This document discusses the importance of advocacy marketing and building an ambassador program. It defines advocacy marketing as encouraging customers, employees or partners to promote a company. Building advocacy can amplify a company's reach through existing social connections. An effective ambassador program provides benefits to advocates like early access, exclusive updates and events to recognize, engage and retain them. Tracking key metrics like shares, user generated content and advocate engagement can help measure the success of advocacy marketing efforts.

1. Why Advocacy
Should be Part of
your Marketing
Strategy
#CMXSummit

2. About Me
Alicia Taggio
Advocate Marketing Lead, Hootsuite

3. What’s on Tap
! What is Advocacy?
! Building an Ambassador Program
! Building Internal/Employee Advocacy
! Measuring Success

4. Why
Advocacy?

5. “The use of marketing strategy, budget and resources to
encourage customers, employees, or partners to do
something on behalf of your company with or without the
expectation of mutual benefit.”
Source: Forrester, Advocate Marketing
What is Advocacy?

6. Why be leaders in advocate marketing?
WOM
Word of mouth is the
primary factor behind 20 -
50% of all purchasing
decisions.
- McKinsey
Social
63% of today’s consumers
search for help from other
customers via social.
- Lithium
Credibility
Advocates are 70% more
likely to be seen as a good
source of information by
people around them.
- BzzAgent

7. Gain valuable
insight from your
power-customers
Drive reviews
Generate trust
Engage
customers as
individuals
Increase
referrals
Deepen
relationships
WhyAdvocacy?
Amplify existing social
activity, extending your
reach
Connect your
fans with each
other

8. Why does advocacy matter?
Official Channels
Advocate Amplification
+ +
x
Facebook
Fans
Twitter Followers Linkedin
Followers
Number of
Advocates*
200 Average
Facebook Friends
61 Average Twitter
Followers
240 Average
Linkedin Connections
440k 425k 36k
400
=
=
TOTAL REACH
TOTAL REACH
210k
3 M

9. Leads
Personas
Prospects
Consumers
Target Audiences
Customer Segments
Humans

10. Our community of advocates help to move our business
forward by building credibility through third-party validation
and amplifying our reach.
Our Objective

11. Our Advocate Spectrum
Brand
Ambs
Audience
Partners
InfluencersFollowers Users Fans
Increasing value
Advocacy Programs
Students
Peeps

12. Building an
Ambassador
Program

13. Brand Ambassador Program
500+ Ambassadors in 50 countries

14. Ambassador Program Objectives
Amplification
Product releases shared
with ambassadors to drive
200% more engagement &
reviews
Insights
Share regional insights,
offer product feedback
and support initiatives in
22+ languages
Support
Support our 15,000
registered customers in
the Support Forum with
80% response rate
Hootup Events
Drive localisation efforts
by hosting
200+ events in
62 countries

15. “I joined the Ambassador Program to share my
passion with people that have the same interests,
want to grow together, and inspire.
I love being part of this community.”
Valeria Landivar
Lanaudière, Canada

16. 400+
Active in our Hub
375
Hootups Hosted
299
Published Content
From 112 Surveyed
NPS 74
26,262
Social Shares
Ambassador Program 2015 snapshot
74

17. Where do they come from?
Advocate
Program
Growth +
Mktg
Peeps
The Wild
Support
Customer
Success
Partners

18. v
Acquisition Selection Criteria
❏ Active user of your brand or product
❏ Has a deep affinity for your brand, company and solutions
❏ Perceived expert or thought leader
❏ Charismatic; good public speaker
❏ Net promoter; refers or references you
❏ Motivated to have a personal relationship with you
❏ Motivated to help/educate others
❏ Wants to improve their knowledge/use of your product
❏ Able to participate as part of their job function/role
❏ Motivated to build their personal brand
❏ Meets your brand tone on Social Media/Content Production
An approved Ambassador should meet at least 75% of these boxes

19. All ambassadors have day jobs, so minimizing their effort asks early on,
and concentrating on maximizing value to them, will get them to
participate more often and more consistently.
Gain commitment → Cultivate enthusiasm → Deliver benefits
Grow Advocacy in steps

20. Sample Ambassador Benefits
• Promotional accounts
• Beta access
• Exclusive updates
• Education Certifications
• Swag
• Speaking engagements
• Brand association
• Thought leadership
• Global network
• Knowledge sharing
• Exclusive event invites
• Job opportunities
Product Profile Community

21. v
The Ambassador Journey
Acquisition Onboarding Check-ins
Consistent
Engagement
Quality vs quantity
Invite existing customers
Website application form
Focus on personas
Agree to T&C’s
CASL compliance
Welcome Swag pkg
Onboard to platforms
Connect to others
30 / 60 / 90 days
6 month check-in
Identify persona
Update CRM profile
Knowledge sharing
Better event topics
Better rewards
More regular feedback

22. v
1. Listen
Find your Advocates
Harness the Advocate Experience
3. Engage
Retain the Relationship
4. Share Content
Sustain the Relationship
2. Build Advocacy
Deepen the Relationship

23. How to Grow your Ambassador Program
LISTEN
Create programs to keep your community active and engaged in your
business; look to incentivize your Superfans through custom giveaways,
early product offerings, swag, recognition etc.
Two-way street to sharing insights about your customer experience;
provide relevant content, share their content to sustain the relationship;
Remember, sharing goes both ways, remember the human aspect
Add value by inspiring, educating or entertaining customers with thoughtful
moderation, relevant content and online/offline experiences; Look for every
opportunity to connect advocates with each other
Find and build relationships with key members of the community, both
internally and externally by nurturing conversations and exploring their
interests and how they interact with your business
SHARE
BUILD
ENGAGE

24. Maturity Model
Source: Influitive, Advocate Marketing Guide

25. Tools: Ambassador Forum
Event updatesAsks for participation
in marketing
activities
Advocate Hub
General communication
and connectivity
Content tracking, engagement metrics

26. Tools: Hootsuite Amplify
Visibility of who
else is in the
program
Read-only
messages &
program/company
updates
Social Shares
Shares, Traffic, Adoption, Reach

27. Employee
Advocacy

28. “The general public wants to hear
directly from employees as
‘Ambassadors for the company.’”
Source: Edelman Trust Barometer

29. Who are they? Employee Personas
The Manager
Champion
The GSD
Growth
Leader
C-Suite
The Social
Seller
The People
Finder

30. Advocacy and your business
Content Creation
& Amplification
Social
Sales
Internal
Communication
Thought
Leadership

31. Your people know your business
●They’re tapped-in to the latest news
●They benefit from seeing updates from across
your organization
●They’re on social
●They care!
TIP
Give them the tools they need,
such as swag and on-brand content

32. +7,100,000 Followers
1 Post
254 Sessions
64 Clickthroughs
300 Advocates
1 Post
572 Sessions
191 Clickthroughs
Initial Data

34. What We Do
ShareContent sent
to Amplify
Employees/
Ambassadors
open Amplify
Increased
Impressions
Increased
Clicks Leads

35. Engagement Tactics: Incentives
Supported our customers the Vancouver
Canucks with their campaign by Amplifying their
new video
TIP Reward your employees for sharing with giveaways and incentives
Results:
→ 123 retweets from our employees
→ 103 shares of their Fb video

36. Measuring
Success

37. Identify YOUR metrics to measure
Business Goals
Awareness
Thought Leadership
Word of Mouth
Talent Acquisition
Leads
Sales
Advocacy Goals
Reach
Comments, inbound links
Shares, Reads, Likes, RTs
Impressions, clicks
Form Fills
Online Purchase
Metrics
Total Impressions
Mentions
Shares
Applications
UGC
Conversions
TIP Measure what matters. Target, benchmark, optimize.

38. ! Shares
! User-generated content
! # of advocates in key local markets
! Advocate engagement and participation
The metrics we track

39. Key Takeaways
1. Give advocates ways to share
experiences that validate you
2. Listen, build, engage & share
3. Enable your superfans and your people
4. Align your advocacy goals to your
business goals
5. Ensure you have the proper resources
and budget to support your program

40. Thank you