The how and why of executive social media activation

Abstract

Social media platforms provide a unique opportunity for modern executives to lead conversations in their industries, improve employee engagement and support the marketing and communications goals of their companies. Unfortunately, this opportunity goes unrealised when executives and the communications teams that support them are not prepared to engage in these channels. Within most companies, technical social media expertise tends to be localised within marketing teams that may not have the capacity to fully support executive social media activation. Executive communications teams are better prepared to develop executive messaging but often lack sufficient experience with enterprise social media to support executive social media messaging effectively. This paper shows that once an executive and their communications team understand the basic functions and cultures of social media platforms, developing a strategy for executive social media communications can be an integrated part of their overall executive communications plan.