How to Encourage Employees to Follow the Company on Social Media

Getting your team to follow your company on social media can feel surprisingly tricky, but it's a tremendous win when you get it right. Your employees are your most powerful advocates, and their engagement can transform your online presence from a simple broadcast channel into a thriving community. This guide will walk you through practical, non-intrusive ways to encourage your team to hit 'follow' and share your story, turning them into your biggest cheerleaders online.

Beyond Follower Counts: The Real Impact of Employee Advocacy

First, let's establish why this matters. Encouraging employees to follow and engage isn't just about boosting your numbers, it's a strategic move that delivers real business benefits. When your team gets involved, you tap into a powerful, authentic source of promotion.

• Authenticity and Trust: People trust recommendations from individuals far more than they trust branded advertising. A post shared by an employee feels like a genuine endorsement from a friend or colleague, not a corporate message. This trust is something you can't buy with ad spend.
• Exponentially Bigger Reach: The collective network of your employees is almost always larger and more diverse than your company's list of followers. When one employee shares a post, it introduces your brand to hundreds of new people in their circle - a network you likely wouldn't reach otherwise.
• Boosted Engagement: Social media algorithms prioritize content that gets early, high-quality engagement. When employees like, comment on, and share your posts, it signals to platforms like LinkedIn and Instagram that your content is valuable, which pushes it out to a wider audience.
• Powerful Employer Branding: A socially engaged team is the best advertisement for your company culture. It shows prospective candidates that your employees are proud and happy to work there, making it easier to attract top talent.

Shifting your perspective from "we need more followers" to "we're building a community of advocates" is the first step. The goal isn't just a follow, it's genuine, voluntary participation.

Step 1: Create a Social Feed Worth Following

Before you even think about asking your team to follow, you have to answer one simple question: Is your social media account actually interesting? You can't expect anyone - employees included - to follow a feed that’s dry, overly corporate, or looks like a ghost town. The foundation of any successful advocacy effort is high-quality, engaging content.

Give People a Look Behind the Curtain

Your team knows what happens day-to-day, but your audience doesn't. Go beyond polished product shots and share the human side of your business. This is the content employees feel a connection to.

• Spotlight Your People: Regularly feature employees (with their permission, of course). Post about work anniversaries, new hires, promotions, or even fun personal achievements. A "Meet the Team" series can be incredibly effective. When you make your employees the heroes of your story, they’ll want to share it.
• Celebrate Team Wins: Did your engineering team just squash a major bug? Did the sales team land a huge new client? Did someone organize a fantastic volunteer day? Share these moments! It recognizes hard work and makes everyone feel part of a winning team.
• Showcase Your Culture: Post photos and videos from team lunches, company outings, or even just candid moments in the office. This content is pure gold for employer branding and gives people a reason to follow along.

Balance Promotion with Value

If your feed is 100% sales pitches, even the most loyal employee will tune out. Aim for a content mix that educates, entertains, and inspires, in addition to promoting your product or service.

• Share Industry Insights: Post useful articles, quick tips, or data that your audience finds valuable. This positions your company as an expert in its field.
• Use Engaging Formats: Ditch the text-only posts sometimes. Create short-form videos (like Instagram Reels or YouTube Shorts) showing a day in the life, ask questions in your captions, or run polls in your Stories. Interaction breeds more interaction.
• Be Consistent: An abandoned social media account is worse than having no account at all. Posting regularly - even if it's just a few times a week - shows you're invested and gives people a reliable reason to check back.

Step 2: Make It Easy and Appealing to Connect

Once your social profiles are in good shape, you can start gently directing people to them. The key here is to remove all friction and integrate the call-to-follow into your existing internal communications. This is about invitation, not obligation.

Weave It Into Your Internal Processes

Don't just send one email blast asking for follows. Make finding your social channels a natural part of the employee experience from day one.

• Onboarding &, Orientation: During onboarding for new hires, include a slide in the presentation that introduces your social media channels and explains what kind of content you post there. Frame it as "a great way to stay connected to our culture and news."
• Internal Newsletters: A lot of companies send out weekly or monthly internal updates. Add a permanent footer section with clear, clickable icons linking to all your social profiles. You can occasionally feature a recent popular post to draw more attention.
• Email Signatures: Encourage (but don't mandate) employees to add company social media links to their professional email signatures. This is a subtle but constant reminder.
• Company Intranet: If you have an internal portal or intranet, make sure your social feeds are embedded or prominently linked on the homepage.

Make A Friendly, Transparent "Ask"

Instead of a formal directive, explain the 'why' behind your request. People are more likely to participate if they understand the impact.

• Communicate the Goal: At an all-hands meeting or in a company-wide email, explain why employee engagement on social media is so valuable. Tell them, "When you share our posts, you’re helping us reach amazing new customers and attract talented people like you." Show them they're part of the company's success story.
• Spotlight Great Content: When you share something you're particularly proud of - like a video highlighting a team project or a major company announcement - send an internal message saying, "We just posted something really exciting on our LinkedIn page! Feel free to check it out and share it with your network if you'd like." Directing them to a specific, high-quality post is more effective than a generic "go follow us" plea.

Step 3: What to Avoid at All Costs

How you ask is just as important as what you’re asking for. Pushing too hard can backfire spectacularly, creating resentment instead of excitement. Avoid these common mistakes.

• NEVER Mandate Following or Liking. This is the cardinal sin. Forcing employees to engage is not only heavy-handed but also produces inauthentic activity that algorithms can sometimes devalue. It makes social media interaction a chore, not a choice. Social media should always be voluntary.
• Don't Be a Content Dictator. If you're building an employee advocacy program, give your team flexibility. Provide them with content and suggested captions, but always encourage them to add their own voice and perspective. A copy-pasted corporate message from a personal account looks robotic and disingenuous.
• Don't Ignore Employee Contributions. If an employee shares a company post or tags the company in their own content, acknowledge it! A simple "thank you" or a comment on their post goes a long way. Recognizing and appreciating their effort encourages more of it.
• Don't Violate Personal Boundaries. Remember that an employee's personal social media account is their space. Never pressure them to post on accounts they use strictly for friends and family. Acknowledge the difference between professional networks like LinkedIn and more personal ones like Facebook.

Final Thoughts

Encouraging employees to follow your company on social media is less about a single campaign and more about building a company culture and online presence that they are genuinely proud to be associated with. Focus on creating value on your social channels, shine a spotlight on your incredible team, and make it easy for them to join the conversation without pressure.

Creating this stream of consistent, high-quality, people-first content across platforms becomes much simpler when you have the right tools. We designed Postbase to make managing modern social media - especially the video-centric formats that showcase culture so well - feel intuitive, not cumbersome. With a clean visual calendar for planning and reliable scheduling for Reels, Shorts, and Stories, you can focus on crafting the content your team will actually want to follow and share.