# Sprout Social Employee Advocacy: Setup, Sharing, Reports and Cost > How Sprout Social Employee Advocacy works: the former Bambu add-on for Standard and up, no published price, stories, sharing, reports, governance and cost. _Source: https://professionalstoolkit.com/articles/sprout-social-employee-advocacy — The Professional's Toolkit · updated October 2026_ --- **$199** — Lowest per-seat monthly price, billed annually, of a plan that can add Employee Advocacy (Standard). - **Standard+** — plans that can add Advocacy - **15** — topics per Advocacy story - **5 GB** — maximum video size in a story ## What Employee Advocacy is, and how you buy it Employee Advocacy is the part of Sprout Social that turns staff into a distribution channel. Admins collect approved brand content, employees pick what fits their role, and they share it to their own social networks in a few clicks, using copy the company has already cleared. The product started life as Bambu, which Sprout rebranded as Employee Advocacy in October 2022. It still runs as its own platform at advocacy.sproutsocial.com, with its own status page and its own mobile app, but it now connects to the main Sprout account so that brand posts and advocacy content come from one workflow. **Employee Advocacy is a paid add-on with no published price.** The pricing page lists it for Standard and up and sends you to sales for the number [1]. Essentials cannot add it. Sprout groups it with Listening and Premium Analytics as a premium solution, and on invoices it appears as a separate add-on subscription. One more detail hints at the cost of starting: in Sprout's agency partner terms, a partner sale of Employee Advocacy only counts when the customer also bought onboarding and implementation at retail price. That suggests onboarding is sold as a separate item; ask sales whether direct customers must buy it and what it costs. The buying rules of the base plan still apply. Sprout prices every plan per seat, offers no free plan and gives a 30-day trial without a card. Annual contracts renew automatically. Annual plans paid upfront in the app are cancelled in the billing page before the renewal date, while annual plans paid monthly and invoiced plans need 30 days' notice by email. Removing an add-on brings no refund. Customers with a premium add-on also cannot switch themselves from monthly to annual billing in the app. For the full plan math, see our [Sprout Social pricing guide](/articles/sprout-social-pricing). > ⚠ **No refunds on the add-on:** Annual contracts renew automatically. Annual plans paid monthly and invoiced plans need 30 days' notice by email to cancel; plans paid upfront in the app are cancelled in the billing page before renewal. Removing an add-on returns no money. ## Connecting Advocacy to your Sprout account Because Advocacy is a separate platform, the first step is linking the two instances. Sprout made that connection self-service in January 2023, so an admin can do it without a support ticket. Once linked, users can send content from the Sprout calendar and the Find Content views straight to Advocacy sources [2]. The connection also unlocks the Advocacy Report inside Sprout, which needs both the purchased add-on and the linked instance. Permissions matter here. Send to Advocacy only appears for people who have access to the Advocacy Report in Sprout, so a social manager without that report will not see the option in Compose. Check roles before launch day. Sign-in is the other early decision. Sprout's privacy policy says it may share anonymized or personalized tokens across the Sprout, Influencer Marketing and Employee Advocacy platforms to provide the service. If you plan single sign-on, note that Sprout Support only investigates the short error codes Advocacy shows and does not do full SSO configuration for you. Your identity team owns that work. > 💡 **Check report access first:** Send to Advocacy only appears for users with access to the Advocacy Report in Sprout. Set permissions before launch. ## Curating stories admins can stand behind Advocacy content is organized as **stories**, the posts employees see and share. Admins build them in Advocacy or send them over from Sprout. Compose can create Facebook and LinkedIn link stories, a feature added in January 2023, and posts already on the content calendar can be pushed across with Send to Advocacy. One quirk is worth knowing: a photo story sent this way arrives as a plain social message rather than a photo story [3]. If the image format matters, build that story inside Advocacy. Each story can carry up to 15 topics, which is how employees filter what they see, and campaign names for link stories run up to 100 characters. Stories can be scheduled to an exact date and time, and Optimal Send Times came to Advocacy stories in September 2023. Video is well covered. Stories can hold uploaded video files up to 5 GB, shareable on LinkedIn and, since January 2024, on X, Facebook Business Pages and Instagram Business Profiles too. LinkedIn stories can also mention Company Pages, Showcase Pages and School Pages. AI Assist helps on the writing side. Message Ideas by AI Assist arrived in Advocacy in September 2023, suggesting share text employees can use or adapt. Translation is narrower than in the rest of Sprout. In Advocacy, message ideas translate only into the user's own language setting, not into any language you choose. For tighter control, the Require Approved Message Ideas setting limits readers to preapproved messages, so nobody improvises the caption. ## How employees find and share content The employee side is built around discovery. Sprout says staff find stories through **My Feed, newsletters, Slack and mobile alerts**, and admins can compile content into newsletters or broadcasts aimed at specific audiences. Broadcasts can go through Slack or Microsoft Teams; the Teams integration arrived in November 2023 and needs an Employee Advocacy subscription. Employees can follow topics that match their role, suggest content of their own and use the product in their preferred language. Since August 2024 the mobile app lets them suggest links and photos directly. Sharing works from desktop or mobile. A network selector, added in October 2022, lets an admin choose which networks a story may go to. The networks are LinkedIn, X, Facebook and Instagram, with two mobile-only extras: image stories can go to personal Instagram profiles through mobile publishing, and video stories followed later. That matters for brands whose staff are more active on Instagram than on LinkedIn. Language support has widened too. In September 2023 the user languages were English, Spanish, French, Italian and Portuguese. Eight more arrived in the second half of 2024: Japanese, German, Finnish, Dutch, Swedish, Korean, Danish and Norwegian. Staff can use the app in their own language, even if the share text still comes from your team. Gamification keeps people coming back. The Leaderboard ranks employees on Shares, Engagements, Potential Reach or Clicks, points went to everyone in May 2024, and the Leaderboard reached the mobile app in November 2024. Use it carefully. **A leaderboard rewards volume**, so pair it with content worth sharing. A better health check is the User Behavior widget in My Reports, covered below: active users and average shares per active user show whether participation is broad or carried by a few enthusiasts. > 💡 **Lean on UTMs, not leaderboards:** Leaderboards reward volume. UTM parameters show the clicks and sales your program actually drives. ## Measuring the program: UTMs, earned media value and reports Sprout's pricing page lists three measurement tools inside the add-on: UTM parameters for tracking clicks into sales, an earned media value calculation and Tags for organizing content in reports. Earned media value is Sprout's way of expressing reach as the ad spend you saved. Treat it as an estimate, not a cash figure. UTMs are the harder evidence, because they show up in your own web analytics. Inside Sprout, the Advocacy Report pulls the program together, with share metrics by network. In Advocacy itself, the General Report gained a team filter in November 2022. Its fine print is important: **engagements are only available for Twitter and Facebook** [4]. A LinkedIn-heavy program will show shares and reach, but not engagement, in that report. The report downloads as PDF, can be sent or scheduled as a PDF, or shared by link. Scheduling changed in 2025. Sprout rebuilt the report, and scheduled deliveries of the old version had to be removed and recreated by the end of September 2025 or they were turned off. If a scheduled report stopped arriving after September 2025, that is the likely cause. Advocacy data also reaches other reports. My Reports gained an Employee Advocacy Network Overview widget in April 2024, then User Behavior (active users and average shares per active user) and Shares by Network widgets. With a connected Advocacy account, the Post Performance Report adds columns such as shares, potential reach, engagements, story views and likes. In Advocacy itself, the Content Report shows totals without an export, and since May 2023 you can export metrics for individual shares. For the wider reporting picture, see our [Sprout Social analytics guide](/articles/sprout-social-analytics). ## Governance: approvals, blocked words and sign-in Letting hundreds of employees post on behalf of the brand needs guardrails. Approvals are the first layer. Since late 2024 an account can have multiple Topic Managers handling approvals, a feature Sprout labeled beta. In the second quarter of 2026 Sprout added team-targeted content by role and region, so a sales team in one region sees different stories from engineers elsewhere. Combined with Require Approved Message Ideas, that gives a compliance team real control over what goes out. The second layer is word filtering. Employee Advocacy gained **blocked words and phrases** in the first quarter of 2026, which stop off-brand content from being shared. In the main Sprout platform, Blocked Words is a Guardian feature: it matches exact text only, catches no misspellings unless you list them, and takes CSV imports. Sprout says Guardian safeguards also extend to Employee Advocacy. The facts we read do not say whether the Advocacy word list needs Guardian or comes with the add-on. Ask sales. > ⚠ **MFA stops at the Advocacy login:** Mandatory MFA since April 15, 2025 covers Sprout logins but not the Employee Advocacy platform, per Sprout's help page. Plan single sign-on (confirm with sales that it is enabled for your account) or your own policy. Sign-in is the third layer, and here there is a gap. Sprout made multifactor authentication mandatory for all Sprout logins from April 15, 2025, on desktop and mobile. According to Sprout's MFA help page, that rule does not cover the Employee Advocacy or Influencer Marketing platforms. Advocacy logins are the ones most employees use. So decide your own policy: single sign-on through your identity provider is the obvious route for a large program. Sprout publishes no plan gate for SSO and lists a dedicated SSO setup service under Enterprise, so confirm with sales that SSO is enabled for your account. On paper, the platform is covered by the same audits as the core product. Employee Advocacy got its first SOC 2 Type 1 report in November 2023, its SOC 2 Type 2 report was updated in November 2024, and Sprout's ISO certification covers the core platform, Employee Advocacy and Influencer Marketing. ## What changed, and when Advocacy has moved steadily since the rebrand. The dates below come from Sprout's monthly release notes and quarterly product updates. Two roadmap items deserve a note. Newsletters for Advocacy were listed as upcoming in the first half of 2025 and now appear on the feature and pricing pages. Advocacy onboarding was listed as next in the second quarter of 2026. Treat listed items as plans, not features, until the release notes confirm them. - **October 2022:** Bambu becomes Employee Advocacy; network selector; LinkedIn video uploads. - **January 2023:** self-service account connection; link stories from Compose; Require Approved Message Ideas. - **May 2023:** LinkedIn page mentions; export of individual share metrics; image stories to personal Instagram. - **September 2023:** Optimal Send Times, Message Ideas by AI Assist, five user languages. - **November 2023:** Microsoft Teams broadcasts; Leaderboard metrics; first SOC 2 Type 1 report. - **2024:** video to more networks, points for everyone, My Reports widgets, eight new languages, mobile Leaderboard, multiple Topic Managers (beta). - **September 2025:** old Advocacy report schedules switched off. - **2026:** blocked words and phrases, spotlighting the most relevant content, and team-targeted content by role and region. ## Working out the cost You cannot price the add-on yourself, so the only numbers you can plan with are the base seats. Advocacy needs Standard or higher. Standard costs $199 per seat a month billed annually, or $249 billed monthly. Professional costs $299 per seat a month billed annually, or $399 billed monthly. Advanced costs $399 per seat a month billed annually, or $499 billed monthly. Take a small brand team. Two seats on Standard billed annually come to 2 × $199 = $398 a month, or $4,776 a year, by our arithmetic. Three seats on Professional billed annually come to 3 × $299 = $897 a month, or $10,764 a year. The add-on, any onboarding and any Guardian need sit on top of that, all quoted by sales. **Get the full quote in writing before you sign**, because none of it is refundable mid-term. The facts we read do not say how employee readers are counted or licensed in Advocacy. That is the first question for sales. The second is whether onboarding is required, and whether it is a one-time fee. The third is whether the Advocacy blocked-words list needs Guardian. The fourth is what happens to the add-on at renewal, since annual contracts renew automatically and, unless paid upfront in the app, need 30 days' notice by email to cancel. Ask, too, whether the 30-day trial gives you any access to Advocacy, because the pages we read are silent on it. Sprout's own numbers lean optimistic, as vendor numbers do. Its feature page cites a Forrester Total Economic Impact study claiming better organic reach and savings in paid media over three years, and its own social team reports that Advocacy drove more impressions than any single one of its channels. Sprout also says it uses its own Salesforce integration to connect social and advocacy activity to revenue. Those are vendor claims. Your UTM data is what should justify renewal. ## When it is worth adding, and how Hootsuite compares Employee Advocacy earns its place when three things are true. You have enough employees with real networks, usually on LinkedIn. You already run Sprout on Standard or above, so the Compose and calendar integration saves real work. And someone owns the program week to week, curating stories and running the newsletters. Regulated teams also gain from the approval layers and blocked words. It is a weaker buy for small companies with a handful of staff, for programs whose results depend on LinkedIn engagement figures the report does not show, and for anyone who needs a published price. Essentials users cannot add it at all. Hootsuite takes a different route. Its advocacy product, Parliament, formerly Amplify, lets employees share approved content to Facebook, Instagram, X, LinkedIn and TikTok. It is sold only with Hootsuite Enterprise, which is quote-only, and it comes with an MCP server for advocates. So Sprout lets a mid-sized team buy advocacy from Standard up, while Hootsuite reserves it for its top tier. Both leave you asking sales for the number. For the full picture, read our [Hootsuite employee advocacy guide](/articles/hootsuite-employee-advocacy). ## FAQ **Is Employee Advocacy included in Sprout Social plans?** No. It is a paid add-on available on Standard and up, not Essentials, and Sprout sends you to sales for the price. **Is Sprout Social Employee Advocacy the same as Bambu?** Yes. Bambu was rebranded as Employee Advocacy by Sprout Social in October 2022, and it still runs as a separate platform linked to your Sprout account. **Which networks can employees share to?** LinkedIn, X, Facebook and Instagram, with image and video stories to personal Instagram profiles through the mobile app. **How does Sprout measure Employee Advocacy results?** With UTM parameters, an earned media value calculation, Tags and the Advocacy Report; engagements in that report are available only for Twitter and Facebook. **Can employees get Advocacy content in Slack or Microsoft Teams?** Yes. Admins can send newsletters or broadcasts through Slack or Microsoft Teams, and employees also get stories through My Feed and mobile alerts. **Does Sprout's mandatory MFA cover the Advocacy platform?** No. Sprout's MFA help page says the requirement covers Sprout logins on desktop and mobile, not the Employee Advocacy or Influencer Marketing platforms. ## The bottom line Sprout Social Employee Advocacy is a mature, well-connected way to let employees share approved brand content, with strong curation, Slack and Teams delivery, a mobile app, gamification and steadily improving governance. Its weak spots are cost visibility and measurement gaps: no published price, a possible onboarding fee, engagement figures in the Advocacy Report only for Twitter and Facebook, and mandatory MFA that stops at the Advocacy login. Buy it on Standard or above, set up single sign-on once sales confirms it is enabled for your account, and judge it on your own UTM data, not on vendor studies. ## Sources [1] Sprout Social Pricing - How Much Does Sprout Social Cost? Platform Solutions Pricing Resources Log in Schedule a demo Try for free Toggle mo — https://sproutsocial.com/pricing/ (2026-10) [2] Sprout Social Help: How do I connect my Sprout and Employee Advocacy accounts — https://support.sproutsocial.com/hc/en-us/articles/39027721988493-How-do-I-connect-my-Sprout-and-Employee-Advocacy-accounts (2026-10) [3] Sprout Social Help: Send to Advocacy — https://support.sproutsocial.com/hc/en-us/articles/40926787609997-Send-to-Advocacy (2026-10) [4] Sprout Social Help: What's included in the Sprout Social Employee Advocacy Report — https://support.sproutsocial.com/hc/en-us/articles/13859476742413-What-s-included-in-the-Sprout-Social-Employee-Advocacy-Report (2026-10) [5] Sprout Social Help Center — https://support.sproutsocial.com/hc/en-us/articles/44592630251533-Essentials-Plan [6] Sprout Social Terms of Service — https://sproutsocial.com/legal/terms/ [7] G2, Sprout Social reviews — https://www.g2.com/products/sprout-social/reviews