This episode of The Business Conversation Podcast features Arik Hanson, Principal at Arik Hanson Social Media and adjunct professor on digital and social media strategy at the University of Minnesota and strategic communications and social media marketing at the University of St. Thomas. Corporate communications especially on LinkedIn have become intertwined with the executives who lead their organizations. In many cases, outspoken c-suite executives who post the same content as their corporate accounts tend to garner much more engagement, and Arik explains that this because this level of transparency is not very common. For the executives who do this, turning corporate events into PR events has a huge impact on how their brand is viewed and how desirable it looks to the general public. But especially today, Arik explains that executives who give what people want from them, like transparency and empowerment, increase trust and engagement considerably.
HIGHLIGHTS
02:18 Executives on social: Looking for leaders whose values align with theirs
06:59 Corporate communications: Executive's personal accounts hold more weight
13:55 Sara Blakely of Spanx: A corporate event increased employee branding, talent retention and company culture
19:13 What people want: Transparency, honesty, empowerment, mental health
25:24 3 myths about executives posting on social media
30:31 Actionable tips: Make your bio personal, engage the community, and understand content pillars
36:56 Book recommendation: Never Eat Alone by Keith Ferrazzi
QUOTES
09:08 "Whether it's employees or prospects or customers or partners, they want to hear from the leaders and the leaders are usually pretty reticent to do that. When you have someone like Ed Bastian that puts himself out there... it really stands out."
15:33 "Recording on video was again, a simple decision, but a stroke of genius because you capture the emotion a little more there because you got the pictures, you got the video of her tearing up and talking about it, and that's a lot different than writing it and showing pictures."
20:14 "You should be hitting some of the notes that Sara's hitting, which is inspiration, empowerment, right now mental health, like some of those things, transparency, honesty. I mean, think about everything that people want from executives."
32:22 "You've got to soften it up a little bit... let's take the bio and massage it and work it into the points we made before about personal details, more personal narratives, more about your passions, more about maybe even a little bit about your family... more personal details, more about you."
35:31 "That's what people want. They don't want to see you share the corporate stuff, they want to hear from. Let employees share the corporate stuff. That's fine, that's what you want. You don't want the executives doing that."
Follow the link below to learn more about Arik Hanson:
This series is being put together in collaboration with AIGA Minnesota - one of the largest chapters of AIGA, that works to enhance the value and deepen the impact of design across all disciplines of business, society, and our collective future.
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Curious, a group of B2B marketers helping their clients define a conversation that is unique, relevant, and honest with their ideal customers. They then help their clients find their ideal audience to start the conversation by pushing content through the most efficient channels, whether that be traditional or digital.