[Episode Eighty-Eight of ‘The Employee Advocacy and Influence Podcast] 🎧
In this episode, Lewis Gray and Elliot Elsley sit down with Michela Di Giorgio Martin, Lead Manager – Social Media at AICPA & CIMA, often referred to as the “Employee Advocacy Queen.” Michela shares the blueprint for how she transitioned a 2024 pilot program into an employee advocacy success story in 2025, leveraging principles to embed advocacy into the organization’s culture.
Key Takeaways:
- Why starting small with a focus on employees and total shares allowed AICPA & CIMA to “iron out the creases” before scaling.
- The specific strategies used to increase active shares per user by 540% and boost the Earned Media Value by 660%.
- How to use Microsoft Teams and internal newsletters to meet employees where they already work, reducing the barrier to entry for sharing content.
- Why focusing on nano- and micro-influencers among your employees builds more trust than traditional corporate messaging.
Strategic Employee Advocacy Pilot Phase
Launching a full-scale advocacy program immediately can be overwhelming, so Michela recommends treating the initial year as a strategic pilot phase. This period allows program managers to “iron out the creases” and experiment with different tactics to see what resonates with the workforce. During her 2024 pilot, Michela focused on foundational goals, such as onboarding users and monitoring total shares to understand the activity. For marketing leaders, this approach provides the necessary data to justify the need for a scale-up in subsequent years. By prioritizing learning over perfect performance initially, you build a more resilient program for the long term.
Shift from Volume to Efficiency Metrics Over Time
While total shares are a helpful starting point, maturing employee advocacy programs must shift toward more sophisticated data points to measure true impact. Michela explains that after her pilot year, she moved away from tracking total volume and began focusing on active shares per user and Earned Media Value (EMV). Elliot notes that shares per active user is a superior metric because it allows a business to predict exactly how much reach they will gain for every new person added to the program. This shift in 2025 led to staggering results for AICPA & CIMA, including a 540% increase in shares per active user and a 660% increase in EMV. With these data points it becomes a way to demonstrate the scalable ROI of advocacy to executive leadership.
Leverage Executive Visibility to Build Program Credibility
The success of an employee advocacy program is often tied to how active and visible the leadership team is on social media. Michela was in a good position in which her senior executives were already open to advocacy and eager to increase their online presence. She supported them through one-on-one sessions to optimize their profiles and guided a sustainable posting schedule, such as once a week. Seeing leaders participate serves as a powerful signal to the rest of the organization that social sharing is encouraged and valued and creates a culture for employee advocacy.
Ready to start your own employee advocacy program?
Whether you’re exploring employee advocacy or considering DSMN8 as your platform, we can help you get started with confidence.
Learn More About Employee Advocacy:
Selina Sher Gill
Selina has a Master's Degree in Marketing and Brand Management, and is DSMN8's Digital Marketing Executive. She's a pro at creating and editing video content, using these skills to create short-form social media videos and edit the Employee Advocacy and Influence podcast.
