Leaders’ own LinkedIn profiles are more powerful marketing channels than their owners may believe, argues 1440’s Ellen Bencard. Making them work better needs a deft hand and the right approach.
I was called in to do some training after a blue-chip consultancy lost a multi-million pound deal to a competitor due to its executives’ poor LinkedIn profiles.
The prospective customer considered the finalists’ proposals equally strong. The decision came down to the people delivering the work.
When the customer’s decision makers cross-checked the proposed teams on LinkedIn they found one with rich, active profiles that validated the proposal biographies and established team as credible thought leaders. The other had mostly inactive profiles, often not even mentioning the skills they said they would deploy within the project.
Too important to ignore
Executives often say they’re too busy for what they perceive to be “soft stuff” like social media. Or, they’ll excuse themselves with, “I’m not a writer.”
That’s no longer good enough. As my example shows, social media for leaders is not just “soft stuff”. It’s a bottom-line boosting necessity. This time it was the deal breaker. At other times, consistent LinkedIn performance can generate leads and nurture customers through to sale. As such, it can be a powerful channel to market.
No corporate leader can afford to overlook social media completely. Almost all senior roles have some public-facing element. The hunger for “authenticity” means LinkedIn audiences … customers, prospects, and quite powerfully employees … are generally far more interested in what executives have to say than anything spun by the marketing department.
Simple communications is part of the modern executive’s role, skills can be learned, and most companies will have professionals who can help them.
In reality, a great LinkedIn feed can take as little as a few minutes a day. It’s a simple matter of working it into a routine, often made easier by tools and support offered by marketing teams.
Getting started with Executive Social Media
So how does a marketing team convince sceptical, time-poor executives who don’t think they’re any good at social communications to embrace their role?
1. Audit: to build on solid foundations
The first step is an objective audit. Benchmark their performance against tangible, measurable objectives. Point out where they’re going wrong and the steps you can take… together… to improve. A numerical, audit-based approach combats the misperception that social media is always soft and insubstantial. Include comparisons to executives at competitive companies. If they outscore your executives, they’re making your argument for you. If they’re not active, you have a chance to convince your executives this is an easy area for differentiation. It can be particularly helpful to bring in outside advice here, to help bring some objectivity to the process.
2. Simple, measurable plan
Second, build a simple plan on top of the audit. Include measurable objectives. This is easier if the executives are willing to check and feed back their own metrics from within their accounts. For the most resistant cases, you may need to set objectives you can measure from an outside view. Ease of deployment and easy, early wins are critical, especially if you have sceptical executives. As with any marketing communications tactic, never miss a chance link back to your broader business plan, reminding them of how these efforts will support their big picture.
3. Get the profile right
Next, work with your executives to update their profiles. This is generally where the most heavy lifting needs to be done, and where marketing can offer the most obvious value. There’s a substantial list of easy wins that can make a big difference here, from rewriting headlines and top-level descriptions to making better use of graphics and rich media. My favourite easy-but-underused LinkedIn tool is a “Featured” section, particularly useful highlighting an exec’s appearances in the media or at conferences. The LinkedIn “low-hanging fruit” will be different for every executive, but it will be there.
4. Support the routine
Finally… and this is where the going gets harder… get a commitment for a minimum amount of interaction every week. Then stay on them to make sure it gets done. This could be as simple as one post a week, or you may set more mixed targets including posts, shares and comments on connections’ posts. The key here, just like an exercise regime, is building regular habits. Once executives get into a routine and start to see results, they tend to do more.
There are few areas as full of potential, and where it’s as easy to realise some quick, inexpensive and tangible results, as LinkedIn. Executive Social Media can be the most efficient tactic in marketing communications. I’d love to see more leaders embracing it in 2025 and, in so doing, making positive change for themselves, their companies and the business environment as a whole.
1440 offers a fast-start approach which helps leaders and marketers get more from LinkedIn. Find out more.