pro account will cost around $100/year.
Google Drive. If you use Google Docs, you may want to use Drive. You get 5GB of free storage. After that, it’s $1.99/month for 100GB and $9.99/month for 1TB.
Think tanks. Encourage and allow brainstorming sessions. Not only are employees working with customers, but they see each other every day and can pitch and discuss new content ideas.

6. Support and encourage personal brands

Many employees use social media to share personal and company information. However, you may want to ensure they’re not risking your [and their] organization’s reputation by sharing the wrong types of information.

So, what can you do? You can help employees build their personal brand. For example, encourage them to start their own blog and write articles on Medium. Then share their content through your social media channels. Allow employees to reimburse their hosting expenses every month.

If you hold an event, take photos of employees who are ‘behind the scenes’. They can create collages, share, and tell a story about your event on their social networks as well as the company’s.

Employees are assets – use them wisely. Develop and provide them with guidance and resources for establishing a strong personal brand. Help employees to become thought leaders by encouraging them to share great content. Do this, and you won’t risk your company’s reputation.

7. Track and analyze and share results

Once employees begin to publish content, you’ll need to track and analyze results. Use HootSuite, CrazyEgg, and other platforms that give you targeted data. Set up goals and define key metrics. Share information with employees to keep them focused, committed and enthusiastic. When they meet content conversion goals, it will reinforce their vested interest in the company’s success. If goals aren’t met, review the numbers to find out why and adjust your content strategy.

Giving employees the chance to represent your company can boost engagement and conversions. It also fosters collaboration and friendly competition. Furthermore, it solidifies that top experts are delivering great customer experiences.

8. Reward conversions

Most companies have rewards programs for customers, so why can’t yours have one for employees? Create a program, maybe based on points and/or reviews [mainly for sales team], to incentivize your staff to create the best possible content. Perhaps you can give away electronics such as tablets, smartphones, laptops, digital cameras, and more. Or maybe you’ll give extra time off. Cash and gift cards work, too.

Just as you reward those who receive positive mentions, you’ll want find out why your company or employees were mentioned in negative reviews, social media comments or posts [if you allow customers to post to your pages], or blog post comments. Address these issues immediately and put a plan into action to reduce the number of negative chatter about your company.

Review your and reinforce the “what’s in it for me” concept. Offer coaching to employees who aren’t performing well. You may consider implementing a peer-to-peer program, where star content creators mentor those who need extra help. All it may take is one valuable tip. And BAM! Employees start producing conversion worthy content.

9. Add key employees to your social media team

How many employees are on your social media team? If you restrict administrative access to only those in your marketing department, you’re missing out on converting content at a higher rate. Why?

Because employees in other departments, for example, billing support, have valuable customer insights that can affect conversions – their knowledge can help to increase the bottom line. If customers post questions regarding billing, who better to answer their questions than billing support? For SaaS (Software as a Service) companies, this could be an easy way to combat churn.

In this example, at least Media Temple is on top of it. Having billing respond first will probably make this revenue catch go even smoother.

Getting employees involved in the discussion around the monthly calendar can boost conversions, too. Plus, other employees may have ideas that could result in a higher ROI. You won’t know unless you ask and open your social networks to other employees.

10. Provide ongoing education and training

To ensure your employees create awesome content, hold education and training seminars and conferences, either once a month or twice per quarter. Introduce the latest strategies and technologies for content creation. Get into groups and brainstorm for new ideas and/or review content that did not convert to help employees understand why it didn’t work.

Consider, intranet, or company group on LinkedIn, Facebook, Google, or some other platform for employees. Allow them to engage with one another by asking questions, sharing content, and more.

The more training you provide employees the better. Not only does your content strategy need the right mix of content, but it also requires collaboration, cooperation and creativity.

Increase Conversions by Empowering Employees to Create Content

Getting employees involved in creating content can be the solution for increasing conversions.

Instead of groaning each time you look at the numbers from Google Analytics, you look forward to sitting down with your team and reviewing the number each month. A smile forms across your face because you like what you’re seeing.

Imagine gaining a 97% increase in conversions all because you transferred some of the power from your marketing team and to employees in other departments.

Not only are your customers and website visitors happier, but employees are engaging and working together more. They look forward to reading everyone’s content and are only too happy to help those who may need it.

Seem impossible? It’s not.

Schedule an in-house company meeting (or hold via a conference call), dig into content strategy and determine the employees that will help you take control of your content.

You’ve got a blueprint – now all you need to do is follow it.

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About the Author: Amandah Blackwell is a professional content writer, copywriter, and speaker who provides small business owners and companies with nonstop, first-class writing and presentations. Get your free social media marketing for events strategy by visiting Savvy-Writer.com.