5 pro tips to transform new hires into brand ambassadors

Are your new hires excited about your organization? Are they telling their friends, family, and former colleagues about your incredible company culture, 10/10 commitment to diversity & inclusion, and five-star benefit program? Well congratulations, you’ve managed to create what many organizations long for, brand ambassadors.

Brand ambassadors are the best kind of promotion money can’t buy, they’re organic, which usually means people take their opinions more seriously than any marketing campaign.

Transforming your new hires into brand ambassadors is no walk in the park. You need to build a compelling employer brand, communicate that brand throughout the attraction and recruitment phases and then deliver the goods when your new hires land on day 1.

These 5 pro tips are a surefire way to transform new hires into fully-fledged brand ambassadors for your organization. But before we dive in, let's take a quick look at employer branding and why it’s essential to get things right.

Employer branding is the process of building and managing your reputation as an employer among job seekers, employees, and key stakeholders. It encompasses everything you do to position your organization as an employer of choice.

A good employer brand is rooted in an organization's understanding of who they are, what they stand for, and what they are offering prospective new employees - essentially what we call an Employee Value Proposition, or an EVP.

Getting this right is vital because if you ‘sell’ an EVP in the recruitment phase that is inauthentic to your organization, new hires will quickly discover this when they land on Day 1 and become disillusioned.

If your EVP is attractive, unique, and authentic to your organization, this paves the way for new hires to become future brand ambassadors and sing your praises to the masses.

In the onboarding phase, you need to build moments for a new hire to become a brand ambassador. Moments that prove that what you sold in the attraction and recruitment phases is a reality. Here are our 5 pro tips for getting things right:

We spend an average of 1,795 hours per year at our job - so for most of us, it’s important that what we do contributes to something bigger than just ourselves.

Putting your (hopefully inspiring and impactful) overarching mission & vision front and center in your onboarding journey, is going to help new hires get excited about what they’re doing and encourage them to root for your organization.

That means reinforcing this message in emails, meetings, and training, especially during the first month of the new hire experience.

It’s no secret that seeing yourself represented in the content you consume is a powerful thing when it comes to building trust and engagement. This is no different in an employment setting, so it is crucial to showcase a wide range of employees from all walks of life in your onboarding content.

If you’re creating a welcome video or another people-centric piece of new hire content, be sure to include employees of different backgrounds, seniorities, genders, and more to give new hires the full picture of the diversity present in your organization.

People tend to share exciting things with their friends and family. The things that were special, exciting, or just downright FUN. So make sure your onboarding process isn’t ALL process and paperwork. Be sure to bring in plenty of moments that spark joy for your new hire. Here are just two to get you started:

- Deck out your new hire’s desk with some company swag, a welcome card, and some tasty snacks on their first day. Make it Insta-worthy with a larger-than-life frame they can pose in for a #day1 selfie with their new colleagues.

- Plan a welcome lunch (or after-work drinks) for your new hire and their team. If you can, make it an off-site activity, so it feels extra special. Want to go the extra mile? Find out your new hires’ favorite food and tailor the lunch accordingly.

Sometimes, we all need a little nudge in the right direction to share how we feel. Potential brand ambassadors may not know when (or where) is appropriate to share their experiences of working for your organization - so let them know.

Set up moments in the new hire journey that include a prompt to write a short LinkedIn post about their first day, week, or month. Or send them a feedback survey at critical new hire milestone moments that includes an option to share their results on social media.

Get creative and you’ll find that your ambassadors-in-training might surprise you with a beautifully worded *public* pat on the back.

There’s nothing worse than a process that just doesn’t work. Even with the best intentions, if your onboarding program isn’t easy to access, modern, simple, and intuitive, new hires will tune out (and probably tell embarrassing stories about how your organization is still stuck in the stone age).

What’s more, according to Gallup, only 12% of new hires believed that their organization did a good job with onboarding. Whilst that statistic is a little depressing, the silver lining is that the bar is low, so with the right piece of digital onboarding software, you’re guaranteed to blow the socks off your new hire and have them dropping your name left right, and center.

A good piece of digital onboarding software will allow your organization to streamline processes, automate tasks & administration, and manage a wide range of new hire activities with relative ease.

It’s that simple!

Transforming new hires into brand ambassadors is a lot about delivering on the promises you’ve made in the attraction and recruitment process. But it doesn’t just happen. HR needs to actively create moments that WOW new employees and prompt them to be your newest, biggest cheerleader.

Talmundo’s digital onboarding software can help YOU transform new hires into brand ambassadors. Speak with one of our experts today to find out how!