How Does Social Media Factor into Your Profession? W/ Paul Copley

Jason Brain

Creative Strategist

6 minute read

How Does Social Media Factor into Your Profession? W/ Paul Copley

How many of your employees are already on social?


You’re engaging with a candidate, or a prospect, or even a client, and just like that the conversation becomes uncannily reminiscent to a scene from Office Space as they ask: Remind me what you do?

Not you personally, but your company, your service, your product. Your value – how many people not only don’t know what your brand offers as a competitive advantage, but also don’t know what the greater category is that you operate in?

The paradox occurs to you: we’re a market leader, and yet no one knows us. Funny, right? And yet way more common than you might expect.

This is a “0 to 1” issue that many brands, and especially B2B companies face all the time. What’s the solution? Hint: something to do with how your employees network on social media.

Paul Copley knows how to deal with this, as the Senior Talent Acquisition Partner at Coupa, he’s seen firsthand how building a social presence accelerates hiring. 

If the people you are engaging with have already seen your brand on social media (by way of your colleagues sharing and engaging with content) then you’re already in first-gear, and the flywheel is spinning for social hiring, social selling, procurement, etc.

In this episode Paul and Cameron explore:

  • How can you get more employees engaged in social?
  • Why is building employer brand on social media foundational and of critical importance especially for hiring and sales?
  • When should a company invest in social strategy and programs?
  • Just like any investment, earlier is best when it comes to establishing a social strategy for your company.

Watch the Full Episode




Three wisdom nuggets for keeps:

Key takeaway 1: one click is all you need

Many light touches make a big difference. Sounds like esoteric sage wisdom, but it’s quite simple where the rubber meets the social media road.

Enable your people with workplace social tools that don’t get in the way of their day to day work. As Paul mentions, “That’s the beauty of EveryoneSocial, that it allows me to share Coupa content very quickly and very effectively just by the click of a button.” 

Of course, there are other platforms, but we do our best to streamline the impact for employees using our platform. Just as advertisers have the metric “cost per click”, we like to think of social ROI in terms of both finance (money) and economics (time, trade offs). 

For every dollar spent on employee advocacy, we’ve seen 20x returns from an active employee influencer. A lot of that is driven by the person’s existing trust they have built up, but also because our platform is built for busy people. 

With as little as one share per month, or just 2 minutes per month, an entire workforce activated on EveryoneSocial can have exponential reach for a fraction of the cost of ads.

Key takeaway 2: if you conhere, you conquer

But on the flipside: if you confuse, you lose.

As per the aforementioned paradox of winning in your space, but constantly having to explain what your company does – get intelligible. 

Unintelligibility is a dire situation for brands, and in our increasingly social mediated workforce, having a confusing value proposition is a constant hurdle you can easily avoid by building employer brand.

No one wants to have to explain what their company does when the goal is to hire or sell. The best way to jumpstart your recruiting and sales efforts is to enable as many of your employees as possible to share content on any cadence (really, any is way better than none).

When people already know what you offer, how you do it differently than others, and why your culture is uniquely cool – then the conversation is already at a decision making place. 

That’s where we all want to be with as little smalltalk as possible.

Key takeaway 3: let time do the work

Just like any investment, starting earlier is the best way for your brand’s social capital to compound and reach the perceived value of a household name.

With over 3,400 employees at Coupa, Paul speaks about the crucial role that social media now plays in hiring for sales at all levels, from entry to AVPs and RVPs. 

But as a high-growth business, Paul is quite candid: despite all the success Coupa has had using EveryoneSocial, activating employees earlier for social engagement would’ve only multiplied their returns across all fronts.


The best time to begin an employee advocacy and social selling program was yesterday, but the next best is today. Let us know if you want to know more.


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