An Expert Guide to Executive Communications

Sixty-one percent of decision-makers in B2B companies report that thought leadership demonstrates the value of its products and services noticeably better than traditional product-oriented marketing. 

Top-down executive communications position your company as an expert in your field, relating your expertise and vision to potential customers.

In an organization, the leaders are the overseers who keep the bigger picture in mind. Effective executive communication relates this goal externally, building a follower base that is drawn to your company not just for your offerings but for your vision.

Learn the role communication plays in growing thought leadership and how to craft a comms plan that builds your brand authority.

The Role of Communication in Leadership

Effective executive communication builds authenticity and increases consumer trust in your brand. This is vital for sales, when 33% of Americans report that they value trusting a brand, because they don't want to waste money on a bad purchase. This is why 70% of American employees expect executives to actively communicate with the public on social media. 82% say it is at least somewhat important to communicate the company's mission, vision, and values on social platforms.

Strategic, authentic exec comms are your way to appeal to this large base of potential customers and even turn them into brand ambassadors who will actively engage with your marketing efforts and recommend you to people in their network.

The Impact of Communication on Organizational Culture and Employee Engagement

An organization's executives and leadership team set the tone for the company's vision. But often, if employees don't see or hear from the executives much, they imagine the company leaders to be faceless, increasing distrust or cynicism with their higher-ups. Raising public visibility through effective executive communication puts a face and voice to your name, humanizing yourself and showing employees there are real people with genuine insights heading the company.

Your approach to executive communication can also signal to the rest of the company that you care about the work they do. For instance, if you routinely celebrate the wins of your teams on social media posts, you show them that you value the work they do, spurring employee engagement more than internal communications would.

You can also incorporate employees into your social strategy, encouraging them to share online and build their personal social media brands. 

Having employees share your posts amplifies them without spending on advertising, increasing your reach and empowering employees because they play a direct role in spreading the company vision. This can develop them into employee advocates who actively try to help your company thrive.

How To Develop a Communication Plan for Executive Communications

Developing a communication plan is more than just mapping out a schedule for your posts. You need to figure out what message you want to send, how you want to send it, and who you want your messaging to reach.

Identify Key Messages and Audiences

The first step for an executive communications manager is to identify what you want to communicate and to whom. Knowing your target audience — your key stakeholders — helps you tailor your messaging so it's more relevant to them. This may take some time, but it's vital to build a foundation for strong communication.

The first part is identifying your objectives. What’s the goal? For example, some strategic goals can include:

• Building brand equity
• Driving sales
• Generating more high-quality leads
• Becoming a thought leader

Next, think about your audience. Who are these people? What would encourage them to share your goals? What are their needs and interests? Jot down your answers to these questions.

With a concrete understanding of your goal and audience, you can craft a powerful executive communications plan that guides your messaging. If you want to drive sales, for instance, you can regularly share customer success stories, describing the problem they had and the steps you took to fix it, encouraging viewers with similar challenges or looking for similar problem-solving approaches to get in touch.

Choose the Right Channels for Your Message

If you want your message to reach your target audience, you need to communicate along channels that they're most receptive to. Identify which platforms they spend most of their time on and focus your efforts there to capture the most interest.

We used to believe the main channels were networking events and email blasts — and they can still be useful — but today the best channel is often social media platforms. Since posts on these platforms are public, you can simultaneously communicate with employees and external stakeholders, making them a vital component for communication efforts.

Crafting Effective Messages Through Storytelling

Now you can move on to crafting your messages. Your goals should inform the tone you convey, the information you provide, and the takeaways you end up with.

It also helps to incorporate storytelling to make your executive communications strategy plan more engaging and memorable. For example, you may talk about a recent accomplishment your organization achieved, an internal challenge that has cropped up, or a case study you heard about that you felt was relevant to your organization.

Keep in mind the three basic storytelling elements:

• Establishing the conflict and setting the scene
• The rising action, or how the problem was approached
• Climax, or the solution

Each section should inform the next, and after the resolution you can pull out the takeaways for your audience. Use vivid language, sensory details, and relatable characters to breathe life into your messaging. For messaging that you publish on social media, make the takeaways shareable so employees can easily spread your messaging. Online tools can help you do this.

But remember, authenticity is critical. Social media users can tell if you're passionate in your executive communications systems or just doing what you think you must. You must be authentic to reflect your company’s values and culture.

Measure the Impact of Your Communications

Over time, you should track how effectively your communications have helped you reach your goals. Employ active social listening, analyzing online conversations on your brand to identify areas to improve. If you know social media experts, ask them for input on what they think you're doing well and what they would do differently.

For objective measures of your performance, you should track some relevant KPIs, like:

• Engagement rates
• Follower growth
• Traffic conversions
• Social sentiment
• Web visitors from social channels

If you're ever unsure how to improve, you can also look through social profiles from executives who perform well according to the KPIs you're tracking and analyze what they do well.

Transform Your C-Suite Into a Social Media Powerhouse

Social media platforms are a powerful tool to communicate with your target audience, helping you build your personal brand and thought leadership in your industry. But it can be difficult to execute a great communication strategy on your own.

This is why SocialHP helps you coordinate and execute social media marketing campaigns, offering simple, powerful tools that automate processes like pulling internal content and importing content across platforms, letting you maintain your existing workflow. Book a demo to learn how we will help you grow your thought leadership and reach new external audiences.