For this post, I wanted to take a break from our usual fare to offer up a list of ideas for rewards you can give your top content creators. Hopefully, this should be a fun post that sparks you to come up with ideas of your own.
The number one way to incentivize good content is to offer prizes. So, here’s a list of actual prizes, from low- to high-stakes, to consider giving your top performers.
1. Cup of Coffee
Coffee is the prototypical workplace drink, partly because caffeine boosts productivity, but also because the majority of Americans drink coffee. A coffee-themed reward can range from a Starbucks gift card to office coffee-machine privileges to free coffee for a month. It’s an obvious and low-stakes prize for top creators.
2. Office Playlist Privileges
If your company has an office soundtrack, you can let your top-performing creator decide what songs get played. Not every office has a shared playlist, but if you do have one, you can assign sole curation discretion as a perk for being the creator-of-the-month.
3. Meal Out on the Company
Either treat your best employee advocate to lunch, or let that person go out (preferably with their spouse or significant other – it’s no fun if you force them to go alone) to a restaurant of their choice, on the company’s dime.
4. Best Parking Spot for a Month
Instead of reserving the closest parking spots for your C-level employees, set aside one for rotating use by the best content creators. Each month, the person whose posts generated the most engagement last month would get to use the space. If they want to keep using the space the next month, they’d have to “defend their title,” by staying in the #1 spot on your content leaderboard.
5. Corner Office for a Month
Taking the parking spot idea to a higher level (literally), you can rotate out the corner office for the top content creator of each month.
6. Tickets to a Sporting Event
This is an obvious one, especially if you’re headquartered in a city with great teams. Even many people who don’t like baseball enjoy going to the ballpark. This reward is especially good if your company has access to a box, or to some of the best seats in the park.
7. Tickets to a Concert
Self-explanatory. Just like the above. You can also try other non-sporting events, like comedy shows or theater productions.
8. Subscription to a Jelly of the Month Club
Or a subscription to any food-delivery club, or similar gift-delivery service. Or a subscription to a streaming service – this is 2022, after all.
9. Wine-Tasting or Brewery Tour
Not everyone drinks alcohol, but for those who do, this can make an excellent prize. Millennials in particular claim to prioritize experiences over material goods, and a vineyard tour or tasting event at your local brewery is an excellent way to combine the two.
10. Gadgets
This could be anything from headphones to a smartwatch. Or an offer for an early upgrade to your employee’s company smartphone or their work laptop.
11. Cash Bonus
Increasingly, Americans aren’t taking time off. They’re cashing in their vacation days for more money. If cash incentivizes your workforce more than time off, monetary bonuses for high-performing content might produce the best competition among your employee advocates.
12. Commissions
Similar to the above. Except here you pay commissions based on the revenue generated per post, instead of paying out a single cash bonus to the top performer. Everyone gets a trophy, but some people get bigger trophies than others.
13. Extra Time Off
Just because some Americans don’t take time off doesn’t mean others won’t jump at the extra vacation days. I’ve definitely been in that position. Especially if older workers in your company accumulate vacation days they don’t use, while younger employees – who accrue fewer days off – struggle to save up enough time for a good vacation, extra time off might be a great incentive for the younger side of your workforce.
14. Vacation on the Company
Similar to the above, you might go all the way and actually gift your best content creator of the year an all-expenses paid vacation to Jackson Hole or Las Vegas or a similar destination. For companies that can afford this kind of perk, it’s a great way to show your employee advocates that you care about their performance.
The best thing to do might be to offer your employees a choice about which rewards they can earn. Some employees will prefer cash to a vacation or time off. Others don’t drink alcohol or coffee. Some workers don’t have cars or don’t care about where they park or what office they sit in. And a few of your employees don’t like sports or won’t want to go to a live event (especially not during COVID).
But with some flexibility and creativity, you can easily incentivize good advocacy work by your creators, which will drive a healthy, fun, competitive, environment that engages your team.
