Why investing in your employees is mission-critical for your B2B brand

When I started working as a lawyer at a Park Avenue law firm decades ago, I was in a small office almost in the basement. Clients didn't know I existed.

Once I was running deals and was known to the client. But they didn’t know much about me.

That was before social media.

Social Media Puts Your Culture on Display

Today, customers and clients can search social media for everyone on your team. The question is, what will they find?

Right now, I’m reading Fusion by Denise Lee Yohn. It’s a great book. It's about how the world's best companies integrate brand and culture to build great companies from the inside out. Interesting, huh? In other words, the best companies drive everything their organization does by operationalizing their clear, distinctive brand identity so that their brand is not just what they say; it's what they do. Very powerful.

I have observed and come across this in my culture and digital transformation work. Denise Lee Yohn has synthesized what I've seen into this book. I’m learning a lot. She says something early in the book that B2B companies need to hear.

“The integration of brand and culture is critical in B2B organizations because employees are highly involved with customers during the sales process and throughout the product service and support cycle. In the case of consulting and other professional services firms, employees often are the product themselves.... So in many B2B companies, culture is on display to customers much more clearly through people’s attitudes and behaviors. That’s why B2B organizations need brand-culture fusion more than most.”? (emphasis added)

Why is this so important??

Do your employees have well-crafted profiles on LinkedIn? If not, what does that say about your organization?

The absence of information on a LinkedIn profile allows people to jump to conclusions.??

I don’t know about you, but I look up everyone on LinkedIn.

What conclusions do you draw about people after looking them up on LinkedIn?

When I see an active and engaged person, I always want to know more.

People will jump to conclusions about your organization based on what they see your employees doing and not doing.?

As Denise Lee Yohn says,

“culture is on display to customers much more clearly through people’s attitudes and behaviors.”

Your social presence, particularly on LinkedIn, matters.

What is Social Presence?

Social presence has two parts: your passive social presence and your active social behaviors.?

Your passive social presence is your LinkedIn profile.?

Your active social behaviors are what you do.

Are you posting content? Are you sharing your insights? Are you engaging in conversations? Are you writing articles that demonstrate your expertise?

Your social presence is on display for everyone to see. Doesn't it make sense to be intentional? Doesn't it make sense to be strategic about how your organization uses this powerful technology?

Suppose you’re an organization invested in helping your people build their social presence for sales, recruiting, or procurement. In that case, your organization benefits from how they present themselves and engage with prospects, talent, and vendors.

It's amazing to me why some organizations engage in certain behaviors.?

For example, the “pitch slap” is rampant on LinkedIn.

The pitch slap is where a salesperson connects with you because "they want to expand their network" or "they noticed you share connections in common." After you accept, they immediately pitch you.?

Pitch Slap!

You roll your eyes and do whatever you do. I immediately disconnect and block the person reporting them as a spammer.?

Let’s step back from that interaction and think about what Denise Lee Yohn said,?

“culture is on display to customers much more clearly through people’s attitudes and behaviors.”

I understand that salespeople need to make their sales numbers, but doesn’t what your prospective customers think about your organization matter?

Recently, I heard that RingCentral was using fake profiles on LinkedIn with pictures generated by artificial intelligence.

That made me think RingCentral is a shady company.

Am I the only person who thinks that’s shady? I wonder what else RingCentral might do in pursuit of sales.

I also wonder about the values of an organization that would use fake profiles on LinkedIn.

Am I alone in thinking that’s not an excellent way to start a conversation??

Doesn't how you treat people matter?

RingCentral’s social presence includes deceptive practices.?

Why does employee experience matter?

How employees feel about your organization will come through in their social presence.?

If you’re focused on your employees and taking care of them, that’s probably a good thing for your brand. If you’re not, that’s perhaps not so good.

As an example, Apple is taking a beating on hybrid work.?

Apple’s employees have written open letters to senior management. It isn’t pleasant if you ask me.

Google has the same hybrid work policy. But they’re not experiencing the same public backlash as Apple.?

Employees say that senior executives aren’t listening. Something is going on in Apple's and culture and it's coming through on social media.

Whatever happens with Apple’s hybrid work policy, it’s clear that Apple’s senior executives aren’t meeting an essential human need their employees are expressing.?

The message that Apple’s customers and prospective employees hear is, “Apple doesn’t listen to employees.” Maybe customers begin to wonder, "will Apple listen to me?"

I don’t know whether that means Apple will sell fewer iPhones. But the brand is taking a hit.?

The post below is from a Vice President at Microsoft, Lani Phillips. She has a LinkedIn Live program called Modern Mentoring with Lani Phillips. She's built an engaged following on LinkedIn, and many people outside of Microsoft know who she is and her values.

Microsoft owns LinkedIn, so I'm sure they encourage people to use it.

But every brand could experience this kind of enthusiasm. It starts with the culture. In this message, Lani mentions how much she loves Microsoft's culture. She says,

Cultural transformation takes time, teamwork, and technology. We didn't get here overnight, but with strong leadership and a clear mission, we've built an incredible culture with a growth mindset and empathy at its core.

That's a powerful statement coming from any employee. Of course, cynical people will say, Lani's a vice president, and so, of course, she is going to promote the company line. But I don't see it this way. I've seen hundreds of authentic posts from people working at Microsoft.

Here's another. I think this is a good brand message also.

These are not corporate brochures. They're not marketing campaigns. They are authentic posts from the organization's people.

This picture is pure gold. With thousands of Microsoft employees sharing posts like these, people are banging down the doors to get jobs there.

Marketing didn't stage this photo. I see genuine smiles. And so do their customers, prospects, future employees, and vendors.

Denise Lee Yohn says this,

The power of a business to create value in the world is unleashed from inside the organization, not by promoting an image on the outside. You build a great brand by operationalizing it -- by using your brand purpose, values, and positioning to develop strategy and guide operations, so that your brand isn't just what you say, it's what you do.

Social media makes it easier than ever to see people's attitudes and behaviors. Employee experience is how organizations shape those attitudes and behaviors. Investing in one without investing in the other is like buying the golden egg and ignoring the goose that laid it.