top manager & social media 2013 - european communication summit 2013 - brussels
DESCRIPTION
Top managers & Social Media: opportunities and threats At the European Communication Summit 2013 in Brussels, Lundquist provided almost 600 communications directors with a preview of findings from our latest research into how top managers at Europe’s top 100 companies are (or are not) using social media. Joakim Lundquist, head of Lundquist, presented preliminary data showing how active 500 leading executives and managers are on social media.TRANSCRIPT
Top managers & Social
Media Opportunities and threats
Milano, maggio 2013 Joakim Lundquist, @JoakimLundquist
European Communication Summit 2013 Brussels, June 27/28, 2013
04/07/2013 | 2
• About Lundquist and our approach to research
• Why do social media matter?
• Preliminary findings: top management & social media at
Europe’s top 100 companies (and some best practice)
• Blogging
• What are the risks?
• Dos and don’ts
• Take aways …
Agenda
Lundquist: the strategic partner to guide your digital presence All digital communications activities are composed of two stages: planning and then execution.
In addition, there is the management of the entire process.
Lundquist is your authoritative partner for planning and managing any digital project, from an
assessment of the digital properties of a corporate ecosystem to the creation of a new “best
practice” website. Our deep understanding of online corporate communications derives from
years of experience in this field and a team of professionals boasting backgrounds in different,
relevant fields (from financial journalists to CSR experts).
04/07/2013 | 3
Lundquist: Measure. Manage. Change
Lundquist is a strategic consultancy
specialised in online corporate
communications and with particular
expertise in financial communications,
corporate responsibility, employer branding
and social media
We adopt a tried-and-tested approach to all
our projects, dividing them into three phases.
In this way, we assist companies in redefining
their corporate presence on digital channels
and accompany them in a process of
evolution and change to better meet their
communications challenges
Our goal is to make online communications
measurable and to guide companies towards
a change in their internal culture
Our clients include more than 70 of the
largest traded companies in Europe
MEASURE
MANAGE CHANGE
04/07/2013 | 4
04/07/2013 | 5
Research programmes
KWD WEBRANKING CSR ONLINE AWARDS
EMPLOYER BRANDING ONLINE AWARDS SOCIAL MEDIA AWARDS
• Europe’s most influential study into online financial and
institutional communication, which has tracked leading
European companies (1,000+ a year) for over 15 years
• Stakeholder requirements investigated every year
through questionnaire (500 professional responses)
• Swiss results published in Finanz und Wirtschaft
• Now in its 5th year, the research assesses
how Europe’s top companies use their online
presence to communicate their corporate
responsibility and sustainability strategy
• First study in Europe to assess CSR
communications based on stakeholder
needs
• Holistic vision of providing non-financial
information on the web, spanning reporting
and communications
• Research “laboratory” analysing the use of
social media from a corporate perspective
• Research comprises a series of studies of
individual social networks
• Two editions of the international study on
Wikipedia now supported by focus on
LinkedIn, sharing platforms (YouTube,
Slideshare, Pinterest, etc.), Facebook and
Twitter. Special focus on use of social media
by top management
• First research in Europe to assess how
companies communicate their identity and
employer branding to current and future
employees
• Based on needs and expectations of actual
jobseekers (international survey used as the
basis of the evaluation protocol)
Top management and the use of social media - who cares?
Preliminary results from the Lundquist survey on how European
top managers use social media
2013-07-04 | 8
Discussion is increasingly online and influences corporate reputation. It is
vital for senior leadership to be familiar with social media, understand the
dynamics and the impact on their company
Digital and social media present new opportunities for business (from e-
commerce to crowd innovation)
Social media can be your eyes and ears on what is happening in the outside
world, unfiltered and real-time
Social media can give the company a human face and show that managers are
open and publicly engaged
Opportunity for thought leadership
Social channels facilitate stakeholder dialogue and build a community of
unmediated relationships to leverage in case of crisis
Why do social media matter?
2013-07-04 | 9
Fast facts
481
managers
100 largest
European companies
6 managerial positions
Head of
CSR 19%
Head of
HR 19%
Head of
Comms 6%
CEO
19%
Head of
IR 18%
Chairman
19%
2013-07-04 | 10
Fast facts
481
managers
100 largest
European companies
6 managerial positions
7%
42%
2%
More than a third of these are
inactive
60% mention company in bio
Women more active than men
28% have fewer than 20 contacts
56% of HR managers aren’t on
Only 8 blogs, of which 6 are hosted
in company website or popular news
site
2013-07-04 | 11
2013-07-04 | 12
We collected profiles using the Twitter internal search engine
and Google, typing (in the following order)
What we looked for
1. Name and Surname
2. Name + Surname + Company
3. Name Surname (without spaces)
+ Company
4. The first letter of the name +
Surname (without spaces) +
Company
04/07/2013 | 13
What we found
:33 profiles 3 categories
ACTIVE PROFILES INACTIVE PROFILES ABANDONED PROFILES
latest tweet posted
over the last 30 days
latest tweet posted
between 31 and 90 days
ago (currently inactive)
... ...
latest tweet posted
more than 90 day ago
18 2 12 (1 account is private, so impossible to evaluate)
2013-07-04 | 14
What we found
5 styles of use:
PROFESSIONAL Tweets are about business and/or company
PERSONAL The owner never refers to company
MIXED A variety of personal and professional content
PROFESSIONAL-HOSTED The user tweets with a corporate profile
PRIVATE Users opting for a “private” account protect their tweets, limiting access
to approved people only
04/07/2013 | 15
Preliminary findings: Twitter
Mixed 42%
Professional Hosted 5%
Professional 27%
Private 5%
Personal 21%
On Twitter 3%**
Head of
CSR 56%
Head of
HR 11%
Head of
Comms 17% CEO 11%
Head of
IR 11%
Chairman 0%
STYLES 18 ACTIVE
PROFILES*
On Twitter 5%**
**Active accounts only
* Total active profiles in the pie
chart exceed 100% because of
double counting due to one
person being both head of
communications and head of
CSR.
2013-07-04 | 16
Marco Patuano
CEO of Telecom Italia
One of the 3 verified profiles we found.
Good example of a professional profile
run by senior figure in a major Italian
company:
• Profile picture and a cover photo
• Has a clear bio with information about
the owner’s positions
• Good use of hashtags and retweets
• Takes part in #Twittertime chat
sessions
• Minus: interacts with the online
community only infrequently
Twitter, professional profile: an example
2013-07-04 | 17
Brian Milligan
Head of Comms at Barclays
He has everything a good profile should:
• A profile picture (posting a cover picture
– as in this case – and/or a background
image is also a plus)
• A well structured bio with a little
disclaimer at the end explaining the use
the owner will make of the profile
• Milligan balances replies, retweets and
tweets written by him, using each format
the platform provides
Even if this is a personal profile, the tweets
are generally not too informal. His tweets
are appropriate considering the platform
and his role
Twitter, personal profile: an example
2013-07-04 | 18
Niall Dunne
Head of CSR at BT Group
• Graphics: Has a profile picture, cover
and background image
• Well structured bio (information about
him)
• He balances replies and retweets:
tweets written by him are less
frequent
• Minus: he should post more tweets
with personal content (not just
retweets)
Twitter, mixed profile: an example
2013-07-04 | 19
04/07/2013 | 20
What we looked for
We collected profiles using the LinkedIn internal search engine (while
logged out) and Google, typing (in the following order):
• Name and Surname
• Name + Surname + Company + LinkedIn
3 categories
(in brief)
WHAT WE
FOUND
201 profiles, 2 categories
INCOMPLETE PROFILES
Empty: no job description, no profile
picture, no experience/expertise OR
profile picture only
Incomplete: something is missing among
the following: job description, profile
picture or experience/expertise
COMPLETE PROFILES
A “complete” account shows profile
picture, job description, some
previous experience, skills and/or
groups
201
PROFILES
2013-07-04 | 21
Preliminary findings, LinkedIn
Head of
CSR 25%
Head of
HR 20%
Head of
Comms 11%
CEO 10%
Head of
IR 26%
Chairman 8% Complete 58%
Incomplete 42%
60 profiles incomplete
24 profiles empty
On LinkedIn 37% On LinkedIn 56%
CATEGORIES
04/07/2013 | 22
A complete profile is a profile
that shows:
• A complete job description
• A brief summary in which the person
can present herself
• Previous experience
• Education
• Skills
• Groups the profile owner is member
of
LinkedIn, complete profile: an example
Blog
2013-07-04 | 23
04/07/2013 | 24
What we looked for
Blogs were collected using Google, typing (in the following order):
• Name and Surname
• Name + Surname + Company + blog
• Name Surname (without spaces) + Company + blog
WHAT WE
FOUND
8 blogs, 2 categories
MIXED PROFESSIONAL HOSTED UNCATEGORISED
The author talks
about job but also life
or interests
Curated by a single
person but hosted in a
company domain
Hosted blog with the
author profile
but…with no posts
?
1 6 1
04/07/2013 | 25
A good CSR blog: an example
Water Challenge Peter Brabeck-Letmathe, Chairman
• The chairman of Nestlé runs a blog
hosted by his company website in
which he talks about “the important
issue of water availability around the
world”.
• The fact he writes on this topic
underlines how important it is for the
company, underlines its commitment
to the wider project this blog is part
of: Creating Shared Value (the Nestlé
CSR approach)
• This blog is well conceived from a strategic and communications point of
view:
• The tone is direct, informal but appropriate
• There are links to external and internal resources
• Regularly updated
04/07/2013 | 26
Tesco Talking Shop
Philip Clarke - CEO
• Tesco hosts a blog community (Talking Shop)
featuring members of the executive team
including Chief Executive Philip Clarke.
• The CEO explains in his first post:
“I want this blog to help put Tesco’s people
back in focus, to zoom in on our business
and examine what we are doing, explain
what we are thinking and how we see the
world”
• Talking Shop is an emblematic example of
how a company could approach blogging:
• Executive team talks directly with people and
customers about specific topics
• Light and pleasant layout with easy-to-access
profile of each blog writer
• Tone is direct, informal but appropriate
• Easy to switch from one author to another
2013-07-04 | 27
• Possible incoherence in the corporate
message
• Different people inside the company start
to communicate independently
• Losing control on the flow of information
and potential asymmetry
• Underestimate that a message sent
out on social media is considered a
publication (including comments that
are too personal)
• Attract negative comments without
being able to manage them (“ask the
Pope”...)
• Create a one-man-show (especially
for CEOs)
Top managers and social media: what are the risks?
04/07/2013 | 28
1. Do keep your eyes and ears open, learn from others
2. Do make a clear decision about what you’re up to: Why have
this account? What will my communication style be? What
am I trying to achieve?
3. If you need support, do make it crystal clear when someone
posts on your behalf (e.g. “#staff”)
4. Try to maintain a regular presence: don’t disappear for
weeks or months
5. Don’t use inappropriate tone (too formal or informal): often
conversational and direct is best (i.e. be yourself!)
6. Always remember that what top management does and says
impacts immediately on brand and credibility
Dos and Don’ts
04/07/2013 | 29
Our research is also a barometer of how digitally aware and literate top
management is… and the indications are worrying!
The penetration of digital into all spheres of business activity make it a cross-
cutting, highly relevant area of expertise for managers:
• New business opportunities; penetration of new markets; internal
organisation, communication and productivity; customer care…
Is your management in a position to make informed forward-
looking decisions?
Social media also provide a direct, unmediated link to what’s
happening in the outside world: breaking news, customer sentiment,
industry news, thought leadership…
Are your corporate leaders “plugged in”?
Digital literacy of management
04/07/2013 | 30
• Our research into social media highlights how this disruptive
technology is altering familiar categories
• Corporate leaders need to be aware social media make it
increasingly difficult to protect their personal life from
encroaching on their public, professional role. An already fine
line is being blurred:
• There is a need for social media training too!
Goodbye private? Everything is public domain
31
What next? Be viral and start a quiet revolution
04/07/2013 | 32
• Are you using social media as part of your professional role? If
not, when will you start?
• Are you concerned about your management’s digital literacy?
• What are the barriers to expanding wider use of social media by
corporate leaders?
• What is our role as communications professionals in driving
digital literacy and social media use?
• How can we transition from a “broadcast” mode of
communications towards a “conversation” with stakeholders?
Topics for discussion
Email:
Website:
www.lundquist.it
Blog:
www.lundquist.it/blog/
Via San Maurilio, 23
Milan 20123
Italy
t. (+39) 02 – 3675 4126
f. (+39) 02 – 9287 8792
LUNDQUIST SRL CONTACTS
SOCIAL PRESENCE
Lundquist company page
@Lundquist
Lundquist page
Lundquist channel
Slideshare account
Contacts | Dialogue | Sharing