Inchcape

case study

In response to the challenge of engaging their remote and disparate employee population, Inchcape Retail had the idea to utilise the popular social networking site Facebook as a channel for communicating the company’s employee voluntary benefits package, ‘Inchcape Employee Advantages Scheme (EAS)’.

THE BENEFITS PACKAGE

Their employee benefits package, provided by Asperity Employee Benefits includes an impressive discount programme along with childcare vouchers and a cycle to work scheme to help colleagues to ‘drive their cash the extra mile’. In order to convey the benefit of their discounts programme, Inchcape Retail set up the Facebook profile as an alternative way for employees to enjoy regular updates. Posts on new retailers, ‘Super Savings’ offers, competitions, most popular offers, weekly ‘top ten’ retailers and offers, and peer-to-peer discussions and recommendations for savings all helped drive engagement to the Inchcape Employee Advantages Scheme.

INNOVATIVE COMMUNICATION STRATEGY

Inchcape Retail’s Rachel Begg was excited by the fantastic opportunity to communicate the great benefits to their colleagues. After the Facebook page had been up and running for little more than a month, it had already increased employee engagement. Realising that the offers and savings available through the discounts programme already generated a good deal of excitement among their workforce, Rachel was thrilled to drive this excitement further with a forum through which they could share their money-saving experiences. With employees based at hundreds of different retail bases over the UK, the Facebook page was a great way to generate a sense of community.

George Farrow, Client Services Director at Asperity Employee Benefits was full of praise for the Inchcape team, remarking how truly innovative their approach to employee benefits communication had been.

FANTASTIC ENGAGEMENT RESULTS

Two months on from the page going live in March 2011, it had gained nearly 140 ‘friends’ without any promotion at all but through word of mouth.  Inchcape recognised a real opportunity in Facebook to generate excitement around the benefits programme in a way that promotes employer loyalty and a feeling of community amongst Inchcape employees.

Feedback on the Facebook profile was hugely positive and there were a number of money-saving ‘good news’ stories posted by employees.

With over 70% of Inchcape employees registered (June 2011) and actively saving £££’s every month, the Inchcape EAS team can’t wait to see how high they can get the engagement rate with their Facebook initiative.

Inchcape are now considering how they could utilise Facebook even further to promote and communicate other aspects of their employee benefits package.