Does engagement fall on the client or vendor?

All of the research, legwork, and vetting is complete. You’ve officially chosen your new wellness vendor. Congratulations! Now the rest is up to the wellness vendor; as the client, your job is done, right?

Well, not quite.

Sure, your new wellness vendor should be expected to do all of the heavy lifting when it comes to program setup, consulting on incentive design, guiding communication strategy, providing best practices for quarterly challenges and contests, and answering member questions. However, our most successful clients have always been those who remain equally involved, excited about, and ready to see (and engage with) real change within their organizations. While we regularly help clients boost their engagement numbers and generate real health-habit improvement within the first year after implementation, consistent cooperation with an internal force makes all the difference.

A real-life client example

A admin of one of our most-engaged and successful clients is a shining example of walking the wellness walk and truly immersing into the Sonic Boom program. Since implementation, the admin took it upon herself to:

• Provide energized on-site kickoff events at 33 different locations
• Identify 77 wellness ambassadors across those locations, all of who are empowered to promote the program at their particular location, helping with engagement, information sharing, and prize dissemination
• Reach out directly to members to discuss how they can get involved in the program
• Collaborate with our team on creative communications to display around brick-and-mortar locations and deploy via email
• Generate ongoing excitement through creative, tailored contests and her amazing attitude

Within two months of launch, the client had already seen 21% of eligible members engaging in the program, with nearly 400 activity-tracking devices registered. These numbers have steadily increased (and continue to increase) each week as she visits new locations and deploys new challenges and communications.

In an industry that can often be over-saturated by artificial participation stats (e.g., people who are incentivized to simply log in or complete a one-time assessment), this admin is putting in the work to establish meaningful ongoing engagement, and it’s paying off!

Is this the norm?

A lot goes into the implementation of a new wellness program; our timeline is at least 90 days. Even prior to that, the program organizer, often with support of the executive-leadership team and/or a wellness committee, will take months to vet various vendors. And unfortunately, we’ve often seen that this is where leadership involvement stops. Many (understandably so) want the wellness program to run itself, even when it most appealing trait is it tailorable communications. How can a program answer the customizing requests of a client if the client isn’t involved with the implmentation of those requests?

Of course, the most well-designed programs can indeed show an impact with little-to-no interaction from the organization (ours included). Creative features and prebuilt communication tools, along with stimulating activities, interesting gaming mechanics, engaging social aspects, and results-driven activity tracking, can improve a work environment simply by being introduced and used. However, the highest engagement (and the most significant results) are achieved when the organization gets as excited for involvement as its members … and takes steps to encourage that engagement.

And we’re not just talking about one-hit wonder results. We’re talking about:

• Sustainable weight-management
• Boosted peer-to-peer interaction and support
• Less employee turnover
• Higher job satisfaction
• Better chronic illness understanding
• Lower stress levels
• A more engaged workforce
• Better teamwork and collaboration
• Healthier work-life balance
• Improved financial health
• Improved mental and emotional health
• Better sleep habits

Work with Sonic Boom

Hiring a wellness vendor isn’t cheap (or easy), – and no matter how supportive and consultative your vendor may be, nothing compares to having “boots on the ground” promoting the program and leading by example. Make the most of your investment by getting (and staying) enthusiastically involved!

Of course, not all vendors are open to this level of collaboration or customization. That’s just ONE of our differentiators. If you want to see what else we can bring to your company, connect with us below.