Bandung 31 May 2022, Companies can use employees as influencers to promote the Company’s business. Employee influencers can create engagement and customer support, even sales leads and management information (such as opinions about product and company decisions).
It is revealed by the collaborative research between the SBM ITB, and Huddersfield Business School, The University of Huddersfield, which explored how State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) in Indonesia select and manage their employee influencers. The research funded by the SBM ITB International Join Research Grant reveals that the involvement of employee influencers is a resource for organizations. It should be done by considering the interest of customers and the needs of employee influencers, including their need to maintain authenticity and be ‘managed’ professionally so that their roles are well-understood and supported.
This research was conducted by four academic researchers and one practitioner, with N.Nurlaela Arief as the head of the research team from SBM ITB and co-authors: Prof. Anne Gregory from Huddersfield Business School, The University of Huddersfield, Aria Bayu Pangestu from SBM ITB, Dany Muhammad Athory Ramdlany from SBM ITB, and I Made Ariya Sanjaya from Kazee.
The researcher conducted content analysis on the social media activities of SOEs employee influencers on Instagram by collecting big optimization data from 2018-to 2020. Two online FGDs were also conducted with 22 employee influencers from 11 strategic industries of Indonesian SOEs.
Research reveals that companies need to know and guide the effectiveness of influencer engagement. The basic content from employee influencers greatly influences its effectiveness. Most clearly, influencers’ content matching the interests of their followers is critical. Especially when followers’ interests are in line with SOEs’ products or services, higher engagement and response will appear.
“It is recommended that influencers’ posts align with the SOE business. For example, when influencers from the aviation, electricity, transportation, and infrastructure sectors post the content showing that the jobs are more visually challenging, high risk, and unreached by the public, they get high engagement,” said Nurlaela.
Informative content alone is not enough to drive good engagement. This research also shows that posts conforming to the interests of influencers and followers and containing sufficient and interesting information about SOEs will result in high engagement. In addition, this research shows that content diversity, creativity, and company-relevant links are fundamentally important.
In terms of literature, this research contributes to current knowledge by introducing the term ’employee influencers’ and differentiating them from ’employee advocates.’ In addition, this study reveals that employee influencers in Indonesian SOEs need to maintain an authentic relationship between their employees and their followers.
Management can also support employee influencers by providing training; materials, such as visual designs, videos, and guides for posts; recognition that they need to maintain their reputation or personal branding and authenticity; and, most importantly, recognition of their contributions. Interestingly, payment is not the main motivator for employee influencers. Considering that the respondents in this research are Millennials, networking and the opportunity to influence other communities is their main motivation. It represents the creation of social capital and training opportunities, and career-leading advancement opportunities. It is ultimately clear that job satisfaction and self-actualization are important elements.
Professor Anne Gregory from Huddersfield Business School added, “This research produces a theoretical model explaining the process of managing employee influencers and can be implemented within the Company. The model consists of a communication hub as an enabler and facilitator who can serve and mediate the interests and needs of influencers and SOEs. Practically speaking, this means that employee influencers are provided with guidelines and standard operating procedures (SOPs) by the communications center, providing information and content that can be posted or shared via social media and advice on how to do this effectively.
Guidelines and SOPs are also important ‘security measures’ to ensure that influencers do not share restricted or confidential information about the Company. However, it does not mean that companies have complete control over employee influencers’ social media. They have the freedom to share or post company information following the guidelines considering the knowledge of their followers.
The research results are disseminated in collaboration with PERHUMAS and attended by the General Chair, Boy Kelana Soebroto. The boy believes that the results are beneficial and applicable to PR practitioners in Indonesia to develop strategic and impactful internal communication strategies.