This week on The Digital Download, we're focusing on how to effectively drive business growth through social media marketing, with our guest, Luan Wise. Luan is a Chartered Marketer and Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing (FCIM), bringing a wealth of experience in guiding businesses to leverage social media for tangible results. She works strategically with marketing leaders, provides counsel to owner-managed businesses, and offers tactical support to social media managers.

In a digital world filled with noise, Luan provides clarity on the tactics and approaches that truly fuel business growth using social media.

Join us as we discuss questions like:

• *What are the fundamental elements of social media marketing that align with and drive business growth?

• How can businesses move beyond engagement metrics to measure real ROI from social media activities?

• What are some common pitfalls businesses encounter when implementing social media marketing, and how can they be avoided?

• How important is it for businesses to adapt their social media marketing as social media platforms evolve?

• What are the key emerging trends in social media that businesses should be paying attention to for future success?

Luan's expertise, drawn from years of experience with diverse organizations, will provide actionable insights to transform social media from a mere presence to a powerful growth engine.

We strive to make The Digital Download an interactive experience. Bring your questions. Bring your insights. Audience participation is highly encouraged!

This week we were joined by our Special Guest -

• Luan Wise, Chartered Marketer and Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing (FCIM)

This week's Host was -

• Bertrand Godillot, Founder and Managing Partner of Odysseus & Co, a proud DLA Ignite partner

Panelists included -

• Tim Hughes, CEO & Co-founder of DLA Ignite,

• Adam Gray, Co-founder of a DLA Ignite

• Richard Jones, Director of Qure 8 Ltd, a proud DLA Ignite partner

Transcript of The Digital Download 2025-04-04

Bertrand Godillot [00:00:05]:

Good afternoon, good morning, and good day wherever you may be joining us from. Welcome to another edition of the Digital Download, the longest running weekly business talk show on LinkedIn Live, now globally syndicated on TuneIn radio through IBGR, the world's number one business talk, news, and strategy radio network. Today, we are focusing on how to effectively drive growth through social media marketing with our guest, Luan Wise. Leon is a chartered marketer and fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, bringing a wealth of experience in guiding businesses to leverage social media for tangible results. She works strategically with marketing leaders, provides counsel to owner managed, businesses, and offers tactical support to to social media managers.

But before we bring Luan on, let's go around the set and introduce everyone. While we are doing that, why don't you in the audience reach out to a friend, ping them, and let them join us? We strive to make the digital download an interactive experience, and audience participation is highly encouraged. Tim, why don't you kick us off?

Tim Hughes [00:01:24]:

Thank you. Welcome, everybody. Thank you, Bertrand. Really excited about, today's discussion. I'm Tim Hughes. I'm the CEO and cofounder of DLA Knight, and I'm famous for writing the book Social Selling Techniques to Influence Bars and Changemakers. And just to say, if there's anybody out there that would like to come on to digital download, then they're more than welcome to, approach Bertrand and, to, to to come on and and, be part of the the process.

Bertrand Godillot [00:01:55]:

My arms are wide opened.

Tim Hughes [00:01:57]:

There you see. Bertrand's arms are wide open.

Bertrand Godillot [00:02:01]:

Thank you for that. Adam.

Adam Gray [00:02:04]:

Hi, everybody. I'm Adam Gray. I'm cofounder of DLA Goodnight. I'm Tim's business partner. And when you were introducing the show today, Bertrand, in, in Spanish, I thought you you've introduced it in English and French, obviously, and Spanish and German and Italian as well. I'm looking forward to you introducing it, a, in Latin for for old timers like myself, and b, in Esperanto in in in, you know, by virtue of trying to be as inclusive as possible.

Bertrand Godillot [00:02:33]:

I'd welcome that. I'd welcome that. Thank you. Thank you. That's that's an interesting challenge by me. Richard?

Richard Jones [00:02:40]:

Oh, hi. Yes. Richard Jones. I'm, an industry veteran, but an enthusiastic, newbie to social selling. I come from a cybersecurity and compliance background, and and I'm delighted to be part of, this esteemed panel.

Bertrand Godillot [00:02:56]:

Excellent. Thank you. As I said this week on the digital download, we'll speak with Luan Wise. In a digital world filled with noise, Leon provides clarity on the tactics and approaches that truly fuel, business growth using social media. Let's bring her on. Luan, good afternoon and welcome. Hi. And, Luan, let's start with you telling us a little bit about, you, your background, and how you, and what led you where you are today.

Luan Wise [00:03:36]:

Hi. Thank you for having me. It's good to join you. And as I was backstage, I was just laughing at the request for Esperanto, because before before you all joined us, I was just saying a blue sky update around new languages includes, Welsh, Scottish Gaelic and Esperanto. So you were very topical with that. I don't know if you're aware. So I should say keeping up to date with with with what's happening in the world of social media is something I do, daily. It's part of my role as a as a consultant, as an adviser, as a researcher on this topic.

Luan Wise [00:04:10]:

And I spent a lot of time doing that, but I also appreciate that I have the time to do that, in my position as kind of, you know, an independent person working in this field. And I've been working in marketing for over twenty five years. Started off working in advertising agencies, moved client side, running my own consultancy and now training business for fifteen years. And social media has absolutely become my specialism from the work I do, the writing I do, and the research area as well.

Bertrand Godillot [00:04:42]:

Excellent. Thank you for that. So let's, let's kick this, this through of, Luan, with a foundational question. What are the fundamental elements of social media marketing that align with and drive business growth?

Luan Wise [00:05:00]:

Okay. There's a there's a few things to unpack as there always is in questions and fundamentals is one of the things I really like to focus on, going back to the basics of marketing. When I first studied, marketing and business studies, you know, social media didn't exist. It was marketing in its purest form and I think those fundamentals are still absolutely relevant today, whether that's understanding your audience, what are you looking to achieve, all of those kind of basics apply, and then you add the social media channels on top of it. I think when it comes to growth, there's something that's really important to think about because actually, a book, subtle plug here, similar to Tim having his books in the background. My book that was published by Bloomsbury last year is called Smart Social Media Marketing How to Grow Your Business with Social Media Marketing and it very much focuses at the beginning on like what does growth mean because we might immediately think that growth is financial, and numbers and very often it is But there is other ways to grow, whether that's, through people, through additional products and services, personal development growth as well. So I think we take it a step back and say, what is growth and what are we looking to achieve? And then make sure that we have those fundamentals in place about our business, the products and services, the challenges we're solving, and who we're solving it for.

Bertrand Godillot [00:06:28]:

Okay. Excellent. So, so we we need to be clear on our growth objectives. That's that's clear. And then what are the the the elements of of social marketing that that that you can then leverage?

Luan Wise [00:06:46]:

Yeah. Yeah. You've you've got to know where you're starting and where you want to aim to get. Otherwise, you're just you are playing in that noise, and you're contributing to that noise. So we're doing this for business we're not talking today and and in this context around our use of TikTok to be entertained in the evening or Facebook to keep up with friends and family this is very much like business focused so we have to be that focused to be able to get the cut through.

Adam Gray [00:07:16]:

So how do you feel social media plays so lots of marketing channels are currently facing, diminishing results. You know, we we're all recipients of of this, from a consumer perspective. You know, whether or not you're riding on the underground surrounded by posters for various things, people trying to sell you things, or sitting in the car behind a bus, or listening to the radio, or TV, or magazines, or the adverts have become wallpaper. Emails have largely become wallpaper as well. You know, where once upon a time, you would have got two or three emails a day, now you get 20 or 30 or 200 or 300 emails even a day. And as a result of that, obviously, the very easy to throw the the good stuff out alongside the bad stuff because you're you're you're tuning it out. So how should a business avoid their social media efforts going into that same pot where it's just another post from somebody telling me something that I either already know or have no interest in? It's

Luan Wise [00:08:27]:

a great question, and there's so many things, again, in there because I, you know, I started off in a very traditional background. I worked in a postal direct mail industry for a number of years. I remember my first posters that were in London Underground and going there with a camera and waiting to be able to take pictures to to, you know, record that it was there. And I think those channels are actually still very much alive. They're being used. If we look at the campaigns that are being run, there are a lot for online services and ecommerce, and software tools as well. So I don't think they are dead, and all these things are actually working together for all the steps of the funnel from awareness through to consideration. And I would argue that email is is probably one of the better places to convert.

Luan Wise [00:09:09]:

Social media is probably better for awareness. How do we cut through all of this? It comes back to understanding our audience and what they need to know from us and respecting respecting their time, I think, in the inbox. I also think we've got a role as consumers to be discerning and not complain so much about things and go, do you know what? I'm in control of this. I can unsubscribe. I can unfollow people. I can skip the ads on TV. So we actually need to take control of that and set our information filters, which we know people are increasingly doing around news and what else is going on. So we can focus on social media if we are focused.

Tim Hughes [00:09:53]:

So so I saw something, this week, which I thought was quite interesting, Luan, which was, a, a video from Rand Fishkin. It actually it's actually a month old.

Luan Wise [00:10:06]:

Right.

Tim Hughes [00:10:08]:

But, what he does is he compares, the way things were measured in 2015 with the way things should be measured in 2025. So in 2015, he talks about how important it was about what you did was you drove people to the website. It was about, you did something to do with SEO. People were going to Google. You drove people to the website. You then try to get them to sign up with a newsletter or something like that, and then you took them through a a a filter to basically convert them to to sales. Now he's saying in in 2025 is that and it's quite interesting because, you know, he's a, an SEO expert, if not probably one of the best expert SEO experts in the world. He says that things have changed.

Tim Hughes [00:10:56]:

And now what we need to be doing is actually driving people to to not our website, but to social media because that's where they where they are, which is next what we're doing is that we're we're we're seeing that people are actually going on to social media and searching. Now he says that people search for brands. I don't think they do. I think people search for business business problems. And then what happens is that that's converting to sales. I mean, it's interesting to see that he's actually saying in ten years, we we've actually or should be changing the way that we we market. What what's your view?

Adam Gray [00:11:31]:

I

Luan Wise [00:11:31]:

think measurement is tricky. It's got more complicated. You know, dare we say, you know, back in the day when I did start in direct mail, you were focused on you knew industry response rates. You had previous data, so you knew how many to mail to get the expected response and and the conversion you needed. The measurements felt a lot simpler, than you could do the numbers. Measurement is important. The challenge alongside that is now we've got multi attribution, multichannel, and so much more data to to sift through to find out what it is that we need to know, and everything is kind of working together. So it's all got a lot more complex and a lot more layered as well.

Luan Wise [00:12:13]:

I think I would like to strip it back to those fundamentals and say, ultimately, you need to think about within your business, what do you need to measure as your end goals, but also what I would call, like, the stepping stone measurements that are gonna help you keep on track. So whether that's how well a social media post does in in terms of engagement because you get to know what resonates with people that helps you do more of that to to drive them along, versus your big end goals in terms of revenue and, you know, all all the other factors that you might be looking at. When it comes to search on social, I think this is absolutely interesting because it means that social media and, hopefully, you know, we know that it was. Anyone working in it knows that it has been, and in some organizations still is that endpoint that we're doing a campaign. We've done a press release. This has happened. Oh, but someone popped it on social, and and then it comes at the end of the chain. I'm now using the the trends and the insights around social search being really important.

Luan Wise [00:13:20]:

There was some data over this week from GWI around different generations and their use of search, and that that now that's actually split three ways, search engines, social search, and AI search.

Adam Gray [00:13:31]:

Yeah. Yeah.

Luan Wise [00:13:32]:

We've got to, you know, put that in the mix as well. And you're right. I think people are using social media for search. The data says it is. The data says that in the first thirty seconds of opening TikTok, many of its users go straight to the the magnifying glass rather than the the scroll. So they are searching whether it's intentionally or or just scrolling. So we need to think about social media in that format as well. I still think we've got mixtures of intent in terms of if we ask our device.

Luan Wise [00:14:03]:

I won't say the name because behind me. Question versus asking a question versus asking a question. I think it's different on on different platforms, but I think social media has very much got a role to play in that world of brand discovery and awareness now so much more than it's a place to amplify content.

Bertrand Godillot [00:14:28]:

Okay. So so so as as a as a business, what are what are the pitfall that I may encounter in, you know, in not knowing everything you just said, you know, especially search, you know, AI, social search, etcetera, on top of the classic the classic search. How how should I approach this? I mean, the what's other mistake I should not make, basically?

Luan Wise [00:14:59]:

Well, I think there is no rule book, but there's always things that everyone can do better to make incremental improvements in what they're doing. And part of that is testing and and learning and and looking at what's happening. But, fundamentally, I think we could group pitfalls into two levels. I think there's a a big pitfall at, like, the the tactical level, the people that are doing the day to day work and implementing. I think we've also got a level at leadership where perhaps there's not the level of understanding and there's a gap between those two, and we need to educate upwards and bring the understanding together as well. As an example, at the leadership level, there's still conversations going on around how many likes did we get and how many followers have we had. That's not a leadership conversation. And at the same time, those implementing are giving those answers back as well rather than thinking about what the impact is of something or how that's contributed to the big picture strategic vision and overall goals and maybe pulled out some really valuable insights from what competitors are doing or customer feedback and and insights.

Luan Wise [00:16:08]:

So I'd say biggest pitfall is we're still focusing on the easy stuff that we think it is about rather than treating it in perhaps a deeper way, which we would have done with other channels. You know, we wouldn't have stood, and have these conversations about fax fax machine campaigns, which I've done in my career or, you know, print, you know, things like that. So big picture pitfalls, but I also think we've got some pitfalls at a tactical level where, Tim, I know that you will be seeing these and scrolling past them all the time. Like, just the myths and the hack busting. And if you do this at this time and then within thirty seconds, you do this and and then you do that. I no matter what training I do, there is always a question, in the q and a around something really tactical around what's the best time to post or how many posts do I need to do or do I need to tag people in because I've heard that. And I think all of that is just distracting from being strategic and focused on those endpoints and those goals. So So we need to change our thinking.

Tim Hughes [00:17:15]:

I'm I'm actually Duran, I'm actually standing on one leg. I saw an article that if you do a restream on one leg, then you get foot better reach.

Luan Wise [00:17:25]:

It it just it it wouldn't surprise me. You know, it's it's almost like sometimes I do believe that those that are creating these ideas, whether they're justified or not, are the best marketers because everyone seems to know about them.

Adam Gray [00:17:41]:

Yeah. I mean, we we have a lot of internal debates about this. And, you know, people in fact, we we we we are as a as a show, we are friends with somebody that's a a clinical psychologist. And she said humans are hardwired to be lazy. You know? So at the end of the day, why would you walk five miles to get water rather than five yards to get water? So we always take the easiest course. And I think that that that's often embedded in all of our behaviors, whether or not we are new to something. So oh, and it'd be really good if you could tell me what's the best time to post. I I don't know because your audience isn't my audience or whatever the answer is.

Adam Gray [00:18:24]:

Through to even people that are really experienced at this, we think, well, if this does go viral, that would be amazing because my phone will start ringing. And, actually, no, it won't because it that's not the way the world works. But we still hold on to that delusion to a a greater or lesser extent. But but back to your point about kind of the conversations that are going on with with the leadership team. You know, part of the challenge is, you know, you're you're my marketing department, and you say you're gonna bring in a 20% uplift in revenue, and I've got a long buy cycle on my product. You know? Probably two years of having conversations with people to convert them to a sale. So it's like we're we're two quarters in. How are you getting on? Well, there's no money yet.

Adam Gray [00:19:12]:

Well, there was never gonna be any money because it's a two year buy cycle. Yeah. So so, actually, we we do need to potentially give the leadership team those those signposts. So, you know, this campaign worked better because we got a hundred likes rather than five likes. The likes in themselves, you know, we can't take those to the bank. We can't say to our investors, we got we got another hundred likes. So can you give us another million pounds, please? But we can say, well, this is what these are indicative of. And I think that that often there's been this big disconnect between marketers talk about, impressions and impacts and, reach and, engagement and all of these things.

Adam Gray [00:19:56]:

And leadership don't really know what those mean. They don't know which of those are vanity metrics and which of those are kind of indicative of something. So so what what what should marketers, modern marketers, be saying to the board when they're challenged with, you've been here half a year. Where's the money?

Luan Wise [00:20:16]:

I'd be rich if I could actually give

Bertrand Godillot [00:20:18]:

you that. That's that's that's an easy one.

Luan Wise [00:20:21]:

I'll give it a go. I I think, Adam, there's something here that goes back to how we report on social media. Particularly with b to b and the b to b cycles, is it any different from having a telemarketing team and saying, our telemarketing team of five did x number of calls this this month, and therefore, it generated this number of appointments, and no one asks what the the end conversion or the lifetime value or, what what the feedback on those calls was. We we're still looking at, in terms of sales and marketing reports when they get aligned, is very short term monthly reportings about outputs. And I think until that fundamentally changes, we're gonna be doing the same thing with social media and AI tools, no doubt. And the next thing coming along is that our reporting is very short term because that's how businesses run and that's how some members of the leadership team need to think. I think what we need to do fundamentally is is challenge the questions we're being asked and talk about boardroom language. And, you know, if we're talking to the the sales director, we talk about lead gen.

Luan Wise [00:21:23]:

If we're talking to the finance director, we talk about financial impact and and investments and and business cases. I think the challenge is particularly b two b that it is long term, but we don't report and measure in the same way as as we need to. So it's a whole conversation around this is the role social media can have within an organisation. These are the different areas it can impact. This is what we're going to achieve, and this is how we're gonna measure it. So so challenge things back.

Adam Gray [00:21:52]:

Yeah. I mean, I I I do agree, and, you know, we are great ones for challenging things. Yes. I I think, as you know, I I think that that that part of the challenge is that, are back back to that kind of humans are hardwired to be lazy thing. You know, invariably pretty much every individual that we talk to within every single organization wants the easy button. They've got a quick fix for something which doesn't require them to work any harder or any differently.

Luan Wise [00:22:20]:

Yeah.

Adam Gray [00:22:21]:

Because that's a very attractive thing. You know, we we all bump into people that that say, you know, here are the 10 things that you need to do to be successful on social media or email marketing or advertising, whatever it is. And people lap that up because, actually, you spent twenty five years working in this particular region, and now I've got this book which gives anybody that experience bottled and, you know, it's five minutes to implement it. So so the challenge and the the perhaps the the economic the the the financial challenge for people selling into organizations is that there'll always be somebody that will tell a buyer what they want to hear. Yeah. So so you're sitting down in front of the the buyer in the marketing function, but it's equally true of every function in an organization. You sit down in front of the buyer in the marketing function, and you say, actually, to make this change, to make this business sustainable, to make it effective, this is a two year program of doing things differently, and this is what will happen at the end of it. And then the next person comes through the door.

Adam Gray [00:23:23]:

You know, next one through the door is Tim, and he says, well, I can tell you three things you need to do of how you can gain the algorithm, go viral, and then the phone will start ringing. And the person goes, well, actually, I like that answer.

Bertrand Godillot [00:23:35]:

Mhmm.

Adam Gray [00:23:35]:

Now in in everybody's heart, they know that answer isn't the true answer. So so how do people when they're selling into an organization and they're faced with that, you know, you got the difficult right answer or the easy wrong answer. People want the easy wrong answer, don't they?

Luan Wise [00:23:54]:

Again, you know, I think the thing is not enough people are challenging things and whether that's, their own nature or the environment they're working in, like, we might all be challenges. That's our role. It's something that we've we've learned over time and people want from us. They want the challenges and the questions, but I don't think everyone is actually doing that in the right way. So they are fulfilling the monthly reports that they've always been asked to do and ticking off the boxes from the the myth busting that they've seen. I think, fundamentally, this isn't about social media anymore or a marketing channel. This is about organizational culture, employee mindset. And, actually, you can't just say we're gonna do things differently from tomorrow or here's a new tool.

Luan Wise [00:24:36]:

We've got AI, you know, coming into the mix around that. Fundamentally, this is again lifting it up again that this is about an organization, how they operate, how they embrace change, how they want to empower people. And, ultimately, I think that's what's gonna lead to long term sustainable growth rather than the day to day, you know, box ticking tactics. This is what I've read. Kind of implement it next.

Adam Gray [00:25:02]:

Yeah.

Bertrand Godillot [00:25:04]:

Yeah. And I'd like to come back to something you said, Yuan, on, awareness versus conversion. Mhmm. And, because I think to some degree in in b two b, we're very much faced with this assumption that social my my social presence is very much brand awareness. And the rate and the relationship to it actually influences my funnel is very, weak. And I would love to understand whether, first of all, you, face the same, with your customers, the same level of understanding with your customers, and, if there are any ways, in which you've been challenging this view Mhmm. Just to make, you know, to maybe change the assumptions. And and as you said, change the mindset around this.

Luan Wise [00:26:09]:

Yeah. I think one of the the challenges and maybe go back to the word pitfalls around social media is that I think many people think that they can achieve everything with one social media post, that they can create awareness about something or, you know, introduce their products and services, get people to buy into that, and then and then sign up and, you know, hit the buy button all in one post and we can't do that. There's no quick wins to this. So we have to be thinking in our content planning like who are we who are we trying to communicate with, what do they need to know, what stage of the journey are they at with us, is this about awareness, the first time they've discovered us because it's come through search? Or is this someone that's been following us for many years and we're now trying to get them to do something different? And I think then it's about what what do you mean by conversion? So conversion could be a download from your website so that you're capturing the data, and then you can go into the email mark marketing nurture funnel one to one conversations. Is it sign up to an event and a webinar? And I would say in that case, social media does work really well if you put the link to the event, get the sign up, post it live on LinkedIn, and follow it up afterwards. That's a different kind of conversion to ultimately getting a sale at some point. I would also say, and, it's relevant to this conversation. It's also about building those relationships until the point where you are looking to extend them.

Luan Wise [00:27:36]:

You know, you you connect with someone, you stay in front of them with your content, and at some point, there is an ask, whether that's, can I meet you for a cup of coffee? Can I interview you for this? Could you refer me for something? Can I pop you down for a testimonial? It's going through that journey, the know, like, and trust, but thinking that a a conversion doesn't always need to be the ultimate sale. It's, again, that stepping stone towards a deeper level of engagement and absolutely what Tim's book is about, social selling.

Bertrand Godillot [00:28:07]:

So it's basically measuring how you're, progressing your your, as you said, I like that the level of relationship with your target, basically.

Luan Wise [00:28:18]:

And then I think it's about adding that that impact, isn't it? Like, if I'm if I'm doing something, I'll think, you know, how has this impacted me? It's like, you know, I'm gonna meet some great people in the next few weeks because I've met them on social media and followed up and built that relationship to the point where there's an ask, and where there's, you know, potentially like a speaking opportunity at a global event, that's a conversion point because it's it's made a difference in my business. And I think it's about understanding what that means and how you want social media to to support that that growth and it's not always about the the buy button or the course sales or the book sales.

Bertrand Godillot [00:28:55]:

Mhmm.

Adam Gray [00:28:58]:

I mean, one of the things that I find really interesting about, and I was gonna say corporates, but, actually, it's it's not corporates. It's individuals as well. You know, they, they have particularly on LinkedIn, they have a strong sense of what they should be posting, And they've they they stray from what they should be posting, and they see miraculous results, and that doesn't drive a change in behavior. And, and, you know, the vast majority of it, I I would imagine everybody's news feed, unless they curate it very carefully, the vast majority of it is people sharing double corporate posts about product enhancements or the fact that they're appearing at events. And the only people that are engaging with that content are people that are on the payroll of the company that the content is talking about. And I I

Luan Wise [00:29:57]:

I

Adam Gray [00:29:57]:

have this sinking feeling that that's reported back to the leadership team as a success. You know? I work for a big corporate. We've got a hundred thousand staff. I did this post about this event we're appearing at, and I got 20,000 likes on it. Now all of the 20,000 likes are on the payroll, and therefore, none of them actually wanna buy the product. It doesn't matter because 20,000 people have liked it. So so for somebody that's in marketing that's that's starting to do some stuff in social, and they're experimenting with different posts. You know, we've got a picture of here's an event, and here's a picture of me at the event.

Adam Gray [00:30:29]:

And one of them obviously outperforms the other significantly, even if it's a photo of me. And, and how do they how do they PR that to Mhmm. Their team, the the boss, in order that that can become the normal normal mode of operation?

Luan Wise [00:30:48]:

Yeah. Again, I think this comes back to reporting and to to take it out of social. Is this any different from going to networking events and someone reporting back that there've been three breakfast events this week, and they've handed out x number of business cards and added four new people to the CRM? It's kind of the same, outputs, numbers, activity, and not identifying, you know, what was the quality of that person that we met? Was it the right event that you went to? How long did it take you? And and the cost and expense on that one? You're absolutely right, Adam. If we were to all sit and scroll through our LinkedIn now, it's all like, you should do this and you should do that and, you know, there's all the those pressures around that. A lot of those posts are are the noise that we need to filter out because they'll be same as your inbox. Like, you need this many number of leads and, you know, pipeline and everything else. No one ever talks about the conversion or the value or how busy they are. They just talk about, you know, the big metrics that is gonna, you know, be your big win and your your overnight success.

Luan Wise [00:31:50]:

And I think anyone that is going after that, should challenge it to come back to challenge and and what they're reading. And if you're getting started in social media, I think it's about being very specific about who do you need to learn from and who are the right people to learn from and what noise do you need to filter out. It is so easily easy to get distracted and try and, you know, buy the big wins and the big courses and, you know, the overnight success, but there isn't any quick wins. There's people to learn from, but you've got to to be focused. And I think there's also the challenge of around, you're right, the content that is being put out there. It it's becoming an echo chamber. People are copy copying other people because they see the big numbers on it or or the posts. And and, actually, when you dive into the comments, they're not valuable comments.

Luan Wise [00:32:42]:

They're like, hey, best bestie, and you're amazing, and and that's hot. And it's like, I'd rather have no comments than, like, comments that don't add any value to me or my audience or my network, and they're never gonna convert into anything. So I think it's about focusing on quality, what we're trying to achieve. And, again, we've got to change how we report and talk about that internally. I don't care about the big numbers. I care about, you know, what it ultimately means to a business.

Richard Jones [00:33:11]:

Right. It it it strikes me that, you mentioned it earlier on, that leadership should be asking tough questions to those who are, you know, in charge of social media. You know, it's almost as if leadership doesn't really understand the potential of what's there. And consequently, it's dancing to the tune of those who are, you know, pumping out content and happening at at the back because they've got a lot of live.

Luan Wise [00:33:39]:

But there's one argument that, yes, it would be great if leadership did have a greater understanding of social, but at the same time, it is one of our channels. Do they understand SEO and pay per click? Do they understand how to buy print, print and, you know, press schedules or things like that? Is it almost because it is so in the public domain that we expect everyone knows about it and learns about it? Or is it just that the leadership team should set the objectives and then trust their marketers to deliver on it, but have more relevant conversations that are away from, the the likes and and things like that. I'm sure that, you know, we don't all report on number of clicks or what are our top search words or things like that. Social just seems to be put into a different box, within organizations, and and I don't think it's doing anyone any favors to be doing that.

Richard Jones [00:34:33]:

Yeah. I guess it's the it's the social it it's lumped in with with social media that is considered to be more trivial.

Tim Hughes [00:34:40]:

So I

Richard Jones [00:34:40]:

guess that's part of the problem.

Luan Wise [00:34:42]:

And I think part of the problem that I see a lot in organizations, and I don't know if any of you see it or or do it yourself is because social media is also a personal thing about how we're entertained. It's on our phones, how we communicate with friends and family. It's actually very difficult for people to separate how they use it personally, what their kids are doing, what their friends and family are doing, and then go, oh, I'm now doing this for work. It's different. I need my, you know, we're still the same person, but it's again, it comes back to that employee mindset of how I use Facebook for work, for groups and communities and conversations is different to how I will post on my personal profile with my friends and family.

Richard Jones [00:35:23]:

Well, I guess you could just start with with the phone telephone using the telephone. You know, that's considered bad form, but, it was the same tool that you were using to call your your customers, wasn't it? So it's apparent there.

Luan Wise [00:35:40]:

Yeah. But but I don't know. Not everyone uses a telephone anymore. We shed your calls in different ways, don't we? So I think part of this is, you know, we can connect use of social media and how that's changed to the smartphone and the fact that we've got the devices in our pocket constantly. And I think we use them less and less of phone calls, but it was about phone calls are much more one to one conversations. You knew who you were talking to, whereas social media, I think, perhaps doesn't feel so one to one, when you're putting content out there.

Adam Gray [00:36:12]:

So so so the the this is a bit of an existential question. So, we we believe the only thing that matters is social media. We we believe Sure. Yeah. Believe the only thing that matters is social media. We believe that all other comms channels are of their legacy channels that Mhmm. Don't really deliver they certainly don't deliver with the same mechanism that they used to do years ago. Mhmm.

Adam Gray [00:36:45]:

And the fundamental challenge that that, certainly, I see when I look out into the business world is that everything is homogenized. So, you know, there are a hundred CRM vendors. There are, 500 car manufacturers. All of them make a product which is perfectly fit for purpose. I think back in, like, the end of the last millennium, JD Power did a survey, and they concluded that there's no such thing as a bad car anymore. So whether you're buying a Skoda or a Rolls Royce, not the opposite ends of the spectrum necessarily, but we it doesn't matter what you buy. The expectation is that it will always start. It will do 35 miles per gallon.

Adam Gray [00:37:29]:

It will be comfortable and quiet. It will have all the tech in the you know, they're all the same thing, basically. And yet every one of these organizations, whether it's a CRM vendor or a car company or a facilities management company, they'll claim that their product is best. And, consequently, the words don't mean anything anymore. There's no trust between you and the company. It may be between you and the brand. You might choose Apple as opposed to Samsung, but but there's no trust between you and the company. But there is trust between you and people.

Bertrand Godillot [00:38:01]:

Mhmm.

Adam Gray [00:38:02]:

And that's what we believe social media enables. It enables me to grow my following where people who like my particular brand and style of conversation and humor and whatever are drawn to me and then are happier doing business with with me. So if that's a reality rather than just a delusion on my path, how long before all of these other things fade out? You know, we we used we used to have people, you know, snake oil salesman. Literally, people selling stuff driving around the rural areas saying, this will cure you know, you drink this and it cures your bad stomach. You rub it on and it cures your rash. You know? That that was the way things used to be done. How long before pick whatever broadcast channel you like is consigned to that bin, or is there a future for those things? Is there a future for TV advertising and radio and print and all of these other things?

Luan Wise [00:39:06]:

I think there's some marketing channels that will disappear at some point. For example, as I said, back in my agency days, I did many fax machine campaigns, to, corporates, to sell health club memberships at the time. You know, literally spent hours on a fax machine and doing campaigns. Obviously, they're not a a channel anymore, so things will change. But I think things need to become more personalized. And you're saying, you know, a car does the same job for everyone, but that's not true. Because for some people, a car is, you know, is a hobby, is a toy, is what people might, you know, go traveling in in in weekends. For some, it's a a workhorse.

Luan Wise [00:39:47]:

For some, it's a family taxi. So, you know, and that influences our choice. So I think it's hard to put everything in into a box and say that cars are the same and what you might choose as a car would be very different to me. My husband would spend hours researching a car and all the technicals. I would walk into a showroom, and I have done it and go, that looks nice. I'd like that one, please. So, you know, buying decisions, but I did do that. Buying decisions, buying journeys are all completely different, and people have different purposes for them.

Luan Wise [00:40:18]:

And even if some organizations are focused on buying into individuals, There are still some organizations where we don't know the individuals, but we still love the brand. Apple, for example, Mailchimp email marketing software. I don't know any individuals at those, but I still would use the brand and follow the brand and engage with the brand. So maybe there's actually something coming up in the future of how do we intercept companies, brands, and individuals so that, you know, there's risks, pros and cons for both if there has been a shift. But maybe that's the bigger challenge of who do we engage with, who do we buy from, and for what purposes rather than I don't think we can go mass market again and just have one car that fits everyone.

Adam Gray [00:41:02]:

Mhmm. Yes. Okay. Yeah. I mean, it I I think that the all of these questions are really important questions to challenge ourselves with because I think that, you know, certainly, when we look at the sales functions within organizations, we see a a lot of even if it's not articulated in quite this way, a lot of the kind of, well, that's just how it is kind of attitude. And it it strikes us that that, you know, that's the mindset that people have just before their entire world gets disrupted by somebody that comes in saying, well, I haven't got any of that legacy stuff. I'm gonna do stuff differently in a more efficient way. And I and I think that that challenging these things just because it's always you know, there's always been TV doesn't mean that there will always be TV or that TV advertising is relevant.

Adam Gray [00:41:56]:

Maybe it is. Maybe it isn't, but you need to be asking the question. To determine whether or not this thing still has some sort of relevance to you and the business and and the world.

Luan Wise [00:42:09]:

I think there's it it's important to question, like, why you're doing things and should you continue doing them. And if I can say that there's anything that Elon Musk has done for the world of social media is he had has actually challenged people to say, is Twitter x still the right platform to be on? Or are our audience there? Do the values align with what we want to do? Does it have all the features and benefits that I need it to? And stop doing what we've always done because that's how we've always done it. And I think there's been a real danger in the past of going, we can't go to that trade you know, we have to keep going to this trade show because we've done it for twenty years. And what will everyone think if we're not there? Yeah. You know? Strategy is choosing what not to do as well as choosing what to do. But, ultimately, I'll come back, because this is my area of research that I'm starting to explore is organizational culture and mindset and all the change management and adoption models and what that means.

Bertrand Godillot [00:43:05]:

And and on that, sorry. It's something to say, Adam. No.

Adam Gray [00:43:10]:

I I was I was just gonna say that that yeah. One one of the things that we see when we when we work with teams and we train them, what we see is one of the biggest barometers for whether or not the cam or the the the program is gonna be successful leader buys into the the program and, more importantly, does what we say they need to do. Because it it's kinda like, you know, if you smoke and you say to your children, don't smoke, they will smoke because they model your behavior, not what you say.

Bertrand Godillot [00:43:41]:

And we

Adam Gray [00:43:41]:

see exactly the same thing in sales team. Sales leaders that say, yeah. I buy this. I'm gonna do this. I'm gonna invest my time and effort in making this a success for me. It not only shows the way, but it also gives permission for other people to do it. Organizational change is is the biggest driver and also the the most difficult thing to change, isn't it?

Luan Wise [00:44:02]:

It's not a quick win, is it? And it's one of the first questions I'll ask with clients when I'm starting to explore a project of who's sponsoring this, what's their attitude and their understanding of this within the organization. And if if they don't show up to the first meeting, they don't want to see the presentation, you know it's never gonna get pushed through or get buy in or or get results. And you can't expect people on their metaphorical, you know, shop floor to implement this stuff if it hasn't got drive and direction from the top. Yeah.

Bertrand Godillot [00:44:32]:

Absolutely. A comment from the audience, and then I'll I'll raise my question, which coming coming from, Ben Smith. Trust is the core funnel of the network tribe. Trust is owned by contributing in a genius in a genuine way to the network. Certain nodes in the network act as gatekeepers. They can help amplify your presence. It's a long game where reliability and credibility eventually trumps content. So, if you want to be interesting, be interested.

Bertrand Godillot [00:45:07]:

That's a good punchline. I'd like to bring, the growth topic to talent because we we we talked a little about growth, and growth oftentimes goes with hiring or attracting at least the right talents. Do you see in your practice any impact of your social media marketing on talent acquisition?

Luan Wise [00:45:34]:

Yeah. Absolutely. So I've done some work, alongside HR leaders and this topic as well and I think there's two things here. There is retention. So ensuring your organisation are you know, know what's going on and they're supportive and and engaging. And it comes back to, Adam, your point about individuals. If they are representing the organisation, that is really key, but also acquisition as well. A lot of social media content and when I'm working with organisations is not just the here's our products and services and our launches and our events, but it's it's the behind the scenes.

Luan Wise [00:46:09]:

It is the know, like, and trust. It's the employee brand content. So rounds of promotions are happening within legal services at the moment aligning with the financial year. You know, that's great content to see that organizations are rewarding their staff and promoting them and that they feel valued. Right. All the CSR activity, who's doing London marathons, who's doing charity bake sales, and, you know, odd sock stays within an organization. That is great and relatively easy social media content, but it's also giving people insights into what it's like to work with you within the organization, as a client, as a supplier. So all of those are really important engagement, content, trust signals, and actually that what I would call that stepping stone content.

Luan Wise [00:46:56]:

People will engage with that because it's easy for them. Some content on social media that we might be being asked to be put out at a corporate level is is really heavy stuff and requires opinions and insights. And while it gets the lurkers and the the offline conversations, it won't get so much visible engagement online because either people aren't comfortable sharing. There's a bit of fear around it. They don't want to get out of their depth. They don't feel that they should be engaging with that content because of, how they're in, organization perhaps is is structured to be seen to do with that. So absolutely the employer brand acquisition retention, that is a really valuable way of using social media. And if I go really tactical, that's a really great way for some organizations to be thinking about using TikTok, to attract younger generations, whether it's your trainees or your your graduates, you know, office humor, office life, who works there, what it's like behind the scenes.

Luan Wise [00:47:57]:

I would say that's a really key, you know, key opportunity for social media away from perhaps the the broadcast, the corporate, spelling stuff that we might think it's about.

Tim Hughes [00:48:09]:

It's interesting that, in the work that I do with LinkedIn, that's actually, what you've just described for TikTok. Actually, LinkedIn won't part of that.

Luan Wise [00:48:18]:

Yeah.

Tim Hughes [00:48:19]:

And their recommendations are for well, they work with, there's a LinkedIn team that actually works with senior leaders about putting out, company reports. But there also is a team that works there in terms of helping how can we get the intern to show people what it's like to work there every day. And there's some famous one that's gone viral on that. On on LinkedIn Yeah. Rather than on Yeah.

Bertrand Godillot [00:48:39]:

Yeah. Mhmm.

Luan Wise [00:48:40]:

Yeah.

Bertrand Godillot [00:48:42]:

Since we are on that topic, are there any innovative strategies that that, you know, come to your mind or that that you see, you know, trends that you see emerging and that, businesses should be watching carefully?

Luan Wise [00:49:00]:

Trends well, there's there's two ways of looking at this. Trends, yes. What we're seeing is user behaviors are shifting, social search, AI search, but much more about private sharing. Instagram talks a lot about sends and shares with friends versus public commenting. So I probably see more activity go on in post communities and WhatsApp groups rather than in the public domain, which could come back to, you know, the way people think that they should be using LinkedIn. But in terms of features, something that I'm watching and quite a fan of is LinkedIn's new features around newsletters, being able to promote newsletters as an ad, but also their thought leadership ad content, which comes back to adding that that connection between brand and individuals that a company page can promote an individual's piece of content, whether that's an employee, whether it's a an influencer or an event speaker, but, again, being able to kind of tie those two things together. So for me, the LinkedIn ads not just being about ads to try a piece of software or promote an event, but being about the thought leadership content and newsletter longer form content as well. And in terms of trends, we can't escape that everything's, pushing us towards video, even LinkedIn.

Adam Gray [00:50:22]:

Mhmm.

Bertrand Godillot [00:50:22]:

Yeah. Yeah. Sure. Okay.

Tim Hughes [00:50:25]:

It it's it's interesting. The the the LinkedIn video thing is interesting because, they always say that you need to be doing it, but they don't tell you how many people are consuming it.

Luan Wise [00:50:35]:

Well, I think that the challenge with LinkedIn, you know, when it first came out on the mobile app was you couldn't search. So you couldn't just see the content from people you were connected to or or search in any way. It was just a just it's just a scroll, isn't it? And Yeah. It's not quite there in terms of functionality. I

Tim Hughes [00:50:52]:

was on I was on a I was on a call with LinkedIn, and there was a discussion, and the people that these people had the discussion with my age Right. Generation. And we also thought we don't watch video on LinkedIn. And it

Luan Wise [00:51:06]:

was just Yeah.

Tim Hughes [00:51:07]:

It was just really interesting where we had the LinkedIn going, you need to do this, and LinkedIn, posts are up 30%. And we're going, we don't watch it.

Richard Jones [00:51:15]:

Yeah.

Tim Hughes [00:51:15]:

Who watches it? But they were my they they were of my generation.

Luan Wise [00:51:21]:

I think it the one thing I like about some LinkedIn video content is those people that do it often, and you're almost looking out for it. So you know that a certain person does a a LinkedIn video update every Tuesday morning, and I'm waiting for it because I've engaged with it a few times. So it's that kind of serial content back to the days of TV, versus kind of, oh, there's a video. I've never seen this person before. I don't know who they are. What's going on?

Tim Hughes [00:51:47]:

It's part of that engagement. Know, like, and trust them. You you you

Adam Gray [00:51:50]:

have a

Tim Hughes [00:51:51]:

relationship with the with that with that content, don't you? Because as you said, you're looking out for it.

Luan Wise [00:51:56]:

Yeah. So it's it's it's part of the content program rather than being something in isolation, I think. And also you've got to be really comfortable to do it and spend time doing it. It's I don't know. Some people take longer than others, but it would take me a lot more time to create a video to add to LinkedIn than it would for me to type out an update.

Tim Hughes [00:52:18]:

I I think with video, it's a, yes. You've gotta be comfortable. And it and and the only way that you can get comfortable is practice.

Adam Gray [00:52:25]:

Keep doing it. And and

Tim Hughes [00:52:27]:

and just and just keep doing it. And, based on that, that that's just there's there's a there's always a fear of us being judged, isn't it? You know, I'm I'm now used to, you know, I know that when I pull out a post, someone will contact me and tell me there's a typo in it.

Adam Gray [00:52:42]:

Yeah.

Tim Hughes [00:52:42]:

And I and I just live with it. And it's, you know, I, you know, I am the typo is my only name, and that's the way that's the way it is.

Luan Wise [00:52:49]:

Yeah. Everyone's experiencing this is different. You know, some people do get calls. I guess it depends on your own tone of voice and messaging as well. Some people potentially, are evoking discussions and conversations around challenging topics whereas others are doing, I'm speaking at this event, and here's an update, which doesn't really require that that level of feedback. So, yeah, it does take practice the same as writing posts, as well. It's it's a almost a continuum of confidence, isn't it? Like, you start off by putting your profile out there, then you maybe, like, do some behind the scenes connections, then you do some commenting, then you do a couple of posts, and then you're like, right. I'm going all out on video now because I'm okay with it.

Bertrand Godillot [00:53:35]:

Excellent. That's right. That's the path. I've been going through this as well.

Tim Hughes [00:53:40]:

So you're gonna start video then, Bertrand. Sorry? You're gonna start doing some video then, Bertrand.

Bertrand Godillot [00:53:46]:

I've done some videos already, but, I'll, I'll, I I I've I've placed I've put this on post, but I'll I'll

Adam Gray [00:53:52]:

be back.

Luan Wise [00:53:53]:

You on

Tim Hughes [00:53:53]:

a hard drive. You know?

Bertrand Godillot [00:53:54]:

I'll be back soon.

Tim Hughes [00:53:57]:

Yeah.

Bertrand Godillot [00:53:58]:

Yeah. Yeah. This this has been really great. So, where can people learn more? Where where where can we find you?

Luan Wise [00:54:04]:

You can find me on social media. I am on, LinkedIn is probably my primary platform. Also very active on Instagram. Have got profiles on Facebook, threads, TikTok, x as well, or just Google my name to find my website.

Tim Hughes [00:54:20]:

So so what so you've done some work at, Warwick University, Lou Anne. What does the students think about you being on TikTok?

Luan Wise [00:54:28]:

I I don't have this answer from from Warwick, but I do have it from another university, and I won't share it because I was doing a a guest lecture about social media and we were kind of doing hands up around the different platforms of who's on Facebook and so I don't want to be on Facebook, and when I said you know are you following me and and your lecture on TikTok? They didn't want us to be there we were the it was the wrong context, the wrong generation. But it it's it's how people are using it. So, for for students studying this, there is, again, that challenge of you are not your audience. You need to go and be in the places that your audiences are gonna be and understand all the different channels as well. But if they're using it for themselves, they don't want their guest lecturers and authors showing up, in their in their feeds when they're trying to shop and and travel and things like that.

Bertrand Godillot [00:55:22]:

Okay. Thank you for that, Luan. We now have a newsletter. Don't miss an episode. Get the show highlights, behind the scene insights, and reminders of upcoming episodes. You can you can scan the QR code, on screen or visit us at digitaldownload.live/newsletter. On behalf of the panelists and to our guests and to our audience, thank you all, and see you next time.

Bertrand Godillot [00:55:51]:

Thank you, Luan.

Tim Hughes [00:55:52]:

Thanks, Luan.

Adam Gray [00:55:52]:

Thank you. Bye bye.

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