How to Motivate Employees to Create Content

It can be difficult to encourage busy employees to provide content in addition to their normal jobs (Whaddaya mean I have to do marketing? Isn’t that why we have a marketing department?). To minimize bad feelings and maximize productivity, follow these guidelines:

Educate Workers About the Value of Personal Branding

Getting paid to build your own brand is a major perk of a content marketing campaign. Some employees may not understand this, and so should be informed of the following benefits that a strong online-reputation brings:

• An enhanced reputation that will stay with them for the long term.
• Greater recognition in their industry and profession.
• Networking opportunities.
• A voice in the national dialogue on their area of expertise.

Build a Culture of Innovation and Idea Sharing

Companies that know how to motivate employees to write content eventually create a culture of innovation and idea-sharing. Employees will get an eye for the interesting in day-to-day activities.

The best way to do this is encourage employees to establish social networks representing themselves and the company. Make sure that IT is not blocking social sites. Also, create a social networking blueprint and reward system. Finally, discuss online performance growth in company-wide correspondence, such as meetings. Company newsletters are fantastic for this.

Provide Content Marketing Training

Don’t assume that your workers know what great content marketing looks like. You may need to bring in outside help to either provide content marketing training, or perhaps use a skilled freelancer working alongside your in-house team to get things started.

When employees work with ghostwriters, their content ideas can be shared orally and then used to create professionally written articles. Knowledgeable writers will tailor the message to the target audience and maximize readability. This approach can be especially beneficial when you’re trying to extract content from people whose schedules are really busy or whose work is highly technical.

Once your workers have good examples to follow and a better understanding of the processes behind producing good content efficiently, they’ll be better equipped to take off on their own.

Reward High Performers

Choose a metric to judge the quality of the content, such as the number of page views or social shares for a blog posts. Acknowledge or reward high-scorers. Encouraging competition through contests and score keeping.

Make sure there’s a central location where employees can see their standings, such as web page or scoreboard.

Let Employees Be Themselves

Keep company branding in mind, but give employees the freedom talk about their interests and give their own opinions. This will add an element of satisfaction to the task, encourage creativity and may even create new business opportunities.

For example, Content Marketing Institute created a case study on an organization that set up branded Twitter accounts for each employee.  The individuals used the accounts to tweet about both their professional areas and personal interests. As the accounts grew, the company had a dedicated following from audiences corresponding to each person’s interest. They would not have had access to these audiences any other way.

Reputation Capital Media Services is a Baton Rouge marketing agency that helps B2B companies and their marketing agencies produce high-quality digital content, including blog posts, e-mail newsletters, white papers and multimedia. Our editors and writers are experts in their fields, which include HR technology, employee benefits, and financial services and accounting. Contact us for a free 30-minute consultation to find out how great content can help you attract and retain your customers.

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2 Comments

1. How to Think Beyond Blogs [INFOGRAPHIC]
   8:22 pm on January 15, 2013

   [...] A culture of innovation and idea sharing among employees will help content marketing efforts, According to Reputation Capital, a marketing agency based in Baton Rouge. Companies need to train their staff on exactly what content marketing is, and employees should be allowed to “talk about their interests and give their own opinions. This will add an element of satisfaction to the task, encourage creativity and may even create new business opportunities.” [...]

   Reply

2. How to Think Beyond Blogs [INFOGRAPHIC]
   8:22 pm on January 15, 2013

   [...] A culture of innovation and idea sharing among employees will help content marketing efforts, According to Reputation Capital, a marketing agency based in Baton Rouge. Companies need to train their staff on exactly what content marketing is, and employees should be allowed to “talk about their interests and give their own opinions. This will add an element of satisfaction to the task, encourage creativity and may even create new business opportunities.” [...]

   Reply