EP #071- Stop Thinking of LinkedIn as Marketing. It's PR 2.0.

I had a meeting last week where I gave my best sales pitch to keep a client who was considering pulling back from LinkedIn.

The CEO had seen strong results: hundreds of likes per post, consistent engagement, thousands of new followers. By any objective measure, their LinkedIn presence was working. But they were struggling to connect the time investment to concrete business outcomes. The sales pipeline looked the same as before, partnership inquiries hadn't increased meaningfully, and recruiting still felt like the same uphill battle.

They asked the question I hear all the time: "Why should I keep spending so much of my time on this?"

Here's the pitch I gave them, because most executives are wrestling with this same calculation.

LinkedIn Isn't Another Marketing Channel

The majority of executives treat LinkedIn like another box to check in their marketing strategy. They post content, track engagement metrics, and try to connect activity to pipeline growth.

But treating LinkedIn as a marketing channel frames it as the wrong type of tool entirely.

LinkedIn gives you a way to shape public perception of yourself as a leader and your company as an organization worth following.

Right now, three groups are making decisions about you based on what they see on LinkedIn:

• Investors research you before meetings by reading your profile

• Recruits decide whether to take your offer by scrolling through your posts

• Customers form opinions about your company by watching how you show up

The unique advantage here is that you're reaching all of these audiences simultaneously through a single channel, speaking in your own voice. Press releases don't give you this kind of direct access, webinars can't reach this breadth of stakeholders at once, and company statements don't let you communicate as a leader rather than as a corporate entity.

LinkedIn is PR 2.0. No other channel lets you control the narrative about who you are and what your company stands for with this kind of directness and reach.

The ROI Isn't in Your Spreadsheet

The ROI question makes sense on the surface, but it misses how LinkedIn actually creates value. Asking about LinkedIn ROI is like asking about the ROI of answering your phone or having a website.

I work with executives whose sales meetings now start with prospects saying "We've been following you on LinkedIn," which means the relationship begins warm instead of cold and the sales cycle shortens because trust already exists. 

I work with CEOs whose recruiting conversations go differently because candidates have spent months reading their posts and already understand the culture they're joining, and with founders whose fundraising meetings are smoother because VCs have watched them think in public about their industry for the past year.

You won't find "3 LinkedIn posts generated 1 enterprise deal" in your analytics dashboard. The value shows up as easier recruiting, shorter sales cycles, and investor conversations that start from credibility instead of skepticism. These outcomes are real, but they don't fit neatly into attribution models.

Most Executives Get the Response Backwards

The natural instinct when results feel ambiguous is to pull back and redirect time toward activities with clearer ROI.

The right move is actually the opposite.

If your voice is resonating on LinkedIn and people are engaging with your content consistently, pulling back wastes the momentum you've already built. The better play is to expand your approach by identifying other executives in your organization who have their own expertise, perspective, and networks. 

Getting them active on the platform multiplies your reach and reinforces the perception that your company is full of smart people building something meaningful.

One executive posting occasionally creates limited impact, but five executives posting consistently creates a presence that's impossible to ignore across the audiences that matter to your business.

LinkedIn Gets More Valuable as Your Company Grows

LinkedIn gives you a tool for owning your narrative at a time when narrative control matters more than ever. As your company grows, as you face crises or opportunities that require public trust, as you compete for talent and customers and capital against well-funded competitors, the credibility and relationships you've built on LinkedIn become increasingly valuable.

Going viral isn't the goal here. Consistency is the goal, because when someone is deciding whether to join your company, invest in your round, or choose your product over a competitor, you want them to already know who you are and what you stand for. 

If you're not active on LinkedIn, you're walking away from one of the few channels where you can speak directly to investors, employees, customers, and partners at the same time. 

Your competitors are showing up there every week, and they're the ones prospects think of first when it's time to make a decision.

— Justin

Justin M. Nassiri | Founder & CEO
M: 650.353.1138 | E: [email protected]
250 Fillmore St Suite 150, Denver, CO 80206
www.ExecutivePresence.io

Executive Presence specializes in helping top-tier executives boost their visibility, activate their network, and position themselves as thought leaders via our premium, fully-managed LinkedIn service.

Our unique process involves ex-McKinsey, BCG, and Bain consultants conducting monthly hour-long interviews with our clients, and turning them into impactful daily LinkedIn posts to establish their unique voice and authority. On average, our clients see a 500% bump in engagement in their first 30 days with us. Data is continuously analyzed to improve engagement and identify impactful messaging that you can use for conferences, podcasts, and internal communications.