The marketing field is undergoing a significant shift in how employees contribute to corporate brand building. No longer passive recipients of corporate messaging, employees today play an active role in shaping the organization’s brand strategy—imbuing them with purpose, meaning, and authenticity.
By tapping into the collective wisdom and power of your workforce, your business can build stronger, more authentic brands that resonate both internally and externally. Here’s how to do it.
Listen to employees systematically.
To ensure your brand reflects your company’s values, listen to your employees systematically—not sporadically. Employees engage with the brand every day, making them a goldmine of insights. Unilever, for example, has successfully embedded its sustainability initiatives into its brand by consistently engaging employees. Through regular employee surveys, including their “UniVoice” survey, Unilever gathers feedback on various topics, including sustainability, ensuring that sustainability is not only a buzzword but also a lived value throughout the organization.
At a tactical level, brands can involve employees when updating foundational elements such as mission statements and brand messaging.
A focus group exercise, for instance, where employees are asked to recite the company’s mission from memory can reveal much about the clarity and resonance of the core values. If they struggle, it may indicate a need to refine the messaging.
By conducting surveys, hosting focus groups, and holding town halls, companies can collect ongoing feedback that strengthens internal culture and aligns external branding with what employees genuinely believe. These insights are invaluable, as they come from people who live and experience your brand daily.
Be decisive with employee feedback.
While employee feedback is essential, it is equally important to be decisive in how you act on it. Companies need to balance incorporating employee input with acting resolutely in the best interest of the brand. Netflix recently faced employee backlash over airing controversial comedic content. While the company listened to employee concerns, they ultimately decided that Netflix needed to stay true to its brand as a haven for artistic freedom—a core element of the Netflix brand. The company elected to continue streaming the content and acknowledged that it could not please everyone while staying true to its mission.
Transparency is key.
Even if some suggestions cannot, explaining the rationale behind those decisions helps employees feel valued and fosters a culture of trust. This approach is crucial for maintaining morale and ensuring continued employee engagement in brand-building initiatives.
Give it importance and purpose, but make it fun.
Creating engaging experiences for employees doesn’t have to be strictly business-focused. Companies that incorporate fun into brand-building can spark creativity and enthusiasm. Consider how Google encourages its teams to participate in “Innovation Week,” where employees pitch creative ideas for improving work processes or products. This initiative is gamified, with rewards for top ideas, promoting both friendly competition and collaboration. Some ideas from Innovation Week have resulted in real product improvements, highlighting the impact of employee-driven innovation.
Align the employee experience with your brand.
Your employees are the frontline ambassadors of your brand, and their experience at work should mirror the brand values you promote to the world. Ben & Jerry’s is an inspiring example. Beyond their famous social mission, the company involves employees in advocacy campaigns aligned with its core values, allowing them to actively participate in social causes like climate change and equality. This alignment ensures that the values Ben & Jerry’s shares externally are lived internally, making employees authentic and engaged brand ambassadors.
If sustainability is a core value, for instance, ensure that your workplace reflects that.
This might involve providing eco-friendly office supplies or implementing sustainable practices in daily operations. When employees experience the brand values firsthand, they are naturally more aligned with communicating those values to customers.
Empower employees as brand ambassadors.
An empowered workforce is a powerful asset for extending your brand’s reach. Patagonia, known for its dedication to environmental causes, encourages employees to advocate for environmental activism, offering paid leave to volunteer for environmental causes. Additionally, Patagonia’s “Worn Wear” program, which promotes repairing clothes rather than buying new ones, exemplifies its commitment to the planet. Employees play an active role in this initiative, engaging with customers to encourage sustainable consumption, making them passionate advocates for the brand’s mission.
Providing employees with resources—from branded materials to social media guidelines—helps them share their enthusiasm for your brand with the world. Meanwhile, recognition programs that celebrate employees who go above and beyond can incentivize and reinforce this behavior even more.
Measure the impact.
Marketing relies on measurement, and this principle also applies to employee engagement. HubSpot, for example, conducts regular feedback sessions and pulse surveys to evaluate the impact of its brand initiatives. These surveys help measure employee satisfaction and alignment with company values, providing insights that HubSpot uses to refine its internal practices and brand messaging.
Feedback sessions allow employees to contribute ideas that directly shape HubSpot’s approach to culture and customer experience, creating a measurable impact on both internal and external brand perception.
By tracking metrics such as employee engagement, customer feedback, and social media mentions, you can assess the success of your efforts. Regular analysis and adjustment ensure that your strategies stay aligned to your goals, and that you’re always moving in the right direction.
Aligning the employee voice across all audiences.
When employees align with your brand, the benefits reach far beyond internal culture. Their voices resonate not only within the company but also with customers, partners, and prospective talent. Apple and Google have shown that aligning employee values with brand messaging creates powerful, authentic connections across audiences. When employees embody the brand, it’s evident in every customer interaction, product launch, and marketing message.
Recognize your employees for who they are: the heart of your brand. For when you systematically listen to, empower, and engage them, you’re not only building a stronger brand—you’re creating a movement that resonates far and wide.
Cover image source: Solidasrock