How CEOs and Other Senior Executives Are Using Digital Media

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As the stakes grow higher in today's fast-paced, interconnected world, top executives are increasingly turning to social and other digital platforms to shape their public personas, engage with critical social issues, and build direct connections with key stakeholders. A new report explores the public relations and communications strategies behind these efforts and how this shift is redefining leadership in the digital age. 

Listen For
6:32 Executives are Moving Beyond Just Sharing Company News
9:51 Authenticity and Thumb-Stoppers
13:33 Building a Consistent Voice
16:24 Multi-Channel Presence
19:14 Answer to Last Episode’s Question From Guest Shayoni Lynn 

Guest: Akeem Anderson, H Advisors Abernathy
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Chapters

• 6:32 Executives are Moving Beyond Just Sharing Company News
• 9:51 Authenticity and Thumb-Stoppers
• 13:33 Building a Consistent Voice
• 16:24 Multi-Channel Presence
• 19:14 Answer to Last Episode’s Question From Guest Shayoni Lynn

Transcript

Doug Downs (00:03):

It is hard to tell a story about executive leaders using digital media without mentioning Elon Musk, but now that we've mentioned him, let's tell a story about someone else. This is a portion of a LinkedIn post written in 2022.

(00:20):

"No statistic stands as stark and simple when measuring gender inequality as the pay gap. And one remarkable aspect of that gap is this, it's barely changed in 30 years. I recognize that the average disparity about 20% doesn't tell the whole story and that race, age, education experience and perhaps dozens of other factors determine women's pay. But even with endless caveats, the gap is still there and it hits home for almost every family because women end up with less money. They often start with a little less, less, and they end up with far less because the issue compounds. Women are much more likely than men to be poor in old age."

(01:07):

The Post was published by Indra Nooyi, the former CEO of PepsiCo, which she stepped down from Pepsi. She used LinkedIn to share many of her personal thoughts. In another post, she recounted how even as CEO of a major global company, she faced the same struggles many working parents do, such as missing important moments with her children. Nooyi's, willingness to show vulnerability and her authenticity on digital media have humanized her as a leader and have helped foster conversations around pay equity and work-life balance. Today on stories and strategies, more and more executive leaders are using social media and other forms of digital media to engage with stakeholders and customers generating likes and fostering leadership.

(02:07):

My name is Doug Downs. Hey, we want to pay you $50 for five minutes of your time. It's just like you're in the NBA and you're a superstar, but they get paid a little more. What we're doing is listener feedback sessions. I want to know how you found us, what you like about the podcast, maybe suggestions you've got for the podcast, you and me on a five minute zoom, five minutes, and I want to send you $50 for your time. There's a link to my email at the top of the show notes. Let's get that done. My guest this week is Akeem Anderson, joining today from Chicago. Hey, Akeem,

Akeem Anderson (02:39):

How you doing? Good to meet you.

Doug Downs (02:41):

I'm good. I would imagine it's, we're still kind of in summer in Chicago. Fall might be hinting at itself, but we're not quite there yet.

Akeem Anderson (02:49):

Yeah, we have some good fall weather in the morning and then God knows what's going to happen toward the late afternoon, but right now it's a nice 65, which is for Chicago, still a pretty warm environment.

Doug Downs (03:01):

That's pretty good. And I know from experience, if it's a humid day, it's a humid day and you're bringing an extra shirt, man,

Akeem Anderson (03:07):

It's relentless.

Doug Downs (03:08):

Akeem, you're the senior vice president, Digital for H/Advisors Abernathy, you have 20 years experience as a journalist and in public relations, a lot of your experience has been leading digital and social strategy development. So Akeem social media has been the default strategy for executives in the last, well, I want to say 10 years, but I know lots of execs that didn't even dip their toes in it until about four or five years ago. Your report is showing seven out of 10 CEOs now have at least one social media account good for them. Is that still the case? What social channels are they choosing and CEOs from what industries?

Akeem Anderson (03:50):

Absolutely. So first, looking at the full dataset, this is really focused on Fortune 100, but we found enough significance in the data by industry to take a look. And that seven out of 10 number is pretty consistent year over year. We say moderate growth at about 4%, but basically you can count on seven out of 10 leaders in the room to have at least one social accountant. And about half of them are using it at least once a month, which is a great improvement of what we've seen even over the last few years, at least moving from claiming an account to using an account. The two leading industries in this regard have been tech, which has changed year over year because they were probably middle of the pack, I would say year over year. But they've actually gravitated toward X as a primary means to get their message out, which is the opposite of all the other industries.

(04:39):

And the other industry leader in the space is the financial services space. And that actually includes thanks, private equity and the like. So we don't necessarily narrow into what financial service they're providing, but those have been the two this year who have really put their effort into maintaining social profiles. And I think if we think about the primary channel that executives are comfortable using, it's LinkedIn hands down among that seven out of 10, most of them are focused almost exclusively on LinkedIn. We've noted in our report some of the best of the best have three, four channels that they've included in their mix. But primarily LinkedIn is the most prevalent. And I would say having been in social media space from the time there was just Facebook to X and to LinkedIn and to now even Reddit becoming a primary source of information in the social sphere. The reason being everyone gives their valid and real profile and personality professionally on LinkedIn. I remember signing up for LinkedIn with an actual email, something I didn't do as much for X and probably even less so after Facebook required a university address to join the platform. But people give their real job, they give their history of employment, they give information that they don't share elsewhere, which makes it, I think a safe place for CEOs to feel like they're getting valid, accurate profile engagement when they're on the platform.

Doug Downs (06:07):

And is it just CEOs or are we starting to get board chairs, VPs, senior VPs directors, the ones that are on their way to the c-suite, and what are they posting? Are they just, you said once a month Elon Musk must be skewing the average beyond belief once a minute, but what are they posting and are they engaging with people? What does it look like?

Akeem Anderson (06:32):

Yeah, so to what they're posting, they're starting with kind of the layup of all content sources, which is company news. You're the leader of a company. There's news to share within that. It's already part of your course strategic plan for the year to share companies with key stakeholders. So they're starting there. But what we've seen arise in a particular interest in terms of topics are more personal stories that I think are impactful. And I haven't really seen that be the case in years past. The reframe we used to get is nobody really cares what I have for breakfast. And that may be the case, but if there's a way to tie in a leadership store into that breakfast, then maybe it belongs on your social channels or maybe that breakfast was just interesting enough to inspire you to share it. But I think the growth at other story types beyond company news have really, really started to grow.

(07:27):

And the other segment I think we can probably hit on are the topics of the deck and what we consider critical issues. H advisors deals in critical issues, and we've kept the question very often, Hey, should I say something about de and I? Should I say something about racial justice? Should I say something about international conflicts happening in Ukraine and in Palestine? And traditionally the answer has been no reason being. It is very fraught sensitive space to do so. But more CEOs I think than ever have at least asked that question. But even in the best case scenario is only two out of 10 have really taken stances on that. Now what's happened in them doing that is they've gotten engagement, they've gotten like shares, comments. I made a recent LinkedIn post that says you've even gotten some shares, comments and foes included into that engagement mix.

(08:18):

And so now it's beyond, should I do this? How do we do it? So the topical relevance of the company news is still kind of at the top of the pyramid, but you'll start to see some of those personal narratives and some of those critical issues kind of bubble up into that content mix. And actually that's where you'll start to see more of the recent engagement. And some of it's polarizing and some of it's not so polarizing, but we've seen kind of the need to at least ask the question, what else should I talk about besides earnings or acquisitions or employee content?

Doug Downs (08:48):

I love that because it's starting to bother me when I see executives posting, here's a photo, our great team at our wonderful gathering. Aren't we all great fake, I scroll past it. I don't even give those a like anymore unless I know someone in the group. But that, should I comment on the Russia, Ukraine war? Should I comment on the Israel Palestine conflict? Should I comment on the US debate that took place last night? As you and I are recording? I love that too because it may not be germane to your business, but the number one category to draw brand affinity is someone just like me. So if it's commenting on Russia, Ukraine, and let's just say I'm a strong supporter of Ukraine. If I see my CEO or another CEO is also a strong advocate of Ukraine or a critic of Putin in Russia, I think they're closer to being just like me, even if their salary is 5 billion a year and mine is 50,000 a year.

Akeem Anderson (09:51):

Absolutely. Well, one of the things that we've really tried to evangelize is the ability to stop the scroll. You have to have a thumb stopping comment in order to drive true, thorough profile building, reputation building. You have to do that. And that's a very, very scary place for most executives to be because it's not a press release. You get immediate feedback. You don't have to wait for the coverage to come the next day. There's no journalist to talk to and go on background. It is going to the people, it's going to key stakeholders and they're going to interpret it live. And in some cases they're going to bring it to you offline. Hey, I saw your LinkedIn posts on this, or I saw your ex post here. Can you expound on that? What were you thinking? Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

(10:36):

What does this mean for the business? It is now a new topic of conversation and strategic comms is really difficult. So doing that right becomes another thing that you layer on top of all the other communications objectives and business objectives that you have to meet. But here's the caveat to that, if you do it right, it now becomes a perf that is yours. Again, as I mentioned before, you do not have to wait for the coverage to come through. You do not have to wait until the headline, which the journalist very rarely has anything to do with, to come to fruition in order to tell the story that you want to tell. But that requires some forethought. It requires really, really closely aligned strategy. It requires advisors. I always tell people strategic cons is hard, or if it wasn't, I would not have a job.

(11:19):

And so you need all those voices in the room to help validate your approach. But when you do it right, it gives a clear window into who you are as an individual. It gives you perspective to share and build on in the future, and it gives you a public record that you can stand on. A good example, I always will give, if you had to think about a public affairs issue and you were standing in front of committee, wouldn't it be nice to point back to a statement that you've already made that affirms your current position and show some consistency, show some forethought and show some value in your words even before you're taking a task in the public venue. So it's hard to do, but entirely possible. And from my perspective, entirely recommendable for executives to at least think about it, even if you decide to not hit post, to ask the question, is this something I should weigh in on?

(12:09):

And that thumb stopper, it can't be, and I've been a strong advocate for this, we're excited to announce. I'm sure excited to announce it because you put it on social media and to the point of whether AI can do that well, it can do that perfectly. If every post you are scrolling through says, we are happy to announce, we're proud to announce you're missing the opportunity to tell a more robust stories. You're announcing a merger and acquisition, tell me why you're excited about it. What value did you see in the company that you're merging with or requiring? Tell me a story. And usually people will rally around a story before they rally around an announcement.

Doug Downs (12:47):

Excellent. Because I wanted to ask you, how do I stop the scroll? What are the thumb stoppers, which is a grotesquely unfair question. Ultimately that's going to come down to who is the executive, who is the audience they're trying to reach? What is the business they're trying to advance in this particular moment? But if you can't give me some examples of executives that tell the story. Well, we talked about Indra Nooyi, the former CEO of Pepsi in the opening to the podcast. I think she's a phenomenal example of someone who stops the scroll and tells a story stories. Who are some of the other execs you've seen that as soon as you see their name, they've now built up that reputational bank in your mind? Wait a minute, let me read at least the first sentence to see if I want to read the rest.

Akeem Anderson (13:33):

Yeah, without, I would be remiss to point out one individual, but I will say executives in the automotive industry, in particularly GM and Ford, have really leaned into their social profile. And it's not just by way of them posting. They have a voice. And when you talk about developing a voice and really developing a rhythm, that means people have heard you before. And I think the thumb stoppers are the posts that people anticipate your voice in, which is why I mentioned before a statement like we're happy to announce. That sounds like every other executive that we're going to hear from. And it sounds like a press release that's translated into a social post. But if I think about it within the automotive industry in terms of just being an actual leader in the space, you can hear their voice or their perspective or their just overall profile embedded in every post.

(14:25):

And I think that's an important distinction when we think about what is going to get somebody to stop, it's the same thing that gets you to stop when you're listening to an influencer. You've heard them before and even if it necessarily in audio form, but you know what to anticipate. You have a relationship with their content that's consistent, that brings forth emotions. And I always tell our colleagues that when we were debating on should this be a press release or should this be just a social post, a newsletter, social is intended to inform, but it's also intended to emote. That's why those buttons are there. Like share, comment, even smiley faces, angry faces. There's all these ways to emote on those channels. And I think the ones and CEOs and the executives that do it best have put themselves into position to do that because they've just curated a voice that people can anticipate want to hear from and are excited to share that experience through their social lens.

Doug Downs (15:20):

And the reality is we're pressing those buttons less and less these days. Statistics are showing that we're spending about two and a half hours a day on social media. In the western world, it's a bit less than that. In Europe, it's more than that in Africa and Asia where they're spending three, three plus hours a day on social. But engagement rates are in decline across every single channel. And I have this image of us being mindless zombies for that two and a half hours a day, or by the way, over the span of a lifetime at current rates, it's over six years, six years,

Akeem Anderson (15:57):

I got to get a life.

Doug Downs (15:59):

I see us as mindless debt zombies just scrolling and scrolling and scrolling and not thinking at all. So other than social media, if engagement rates are on the decline, which they are and continue to decline, where are executives who are thinking about tomorrow? Where are they going to go? What are the other channels that they can use?

Akeem Anderson (16:24):

Well, I would say place your bets where there's some degree of ubiquity and where you can show up more than once. So I think one of the early advantages to being on X is that you knew if you had the right handle, the right naming convention, you show up early in search results, which now gives you two channels for discovery. Or if you knew you said something on X or now even it's expanded to LinkedIn, where can we be more discoverable? And I mentioned the automotive industry, but I'll speak to the others within the report, we called out those who we deemed most influential, and the influence score came by way of them having multiple channels. There has to be multiple touch points. And one of the things that when we advise our clients on whether to do or not to do in terms of channel development is where's your audience?

(17:08):

And very rarely will the audience be in one place. You can guarantee that they're doing multiple things while they're scrolling, they're looking up at the television, they're looking back at tablet, they are moving around to find content and information. You've got to be there. I'll kind of throw back a little bit to my time in pay media where we around people will say, Hey, should we pay for this newsletter to be featured? And potentially, but also if you give me the same budget to do a display campaign to other outlets, I can probably get to that newsletter in a few other places. You have to be discoverable in multiple avenues to get that message out. And also that you'll want to get two to three moments of exposure to get people to do anything. And in doing so, you allow them time to scroll past you on LinkedIn, but also rediscover your messaging on X and then see that same message carry through on a headline.

(18:05):

In the New York Times, you have to be ubiquitous. And when we look at the report and we saw those top level CEOs, which Elon was included in that he's not necessarily achieving the algorithm by posting as much. He's just everywhere. He posts something on X is now a piece of news, which then is now a direct connection to his search profile and it bleeds from there. So that level of multi-channel touchpoint and the willingness to do so, because again, most people are thinking about this in process. There's another channel I got to manage. But in doing so and in making that investment and not just being in one place, you give those different points of discovery. And I think our research shows that within two or three times, if people like the content, they'll do something with it. Beyond that, you got to start to ask yourself, am I posting the right stuff and then posting the right stuff? Am I speaking to what my audience needs from me? And that takes strategic work that takes thought. And again, it's not just about what you eat for breakfast, it's what story are we telling to different stakeholders at different times to make that story one that they enjoy and one that they will emote against or have an emotion regarding.

Doug Downs (19:14):

Excellent Akeem. In our previous episode, our guest Shayoni Lynn of Lynn in Wales left a question for you.

Shayoni Lynn (19:23):

My question is looking at the social media platform, which I shall always refer to as Twitter, and looking at how Elon Musk is not just proliferating his ideology because we know over time he has become more anti progressive and more anti woke. There is now a big question about the responsibility of social media platforms. Zuckerberg provided that letter to Congress. I would like your next guest to consider the future of social media. Do we think that this is a moment in time and people will revert back to usual behavior, go back to Twitter because we are habituated to it, we know that that works. Or do we think that this is a pivotal moment where we will change how we consume information on social media and the types of social media that we access

Doug Downs (20:25):

Your thoughts?

Akeem Anderson (20:26):

That is a great question and I have kind of a two part answer. The first being we're not going anywhere. And the reason being, social media is designed around community and by way of creating community, there is innate ability for them to create tribes. Tribes of people who believe same thing, who think the same thing, who borrow ideas from one another to create our whole society. When people say, ah, it's just Twitter lies, I work on campaigns and issues, and you would not believe the impact of that public square and regardless if it's known as Twitter or if it's known as X or if it's transformed in Facebook or it's Reddit, it's all built around the community that we curate amongst ourselves. Even in the report that we pulled together, we did the analysis of what tribes are really driving conversations on behalf of executives and CEOs, and it was the usual suspect.

(21:27):

We saw investors, we saw influencers in global business, we saw employees, we saw all of these folks who are gathered together to access a message from their leadership. So I remember the day that the announcement was made that Eli had finally put the nail in the coffin on Twitter. He bought it, he's going to change it, it's all dying. We had a morning for about six hours because the app was a little buggy and we all came back and droves to again build community of one another, share ideas, share our thoughts, and I don't think that's going away. Now the channels that I think it might evolve to or the places that I think it might go are where we can see each other differently. I think about the Reddit community. I remember when Reddit kind of first made itself a big player in driving market activity and we were like, these people are anonymous.

(22:23):

Are they tech bros or finance bro who's driving this stuff? And come to find out it was a combination all they're in, but what everyone on Reddit is looking for and other social media is the ability and the opportunity to gather together. And so I don't think social media as a means to communicate is going to change. I do think the way that we engage with it is going to continue to evolve and also our ability. The second part of that as long answer is our ability to self moderate is what is probably going to evolve. We are responsible ultimately for what shows up within the platforms. I know there's a debate about how responsible each individual platform should be in moderation. I think there's an absolute role for that, but as a society, we will always be able to look around and say, Hey, you know what? This is acceptable or this is not acceptable. And push upward to change what social media means. That's on us, and I think it'll continue to be in our purview to do that with respect and honor to what we really want to do, which is build community.

Doug Downs (23:25):

I hope you're right. I hope that's how it evolves.

Akeem Anderson (23:28):

I'm optimistic, guys, so forgive me about overreach, but I really do think that it's ours to build on it. It's always been ours to evolve.

Doug Downs (23:39):

It can't be anybody else

(23:40):

No, that's the bottom. It has to be ours. Yeah. Okay, your turn. What question would you like to leave behind for our next guest?

Akeem Anderson (23:48):

Well, the question that I would have for the next guest is to take a look into your crystal ball and think about what scares you the most about where we're headed on social media. There's been a lot of news coverage about bots, there's been a lot of hammering about negative engagement. How responsible can we be with the misinformation campaigns happening in public policy and politics? But which of these things scares you the most and is there assault? Is there a way out? We've built all these webs and we're flailing trying to get out of them to a safer place, but I'm interested to know what others are concerned about and if there is a solve for that concern.

Doug Downs (24:32):

Dynamite. I really appreciate your time today, Akeem. Thank you.

Akeem Anderson (24:36):

No, it was fantastic, Doug, and thank you for the invitation. Hopefully you got what you needed, but I'm excited to stay inside.

Doug Downs (24:42):

If you'd like to send a message to my guest, Akeem Anderson, we've got his contact information in the show notes. I bet you can find him on social media too. Maybe LinkedIn. Stories and Strategies is a co-production of JGR Communications and Stories and Strategies, podcasts. If you like this episode, please leave a rating and possibly a review. If you want to make 50 bucks, email me. The link is at the top of the show notes. I'd love to chat with you for five minutes just to get some listener feedback, helps us expand and grow and understand the podcast. Thank you to our producer Emily Page. And lastly, do us a favor forward this episode to one friend. Thanks for listening.