10 social media tips for directors
TRANSCRIPT
10 Social media tips
for senior directors
Introduction
So you’ve decided to become a public face for your organisation on social media. Many senior directors continue to be
reluctant to take this step, either because they don’t see the value or are wary of the risks associated with using social
media. However, there is a growing body of evidence to suggest that - with the right skills, strategy and support
systems - your use of social media can provide a significant reputational and commercial benefit to your organisation.
Deployed smartly it can help give it a human face and open up valuable new communications channels with customers,
stakeholders and employees.
Tracking and observing conversations on social media will also give you an unrivalled insight into the interests, views
and concerns of your customers: real people talking about real things, in real situations and in real time. According to
McKinsey’s Martin Harrysson and Estelle Métayer, directors monitoring social media are able to “Figure out what
customers want and spot looming industry and market disruptions before their competitors do” and they go on to
suggests that ‘Executives who are curious and attuned to the themes emerging from social media are more likely to
spot insights”McKinsey Quarterly, The strength of weak signals (February 2014)
The following guidelines build on our experience in running numerous social media training workshops for senior
directors and working with leading organisations on the development of their social media programmes.
Did you know? 71% of UK employees agree that a CEO’s engagement in social media helps shape the corporate
brand reputation and 61% agree that a company who’s c-suite executives use social media to openly communicate
the company’s mission, values and purpose is more trustworthy.” Brandfog, April 2014
10 social media tips for senior directorsRules don’t tend to work when it comes to social media. Success or failure is often determined by the ability to exercise
judgement and to deal with the unexpected. However, our work with many leading organisations and conversations
with numerous business leaders suggest that there are ten guiding principles worth adopting if you want to survive and
thrive in the world of social media:
1. Think strategically
2. Develop a support system
3. Mitigate risk
4. Don’t be afraid to reveal the true you
5. Become visually literate
6. Grow a thicker skin
7. Be interesting and interested
8. Market your personal brand
9. Analyse and learn
10. Use the opportunity to drive change
Did you know? “80% of business leaders think it important to make the most of social media but 70% admit that their efforts are currently ineffective.” Chartered Management Institute, February 2014
1. Think strategically
It is essential to ensure that all social media activity is aligned against your organisational priorities and planned from a
strategic perspective, rather than as a series of tactical initiatives. You need to ask yourself some important questions:
• How does my use of social media support our organisational priorities? Whether your senior team is focused on
recruiting new customers, enhancing the corporate reputation, identifying the best talent, sustaining internal
morale or engaging the most important influencers in your sector, social media can play an important, strategic
role.
• What will be a successful outcome and how will I measure this success?
• Could this be achieved more cost effectively through the use of other channels?
• Is this a good use of my time?
You should also discuss your objectives and strategic approach with your corporate communications team to ensure
that your initiatives complement those of the rest of the organisation and other colleagues engaged in social media.
One of our clients has over 40 different Twitter ‘handles’ for different parts of the organisation and key individuals. In
order to make the most of the channel, they need to co-ordinate the output from each and ensure that all have a clear
role within an overarching communications strategy.
Did you know? “The board has a responsibility for ensuring a corporate strategy is developed, that risk management
processes are in place and that a crisis communication plan exists.
Each must take account of social media.” Anthony Goodman, Tapestry Networks, Financial Times Oct 2013
2. Develop a support system
‘How can I find the time to engage in social media activity?’ is probably the most frequently asked question in the
workshops that we run. The simple answer is that there is never enough time and it is simply a question of deciding
where social media ranks alongside your other executive responsibilities.
The best way to maximise the value of the time you spend is by putting together an appropriate support system to help
manage the workload. This is especially important if you are likely to receive a large number of direct complaints or
comments from customers. One of the things that dissuades some senior directors from using social media is that they
will inevitably become a channel for customer service issues. Some might argue that this isn’t a bad thing: it can be
useful to know when your customers are experiencing product or service problems, but without the appropriate support
systems it could soak up a great deal of your time.
The solution is partly about having the right tools and technology– for example, using a social media dashboard such as
Hootsuite will make it easier for you to manage your news feed and conversations – but mainly about having the right
people to support you. Some of the most high profile business leaders rely on colleagues to help them manage their
news feeds and deal with the majority of posts and comments. Generally speaking, people simply want a problem
solved or a question answered and don’t care whether it is the CEO handling their enquiry in person: they just want
someone to listen to them and to respond quickly and appropriately.
Did you know? 31%of UK adults (and 40% of 16-24 year olds) will use social media to complain about poor customer
service (New Voice Media, June 2013)
3. Mitigate risk
No publically-facing communication is without its risks, but social media is widely perceived by many senior managers
as particularly risky. An article in The Economist described how “Thanks to the digital revolution, chief executives now
live in glass houses. An ill-judged remark can be broadcast to the world in an instant.” That said, you only have to
think of Gerald Ratner’s infamous speech to the Institute of Director’s conference in 1991 – in which he described some
of his own jewellery products as ‘total crap’ – to appreciate that chief executives have always been subject to criticism
for their ‘ill-judged’ remarks.
Using social media channels need not be any riskier than any other form of communication, so long as you adhere to
some simple mitigation steps:
• Are you abiding by the regulatory codes and constraints of the industry in which you operate? If you aren’t sure,
check with you colleagues in legal or compliance before you start.
• Have you and the people supporting you been properly trained?
• Think before you press ‘send’ on that tweet or post, ‘how is this likely to be perceived by my boardroom
colleagues’ and also the people who work at every level of my organisation?’
• Consider your state of mind before communicating. Are you angry, frustrated or in high spirits (figuratively and
literally) and is your mood likely to encourage you to say things that you wouldn’t say in the boardroom?
• Is this a subject area in which you have acknowledged expertise - which will give your opinions both credibility and
legitimacy – or are you straying into areas in which your expertise and knowledge is limited?
• Is there a clear escalation procedure within your organisation in the (hopefully unlikely) event that a significant
issue or potential reputational crisis emerges within you social media platforms?
Did you know? ‘Mitigating social media risks is not all about the technology. You can put in as many firewalls as you
like, but people still need to be knowledgeable about risks and understandtheir role in mitigating them.” Accenture, A
Comprehensive Approach to Managing Social Media Risk and Compliance
4. Don’t be afraid to reveal the true you
One of the main reasons you are using social media in the first place is to give a human face to your organisation. It is
therefore nonsensical to hide behind a corporate mask. Let your real personality and interests out into the open and try
to use the same informal language that you would use in conversations with friends and family. Few things in social
media grate more than the use of corporate or ‘press release’ speak
It is perfectly acceptable to showcase your hobbies and interests outside the workplace: in fact people will be
interested in your ‘other’ life. You may not want to go as far as Sir Richard Branson, who in his advice to entrepreneurs
talks about how: “Among my posts and tweets you'll find lots of funny tales, cheeky questions and the odd photo of me
making a fool of myself,’ but this doesn’t mean that you can’t be natural, human and authentic.
We are often asked by directors whether it is acceptable to have their social media content – especially time-consuming
items such as blog posts – written by other people. Given the fact that authenticity is widely accepted as one of the
most important traits of people in leadership positions, it doesn’t feel particularly authentic to use of ‘ghost writer.’ Your
customers, stakeholders and employees would always prefer to know that they are reading your own thoughts and
opinions – even allowing for the odd grammatical error - rather than the polished pronouncements from your corporate
communications consultants..
Did you know? ‘To thrive in the world of social media, leaders need to acquire a mind-set of openness and
imperfection and they must have the courage to appear raw and unpolished.’ Roland Deiser and Sylvain Newton, Six Social Media Skills Every Leader Needs. McKinsey Quarterly
5. Become visually literate
We live in a visual world in which every picture is worth 140 characters if not a thousand words. It is therefore hardly
surprising that Tweets or posts featuring photographs, images or links to visual content (films, videos, infographics) are
far more likely to be shared than text-based messages. This can be something of a challenge for many of us brought
up in a pre-digital, text-based world, in which our writing skills are far more honed than our visual ones.
The camera phone has turned all of us into professional photographers, even chief executives. Anything that grabs
your attention and can be captured in a photograph – company events, new products, interesting graphics, people you
admire – has the potential to interest your followers and grow your following.
Business leaders are also starting to embrace the new generation of visually-focused social media platforms, such as
Instagram and Pinterest. This is Management Today’s summary of the CEOs worth following on Instagram:
http://www.managementtoday.co.uk/news/1296707/ . Not surprisingly the early adopters have tended to operate in the
new economy or design/creative industries, but the use of image-based content through all social media channels can
only increase.
Did you know? Tweets with images deliver on average twice the level of engagement as tweets without images (Simply Measured, June 2014);
6. Grow a thicker skin
Senior management teams can be remarkably thin-skinned when confronted by online criticism of their organisations.
All too often they only want to use social media on their own terms – a monologue with uncritical and largely passive
supporters – rather than as a means of engaging with all stakeholders, including their critics. In a post digital world - in
which everyone has an opinion, deference to authority or establishment figures is virtually non-existent and a single,
angry customer has the potential to voice their complaints to millions of other people – this is dangerously myopic.
Smart leaders embrace criticism as a positive force for improving the quality of their business and see a value in
engaging their critics in a positive debate.
By all means stand up for yourself and your business if the criticism is unfair or inaccurate, but don’t get into an
argument. Take criticism on the chin, accept other people’s point of view – although you are well within your rights to
refuse to deal with people using offensive language – and thank them for their feedback. Don’t forget that any
arguments on social media are being fought-out in the public gaze, so keep calm and try to avoid inflammatory or
patronising language. When in doubt, take the advice of the customer service experts within your organisation who will
have had years of experience of dealing with all types of situation.
Did you know? Acts of humility, such as ‘learning from criticism and admitting mistakes’ have been identified as one of
the most important traits of the best leaders, according to a recent study (Catalyst Research published in HBR, May 2014)
7. Be interesting and interested
The size and quality of your following is largely a product of the perceived value, interest or usefulness of the content
that you share. Some people are followed simply because of their status or fame – dare we suggest that Lord Sugar’s
3.7m Twitter following owes more to the Apprentice than the quality of his Tweets - but most of us have to build a
following the hard way: through the quality of our original content and by signposting or curating other people’s content.
Finding the time to create original content or come up with a 140 character aphorism can be challenging, which is why
many successful users of social media rely heavily on curating other people’s content.
Social media is primarily a conversational medium: a two way exchange of ideas. This can be something of a
challenge for individuals used to operating through a monologue. To thrive you need to be genuinely interested in other
people’s ideas. In a way it reinforces the old adage that the best way to be considered interesting – whether at a dinner
party or in a business situation - is to be interested in other people. The world of social media is definitely not without
its egotistical element, but the smart senior manager will retain a degree of humility and value the importance of
listening.
You need to ask yourself some simple questions:
• How am I adding to the conversation?
• Am I building-on, reinforcing or amplifying other people’s thoughts and ideas by responding to their tweets and
posts or contributing to LinkedIn Groups?
• Am I encouraging feedback and debate? This is an easy thing to measure: how many of your posts and tweets
generate comments, especially from people outside your immediate network?
Did you know? When I comes to the balance of creation and curation, the advice from Jeff Jarvis, one of the leading
commentators on the digital economy, is ‘Do what you do best and link to the rest.’
8. Mobilise your network
Organisational leaders are almost by definition well connected people. You will have an extensive network of
colleagues, contacts and associates, both on social media and in the real world. If you want to build critical mass on
social media it makes sense to mobilise this network to both follow you and spread the word about your content.
Wherever possible you should promote your Twitter ‘handle’ at events, and conferences and on your business card as
one of the primary ways to connect with you.
Did you know? 5,000 followers is widely regarded as the threshold for being considered as an influential person on
9. Analyse and learn
Everything you do in social media is measurable and even the most experienced social media users find that they
benefit from self analysis and self appraisal. Using simple and free tools such as https://analytics.twitter.com/ will help
you establish what Tweets attracted the most views and retweets. Questions you should ask yourself include: what
type of content appears to be most effective? Is there a particular time of day or week that appears to be most
effective? What activity was most successful at engaging key influencers within your sector?
This is our standard four-stage model for measuring social media activity:
Did you know? ‘If it isn’t worth sharing it isn’t any good.’ A typical response from a 20-something member of a recent
focus group.
Reach Engagement Advocacy Action
Followers, fans, views, subscribers
Likes, DownloadsDwell-time
Shares, Retweets Clicks, Web visitsPurchases
This tells you that you have an audience for
what you are producing
This tells you whether content you are sending
out is relevant
This tells you whether content you are sending
out is valued/ useful
This tells you whether your content has driven people to your company
website & whether it has led directly to online
sales
10. Use the opportunity to drive change
Some of the smarter business leaders have started to recognise the role for social media as a positive driver of organisational change. Put simply, embracing social media can make your business better. McKinsey has described the effect as giving the organisation “a new type of competitive advantage.”
The challenge facing organisations seeking to embrace social media is not technological but cultural. Social media dramatizes the weaknesses that impede the performance of most organisations: excessive bureaucracy, tortuously slow approval processes, un-collaborative silos and a lack of trust in frontline employees. Above all there is a mismatch between the pace of most organisations’ internal operations and communications outputs and the immediacy demanded by social media. Real time meets institutional time and the effect can be pretty disruptive.
Conversely, the organisational and cultural traits of organisations thriving in the age of social media happen to be the same, simple behaviours that underpin the performance of the most successful businesses: trust, openness, agility, informality and collaboration. Equally, leadership experts Roland Deiser and Sylvain Newton, have described how ‘The dynamics of social media amplify the need for qualities that have long been a staple of effective leadership, such as strategic creativity, authentic communication, and the ability to deal with a corporation’s social and political dynamics and to design an agile and responsive organisation.”’ (Six Social Media Skills Every Leader Needs: McKinsey Quarterly, February 13).
Good businesses and good leaders rarely have problems embracing social media and successful social media users are invariably good businesses. Get the organisation and culture right and the tweets will look after themselves.
Did you know? 70% of business professionals believe social business is an opportunity to change the way their
organisation works. MIT Sloan & Deloitte. July 2013
For further advice or to book a social media training workshop
tailored to the needs of senior directors, please contact us at
@DissidentBiz