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I am working with a dealer that wants their teams to start becoming advocates and in order to do that I recommended a foundation, policy, easy rules and some training. I've done it in dealerships that I was an employee at and am passionate that it helps the grassroots efforts along with providing a salesperson to take that responsibility and create their own traffic. With this effort they bring in business, they take pride in the experience, and push the dealership to step it up. There are obvious downsides to this but the foundation, policies and regulations help limit those. (You will always have the outliers).

Now, the thing I found most interesting is that MANY of their staff... approximately 18 of their 49 staff that I trained were already branding themselves or attempting to sell via Social Media. MOST were doing it wrong and some had even invested in websites and business cards etc.

I'm a believer that building and supporting company advocates (no matter what the company) is important. But we, as management, need to control the narrative and the manner in which the message is delivered. Simple rules and agreements aid that effort. For example: The assets need to be "Name at Dealership" and all material should include official/approved logos, graphics, and messaging. The content, tone, information shared should follow with a Social Media or Brand Ambassador policy to ensure no legal ramifications of someone publicly representing your business saying the wrong thing.

HUGE fan of this thread. Good stuff!