How to Promote Your Organisational Mentoring Program (Tips for Success)

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Workplace mentoring programs come with an expansive number of benefits, from assisting the recruitment of top talent to enabling productivity within an organisation. However, many people fail to realise that when launching a mentoring program within any organisation, investment is demanded, from time and effort to the number of resources required.

One of the most influential factors of starting a program is the marketing side of it, although, unfortunately, this is one of the key factors that organisations overlook. Marketing is particularly important, with how an organisation actively promotes their program having an immediate impact and effect on the overall success. Since you can't have a mentoring program without actually having any mentors or mentees, having a marketing strategy in place is key to keeping engagement and participation high.

Once your program has been backed as well as designed, it's time to start promoting it to the workforce. To guarantee it's successful, you need to have a plan in place that includes all aspects of marketing. We know that marketing can seem daunting, especially for those who aren't in the industry. We've helped organisations across the world effectively promote their programs and know a thing or two about the best practices. That's why we're here to help.

Throughout this article, we will be discussing the best marketing practices you need to keep in mind, methods of promotion and ideas for ongoing marketing for your mentoring program.

1. Understand your objectives and audience

Do you want your program to be successful? Then firstly, you need to understand your key objectives and audiences. Whether you're looking to improve retention within your organisation or looking to enhance diversity and inclusion, whatever the reason, you need to have a clear understanding of whom you're promoting to.

Once you've identified the objectives of your program, you need to then take a step back and work out whom you're looking to engage with. Is the mentoring program company-wide? Are you looking to help with the onboarding process? Once you have a clear understanding of the target audience and objectives, it's time to begin planning the rest of your marketing strategy.

2. Plan your message

Once you have a better familiarity with the objectives and target audience, now is the time to start constructing a marketing message that is at the core of your mentoring program. This is the message you plan to send out to your participants, making sure it resonates with them, is straightforward to comprehend and will get their attention.

There are many reasons people may be participating within your mentoring program, therefore, you need to understand these reasons and emphasise the ones most alluring to them.

3. Time your messages

So, you've got a plan in mind, who the marketing is for, the objectives and the message itself. What's next? Well, it's time to think about the best time you should be distributing messages to your audience. If you want to have an effective message and an improved engagement rate, you need to ensure people are reading what you have to say.

Timing your message is completely dependent on the method you choose to use (we will be presenting some methods throughout this article). For example, don't send emails on the weekends because the majority of the time, it will be lost by the time it comes to Monday. The next thing you need to think about is the timeline you have in mind for the launch of your program. If you send a message out the night before, the likelihood is that you'll have 0 participants. You shouldn't wait to the last minute to transmit marketing messages, instead, have a precise plan and timeframe in place to ensure you obtain the most attention possible.

4. Distributing messages

Now you've got a strategy, let's get started with distributing the marketing messages. When it comes to communicating and promoting to potential participants, there are so many ways and activities you can undertake to ensure you keep ongoing engagement for your mentoring program.

Listed below are some prime methods you can use, to create a thriving program that all your employees want to be a part of:

• Email

Email communication is a widespread and powerful tool used amongst many organisations and is a great way of extending the word about any new activities or programs internally. When promoting your program, you can construct alluring emails to communicate and showcase the mentoring program with potential participants.

However, when it comes to email, the downside is that it can be easily missed or ignored. Don't solely rely on this method to distribute your messages, you need to consider things such as timing, subject lines and content.

• Instant messenger channels

With the peak of working from home, came along the use of instant messenger channels such as Slack and Microsoft Teams. Using instant messenger channels is now a part of our daily workday as a way of communicating with our team members and keeping up to date with the latest news.

If your organisation currently uses this method of communication, then you'll be happy to know it's the perfect way to promote things internally. To get started, conduct a mass message that can be sent across to potential participants. In comparison to emails, these are less likely to be ignored and are a fantastic way to get a conversation going about the new mentoring program in place.

• Utilise social media

Now, while this doesn't apply to all organisations, using social media is a great way to promote the program, particularly if your organisation consists of members. For example, a not-for-profit focused on helping individuals gain the skills needed to enter the workplace.

Promoting the mentoring program on social platforms such as Instagram and LinkedIn provides the opportunity for your post to reach more people than using internal methods of communication. It's also less likely to be ignored than other methods.

People are also more likely to share content that's been posted on social platforms, which could also be a terrific way to entice new individuals to your organisation whilst creating awareness and engagement surrounding your program.

• Intranet

Some organisations have them, some don't, but if your organisation has an intranet portal for employees, then you're just in luck. An organisational intranet is a location for employees to access news and updates about the organisation. When publicising your mentoring program, you should consider posting a message announcing the launch of your program or the latest insights. This will help distribute the word, at the same time provide everyone in the organisation the opportunity to retain more and see if it appeals to them.

• Hold mentoring events

Holding events promoting the mentoring program is a compelling way to create awareness and increase participant sign-up rates. The results speak for themselves, with one organisation that worked with PushFar having 50% of employees turn up to the event.

There are many ways to draw people in, from offering free champagne to having an inspiring mentor share their stories. Either way, mentoring events are inspiring and motivational for participants.

• Traditional marketing collateral

Traditional marketing is often forgotten about in the rise of digitalised approaches being used. However, sometimes traditional methods are a great way to convey the details needed to the people who want to see it. Placing things such as posters around the office area is an underrated way to announce new organisational incentives such as mentoring programs, whilst you don't need to place posters all over the office, consider putting some up in communal working areas that showcase the mentoring scheme in its full glory.

Make sure to include the details and information needed, such as the benefits mentoring can provide and how participants can easily sign up for the program.

• Word-of-mouth

Following on from traditional methods of marketing, word-of-mouth is a great way to share insight about the mentoring program as a whole. This method works particularly well when a participant has a success story to tell, it also creates trust and creates an environment where conversations can be held.

5. Ongoing methods of marketing

As well as marketing the launch of your program, you must incorporate ongoing marketing methods into your strategy. If you want to keep engagement high with existing participants as well as scale up your program, the only way you can do this is by continuing your marketing efforts.

Listed beneath are techniques you can use to continuously promote your marketing program after launch:

• Case studies

Gathering case studies from existing participants is something we recommend to keep the motivation going amongst other individuals who are taking part in the program.

Reach out to individuals in mentoring relationships and ask them to take part in case studies. This is a simple but impactful process you can use to enhance your marketing endeavours.

If they agree to take part, ask them questions about their mentoring successes, these case studies can then be turned into other forms of content. Such as promotional emails, articles, and stories you can share to showcase the benefits of mentoring within the organisation.

• Check-in-events

It's ideal to host frequent check-in events focusing on the progression of mentors and mentees of your mentoring program. This is a great way of confirming engagement is improving and allowing participants to share their feedback, which can be used to create an even better experience going forward.

These check-in events also mean that mentors and mentees can meet face-to-face. Furthermore, these events provide the possibility for new mentoring relationships to be created.

• Get senior leadership involved

Do you want to create a successful and worthwhile mentoring culture within your organisation? Well, what better way than to get senior leadership involved!

Having senior leaders onboard as mentors (or even reverse mentees) has a positive impact on the visibility and awareness of the program because it creates an organisation that values and embraces mentoring within the workplace. It influences others to join because leaders are often those we feel inspired by.

Asking leadership to take part in the discussion of mentoring, their experiences and success helps boost the program through ongoing word-of-mouth, whilst also improving motivation amongst participants. These stories can be used to create various pieces of content that can be distributed to further attract and retain employees.

Final thoughts

Mentoring is one of the new things where the benefits outweigh any resources involved. Whilst marketing can seem intimidating, we hope this article can get you on the right track and give you a few ideas to help your marketing efforts.

When it comes to marketing your program, it's all about trial and error. Don't be afraid to make mistakes because, in the end, it'll all be worth it. After some time, you'll soon learn the best way to gain new participants and the methods you can use to retain mentors and mentees.

Remember, have fun and enjoy the journey. If you need help with mentoring within your organisation, you can find out more by visiting PushFar - the world's leading mentoring and career progression platform.