This was a super fun circumstance I came across—employee advocacy mentioned in the news! I subscribe to the Financial Times, and I saw this article last night. I thought it sounded right up our alley, so I started reading.
Sure enough, it was about employee advocacy. Deep in the article, they mentioned that “the appeal has prompted some to actively encourage their staff to take part in, quote, employee advocacy, or to post about their company on socials as a way to increase reach for employees.” Staff posts can be a cheap way to boost a company’s profile and even help with hiring. A survey by the social media company CareerArk (I don’t know who they are) found nearly half of surveyed Gen Z and millennials who had a job had found the role through social media.
While a lot of this is familiar to those of us in the social media marketing world, it was great to see an actual mention. They also talk about the Edelman report, specifically the 2025 Advocacy report, which we have a copy of on our website. That report discusses how people trust colleagues and others more than official influencers.
The article is interesting—I’ll share the links in the comments. I felt it skipped the reality of employee advocacy a bit, though. This is what I see often with news about social influence: when it brushes on advocacy, it’s always from the standpoint of consumer influencers, as if employees can also be influencers.
The reality, as you all know, is that advocacy is critical for all functions of business, particularly for B2B businesses. In my view, B2B is a rare example of being ahead of B2C on this marketing frontier.
It’s an interesting read, and I love seeing the data supported. Edelman and others have stats showing that, not surprisingly, the younger the demographic, the more frequently they post about their job without even being prompted.
My takeaway is that this trend is only growing with Gen Z and millennials. For many of our customers, LinkedIn is the primary focus today, especially for B2B. I think over time, these other networks will become more and more important. It also gets to the heart of something we’ve believed after 15 years of advocacy data: all sharing is good sharing.
If someone is inspired enough to create a video like this, it doesn’t have to be superstar, high-polish content. There’s a quote in the article from an influencer who said, “I do all this stuff, but my office videos tend to get the most engagement and impressions.” Most content is good content, especially when people are creating it on their own.
As I said, this is the first time I can recall reading the term “employee advocacy” in an article. The one other thing that stands out is that even after so many years, it’s still relatively early days when it comes to advocacy.
There is so much opportunity for all companies to proactively engage, activate, and enable their people. They need to have some control over the process; not surprisingly, this piece talks about a young woman who was fired for posting something, and the company wouldn’t reply to any request for comment. It’s important for companies to have some level of control over the process, over messaging, et cetera.
Anyway, it’s an exciting read. Hope you enjoy the article!
