How CXOs can be the best ambassadors for their brands on social media
Why CXOs need to make time for social media
Any CEO or senior executive who says they don’t have time for social media, means they don’t have time for building their company’s brand, culture, listening to customers’ voice, doing R&D on their products, advertising their company, and information gathering on what’s trending.
In this video (from 9:00 min onward) Chairman of Mahindra Group, Anand Mahindra, and one of the most active CEOs on Twitter, explains why his social media presence is indispensable to his management style. The anecdotes he shares in this video should be enough to convince any executive of the value of a well thought-out social media presence.
Anand is one of the few executives who have more followers than their brands on social media. The person who often comes to mind when u say ‘ceo on social media’ is — Elon Musk, whose following (48.8 million on Twitter) is bigger than Tesla ( 8.3 M) and SpaceX (15.3 M) combined. He tweets about his companies, personal updates, STEM jokes, and memes. But what he gets most good press for is customer service.
Other founders who are very active brand ambassadors for their companies on social media are PayTM’s Vijay Shekhar Sharma and Zomato’s Deepinder Goyal. Both regularly engage with their customers, issue clarifications on press reports, as well as share interesting data about the company’s performance.
These examples showcase how senior leadership’s active social media presence makes their companies more accessible to the customers and could lift the brand’s value through the positive press it may generate.
My favorite CXOs on social media
The executives I personally love to follow for inspiration, education, and even entertainment are —
- Sarah Blakely — Nothing seems off-limit for Sarah on Instagram, the inventor and CEO of Spanx shape-wear . From her Sunday breakfasts, to 50th birthday celebrations, even shots of her sleeping husband — Sarah comes across as funny, and authentic, and even daring. There is a video of her trying out new Spanx products on camera! I wonder if there is any other CEO who shares so much of their personal lives on social. What inspires me is seeing a mom of 4 running a billion-dollar-company and while having so much fun along. It’s well known that Spanx became a billion-dollar-business without advertising. With Sarah, they have a CEO whose public persona is the living embodiment of its mission: ‘To help women feel great about themselves and their potential’
- Dharmesh Shah — The Founder and CTO of marketing and sales platform Hubspot is a LinkedIn influencer (yes, they exist). In a world of Neil Patels and Gary Vaynerychucks, Dharmesh stands out with his amusing posts on life and career. One of my favorites was his post supporting Khan Academy, which resulted in Dharmesh donating $200,000 to the organization.
3. Stewart Buttertfield — It’s not unusual for a B2B company CXO to be active on LinkedIn, which the CEO of Slack is, but Stewart has a even bigger following on Twitter. He does not shy away from taking a position, and regularly tweets interesting updates on his company and personal life. One of his most popular tweets (also pinned on his profile) is a thread about the impact of Coronavirus on Slack and how they have dealt with it.
4. Payal Kadakia — It’s very inspiring to see how the Indian-American founder of ClassPass brings her whole-self to work and finds time to do what she loves (dancing and running SaDance company) while managing a tech unicorn and a growing family. Her passion for dance was the genesis of ClassPass. Here is one of her posts that shows how she maintained that connection with her art during the lock-down. She brings to life ClassPass’ mission to motivate people to live inspired lives every day through soul-nurturing experiences.
5. Jacinda Arden — To know why the PM of New Zealand is such a popular political figure, one just has to watch her IGTV channel. Refreshing and spontaneous, though Jacinda posts mostly about work, her content makes her job seem more fun than it actually must be. Here are posts showing her eating what looks like a giant cheese ball and a piano-cake.
To sum up, although all these CXOs have different approaches, what is common is how they serve their brands by listening, sharing, engaging, and inspiring people through their social media presence.
Any others CXOs worth following on social? Would love to know your recommendations in comments below.
