A recent Notified and PR Week survey revealed that 57% of respondents believe authenticity and transparency are crucial for consumer trust in brands. Yet, only 31% think consumers even “somewhat” trust information from company executives.

Why the gap? One reason may be that executives are often only visible during earnings season or amid a crisis. What if leaders prioritized building trust year-round through consistent communication? This type of reliable connection could be the key to stronger, lasting relationship with consumers — the kind that drive a brand’s success.

In today’s crowded social media landscape, executives can help humanize an otherwise faceless brand. An active LinkedIn presence gives credibility and authenticity to your brand’s image in a unique, invaluable way.

So, why LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is Crucial for Executives

At over one billion users, it’s no secret LinkedIn has experienced a boom in recent popularity and come a long way from primarily functioning as a job search platform.

While we can speculate on the various reasons leading to this growth, what’s certain is that it is a place where you’ll find company decision makers, stakeholders, institutional and retail investors, consumers, and industry leaders. This pool of users makes it the place to share your company’s messaging, build brand awareness, and extend network reach to relevant audiences.

As LinkedIn continues to keep up with its newly found popularity, the company itself has explained their algorithm’s prioritization of content that promotes knowledge and stirs conversation with “meaningful” comments. We’ve seen here at Gateway this naturally correlates to a bias towards content on a human’s profile over a business page. This is simply because it’s easier (unsurprisingly) for users to engage in a meaningful dialogue with a person rather than a company.

Now that we’ve established LinkedIn as the place executives need to be, let’s look at some strategies to align their content with your company’s mission and messaging.

Content Strategy Tips for a Company Executive

To build and nurture relationships, there are three main buckets of content that an executive can and should post about. Consistently (at least once a week) posting in one of the following categories will not only help them find favor with LinkedIn’s algorithm but also keep them top of mind for those within their sphere of influence.

•Executive Thought Leadership

Commentary on current events or trends in your business’s industry is not only a way to stay in front of target audiences interested in relevant topics to your business but also establishes your executive (and by extension, your company) as an authoritative voice. Thought leadership content does not need to be controversial or polarized by any means. The goal is to simply provide the perspective of an experienced individual on a relevant matter that may be impacting the company.

•Company News and Updates

As discussed above, LinkedIn often sees content from individual profiles perform stronger in the algorithm compared to company pages. This means that when an executive posts an update with news about the company — whether that be around your latest product launch, facility expansion, or other significant announcement — the reach of that post will likely go farther and reach more users than if it was posted solely on the business profile.

•Networking Activity and Personal Stories

The core of the strategy for leveraging an executive’s profile online is the notion that people like people. So remember to give them just that – an actual, real person. We often see photos and video content perform exceptionally well and receive high engagement because people want to see the person they feel connected to. Your executive’s followers want to see the latest conference they attended, the panel they spoke on, and other personal experiences of them out in the world representing your business. Nurture and build authentic relationships by giving your audience a glimpse into the real life of these executives.

Outsource Social Media Management if Needed

It’s a safe bet that a top-level executive has the knowledge to create all of the above mentioned content to help users better connect with your company. The challenge comes in their full schedules and long lists of higher priority daily tasks associated with running a company.

With such full plates, how can executives maintain a consistent LinkedIn presence? This is where our team of social media and marketing experts step in.

Together we help you with content strategy, prompts and brainstorming, post scheduling, community engagement, and profile management. Ask us how we can build your executive team’s network and online community to amplify your company’s message!

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