Why Social Media Ads Were the Diabolically Perfect Way to Meddle in an Election

We are all aware of the Mueller Report and its findings from our federal intelligence agencies that a Russian company (Internet Research Agency (IRA)) was hired to use social media advertising on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter to engage likely Trump supporters during the 2016 presidential election. They targeted people with interests consistent with existing Trump supporters and showed them sponsored content within their feed. 

From 10,000 feet this approach is vanilla. It is the approach that every legitimate advertiser takes to cost-effectively reach its target audience. If I’m engaging with Mommy blogs, it’s appropriate to target me with content about children’s clothing. If I’m watching videos of extreme sports content it’s appropriate to target me with content about GoPro cameras. As consumers, we have learned to expect this, and we may sometimes even appreciate learning about relevant products/services we might not have otherwise heard about. 

This ad revenue is how Facebook (who also owns Instagram) and Twitter make their money. And the more specific and unique the targeting desired, the more expensive it is for the advertiser. When the advertiser is able to get users to engage with their sponsored content (like/share) it significantly increases the reach and impact of their message, and their investment ROI. 

For me, it is when the sponsored content on social media veers away from consumer or business products and services into informational content that it moves away from advertising and slides into “propaganda”.  And the slope is especially slippery when the informational content looks and feels like news or opinion from a credible source.

The reason it changes when it’s informational content is the “sleeper effect”. This is a social psychology concept when people see a message many times, over time they remember the content but discount the source. So even if they knew the first 3 times they saw a message that it was coming from a less credible source, over time the repetition “wins” and the message remains in their brain.

Social media is so perfect a medium for the sleeper effect - it’s almost diabolical. This is because, as humans, we are always most influenced and persuaded by the people we perceive to be most like us. And, at its core, every social media user experience is built on encouraging interactions among people who are “like us” - our close, loose connections and aspirational connections. And because what populates the majority of our feed is from and by these people “like us”, we do not have our guard up when engaging with the content they may like/share. 

When we are scrolling through our feeds, we are far more likely to be “processing spontaneously”. This is harmless when reacting to baby, pet and food images shared by family and friends. But when the same feed also has political, opinion or “news” headlines, it also means social media users are not thinking critically about the source of this information. 

An audience in a social media experience is in a state to be more highly influenced because they are interacting with people like themselves and they are processing what they see spontaneously. When informational content is shared — content that is not directly about the person in their friend group — it is being consumed with a highly non-critical eye.  And that makes people far more susceptible to the sleeper effect when they see it shared again and again across their friend group. 

The media and lawmakers are pressuring Facebook and Twitter to regulate its sponsored political content more tightly in this election cycle. Both companies earn their revenue from advertising and they would not want to voluntarily throttle any potential ad revenue. And, importantly, they also do not want to be the arbiter of the “goodness” or “truthfulness” of informational content shared on its platform. 

While social media firms do staff teams who review reported content to ensure it meets their established standards; these standards generally include taboo things like exploitation of children, violence, hate speech, etc. It does not address content that shares facts out of context or those with misleading headlines about a particular political party or candidate. 

The “I am so-and-so and I approve this message” on radio and TV ads are easy to recognize as political ads. But unlike regulated media, any content from any source can be promoted on social media. Anyone can pay to promote any blog post, news article or video that they want, to whatever audience they select. This informational content doesn’t “look” like a political ad, nor does it trip any of their established standards -- it looks like just another piece of content that people share with each other. Because it hides in plain sight, there is no reasonable way for Facebook or Twitter to review and assess the truthfulness or intent of every piece of sponsored content on its platform -- it’s just too big a job.

The social media firms appear to want to take more of a “Public Service Announcement”  approach -- educating their users that they need to be wary of the sources of the informational content that is shared on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram. However, this strategy of forewarning and inoculation is likely to backfire. This is because people do not ever want to believe that they were, and still may be, being actively manipulated. No one wants to admit to themselves or to others, that they were fooled.

Net net, social media is the perfect place to share misinformation that “looks like” credible information. The people using social media aren’t in a mindset to be able to critically evaluate the source every time they see a message. And the social media firms aren’t equipped to review every piece of sponsored content for its truthfulness, context and lack of bias. With that in mind just isn’t a clear and easy answer for preventing this same kind of ‘interference’ from happening again in the current election cycle.

Take Steps to Reduce Bias in Performance Reviews

A recent study by HR.com revealed that two-thirds of organizations don’t think that their performance management system is effective. This may be because (as research from Stanford suggests) most people view performance reviews as “subjective and highly ambiguous”.

Ideally, the purpose of any review process should be to improve employee performance and drive better business results. However, this intention is often negated because many employees believe that their evaluations are unfair. And these beliefs may be more valid than most of us would be comfortable admitting; even though it may unconscious, bias is very real in performance discussions and takes a number of forms including, but not limited to:

• Recency bias: Judging people primarily on their most recent achievements or failures  (businesses that perform annual reviews are particularly vulnerable to this.)
• Halo effect: When someone excels at one aspect of their job, a manager may overlook negative factors that would be an issue for any other employee.
• Gender bias: According to a recent study women are 1.4 times more likely to receive critical subjective feedback in performance evaluations than men.

To reduce bias in reviews and drive better performance for everyone at your business, you need a consistent structure and clear objectives. Here are four simple ways to do that.

1. Write down goals and expectations

A study from MIT shows that the best performing teams usually have clear and ambitious goals. This is hardly a mind-blowing insight, so the real surprise is that 50 percent of employees don’t know what’s expected of them.

Setting clear targets is an obvious way of evaluating performance and developmental needs. It also reduces bias. Referring to goals before completing evaluations gives managers a more objective perspective than open-ended questions like, “how did this person perform?”.

Reviewing performance against goals more often allows you to track progress more effectively while reducing the impact of recency bias. Managers are much more likely to recall how an individual performed over the past month or quarter than for an entire 12 months.

2. Align individual and business goals

Companies with a purpose outperform the market by 42 percent. Not only does a mission guide the direction of your business, it motivates employees by connecting their day-to-day tasks and goals to broader business outcomes. Yet one study found that less than one-quarter of middle managers knew their company’s strategic priorities.

When business goals are clear and transparent, employees can directly connect their goals to specific company targets. The ability to see real business impact will reduce bias in reviews. When priorities change, individual goals should be updated as well, so that you’re not unfairly judging people against outdated targets.

Aligning individual and business goals also help to reduce gender bias. Women are less likely to receive feedback that’s specifically tied to business outcomes than men, which may explain why they only occupy 24 percent of senior roles. The more women are evaluated on their broader business value, the more they will feel like and look like the future leaders of your company.

3.  Avoid the open box

Much of the unconscious bias in performance reviews stems from the “open box”. Many review processes lack structure and simply provide managers with a few open-ended questions and a large blank space to fill. With so little guidance and so much leeway, it’s no surprise that certain biases find their way into evaluations.

The open box is a symbol of how little guidance managers get in general. Just 39 percent of new managers received training for their role and nowhere is this more apparent in the performance management process. In a McKinsey survey, less than 30 percent of employees said that their managers are good coaches.

To help managers improve, train them to collaborate with their team on setting and aligning goals and on providing constructive feedback that’s development-focused. Encourage more frequent conversations to reduce recency bias and provide technology that prompts them to check in with their team and what to discuss. The more guidance and structure you provide, the less likely you’ll see their open-box biases.

4.  Use analytics to spot potential bias

HR professionals are often uncomfortable using data to inform decision-making. But when it comes to the very human problem of bias, analytics is useful, especially as an accusation of prejudice can itself be accused of bias if you don’t have evidence to back it up.

It can be easy to spot potential bias from the data, like when an employee receives a negative evaluation but you can see that they hit all their targets and directly contributed to the broader business goals. Or if the data shows that a manager didn’t have regular performance-related check-ins with an individual, be on the lookout for recency bias in the review.

Treat these insights as opportunities for identifying which managers need additional coaching and ensuring employees know to speak up if they feel the review process is unfair.

Objectivity = Better Performance

Labor costs can account for as much as 70% of total business costs, and employees play an essential role in productivity. You need to maximize every opportunity you have to improve performance.

60 percent of people who believed that their company’s performance management process was fair also said it was effective. By reducing bias in your reviews and helping managers have a genuine impact on the development of their team, you’ll boost performance and drive growth for your business.

This content was originally published at HR Technologist

A Leader's Role on a Dysfunctional Team = Responsible

We’re all familiar with what Tolstoy’s posited in Anna Karenina, that “happy families are all alike and every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” And while the particulars of what makes each family unhappy are different, the source of the dysfunction always stems from the behaviors and attitudes of the parents/adults in the home. It is the moods, habits and behaviors of one (or more) adult(s) which catalyze and inform how the others in the family behave, act and react with the catalyst and with each other. It is the combination of the adult’s catalyst behaviors and the resulting reactive behaviors which create each unique unhappy family situation.

The origin of team dysfunction is always the leader

This analogy also applies to teams at work. Namely, that happy, productive teams are all alike and every unhappy team is unhappy in its own way; with Forbes’ Coaches Council identifying 14 different ways a leader might diagnose dysfunction on her own team. And, like the adult in the home being the catalyst in the unhappy family analogy, dysfunctional team behaviors are in reaction to the habits, attitudes and behaviors of the leader.

Of course, unlike children, every adult in the workplace is responsible for his own behavior, but Shawn Casemore, author of Operational Empowerment may have said it best on his blog on this topic: “The origin of dysfunction in an organization is always the same. It’s the leader of the team.”

If you’re leading what you fear is a dysfunctional team, use these tips to course correct your own thinking and behaviors to get your team back on track.

Team dysfunction is never one person’s “fault”

A less seasoned leader will focus his attention on one person who appears to be “the problem” because that looks like the easiest way forward. Skilled leaders, on the other hand, resist the urge to ambush any one member because they understand no one is coming to work with the intent to upset the boss and foil her plans. Rather, every person’s behavior on the team is influenced both positively and negatively by the leader’s own attitudes, moods and behaviors.

Withdrawal is one of the behaviors which may be called out as a problem, but is, in fact, a reaction to the wider dysfunction.  Blaming or scapegoating an individual on the team won’t “cure” the team’s dysfunction, because the behavior is a symptom, not the cause of it. In fact, it’s the whole team which needs a tune-up, including the leader.

Your behavior creates fear

As a leader, if your team members generally defer to you, I’m sorry to say that it’s not because you’re ever so wise, charismatic and smart. On the contrary, if this is happening, you are surrounded with yes-men because your behaviors create fear.

Google’s Project Aristotle research demonstrated that trust and safety are necessary for high performing teams. Team members need to feel “psychologically safe” both with you as their leader and with their team mates.

At work, people’s fears fall into 3 main categories: being misunderstood (their motives or credibility questioned), being excluded (ostracized for not conforming) and being invisible (not heard). All of these fears are inextricably tied to our core feelings of value and sense of worth and if your team is spending the majority of their days outside their psychologically safe zone, then it is draining their creative energy and productivity -- and likely leading to dysfunctional behaviors.

Strong leaders learn how to manage conflict in ways that maintain psychological safety of the people on the team, in order to have the needed conversations necessary to productive growth. Unfortunately, too many conflict-avoidant leaders fall into the next trap...the sidebar conversation.

Sidebar conversations are a sign of dysfunction

Sidebar conversations are those hush-hush tete-a-tete’s among sub groups of team members (with or without the leader) which purposefully exclude other relevant members and are akin to gossip and just as dysfunctional. And when these sidebars are driven by the leader, you’re normalizing scapegoating and instilling fear - because if you’re comfortable with sidebar conversations with one team member about another team member, you might be doing the same to them.

This is also evidence of a dysfunctional hub and spoke management style. This approach of being the primary means of keeping activities synchronized, it actively discourages the team from engaging with their team members on topics outside their direct responsibilities. They forgo sharing their insights and thoughts of strategic relevance because of a politeness ritual inherent in the hub and spoke setup.

You don’t communicate as well as you think you do

You think you’re communicating effectively, but the evidence clear shows that everyone overestimates their ability to communicate. As a team leader, you need to take this insight to heart and endeavor to understand how each of your team members thinks and feels so you can best tailor your communication style to what suits them. This small effort to adapt on your part will help build strong relationships and enhance trust. Maya Angelou said it best: “People will forget what you said and did, but they will never forget how you made them feel.”

Next time you find yourself wondering what to do about the dysfunctional behavior on your team, take a step back and explore how your attitudes and behaviors are contributing to what you’re seeing. Your team will not begin to work better together until you also look at your role in it.

Leaders Must Learn To Recognize Team Aptitude

We all recognize that success in today’s business environment requires every professional to demonstrate a high EQ. The increasing complexity of the business challenges faced means, as leaders, we are constantly forming and evolving new and different teams.

While being a “team player” has long been a stated corporate value, its meaning has irrevocably changed. Where once it meant being pleasant, helpful and not bucking the status quo, it now requires working effectively on cross-functional, multi-generational, multi-cultural teams tackling ill-defined problems with time sensitive urgency without driving themselves (and others) to burnout.

And as organizations have flattened out, more and more we ask our individual contributors/SME’s to represent their wider functions’ needs and priorities, contribute ideas and proactively solve problems within these complex teams. To do this well requires “leadership grade” EQ and communication skills.

Traditional leadership training typically focuses on the self awareness and communication skills necessary for effective team participation and successful collaboration. These skills, while not nuclear physics, do take years of practice, application and refinement before one can truly claim its fluent application.

Even when hiring into in entry level or promoting into early-career roles, leaders need to look for and reward behaviors which signal “team aptitude” in addition to any technical job competencies. Here are behaviors to look for to help you spot team aptitude:

Shows initiative: she volunteers to learn/try new things where others may step back; she appropriately and considerately offers insightful feedback and opinions

Has a point of view: He can make thoughtful, insight-driven recommendations and, where possible, makes an effort to solicit and apply the input of others

Confidently asks for help: She is aware when there are things she doesn’t know and is confident enough to seek out and ask for help and guidance.

Reminds you of Pooh (not Eeyore): there just isn’t a better way to describe how to recognize this. Pooh’s are forward thinking, taking responsibility when things go wrong and focused on the go-forward while maintaining a positive attitude in times of stress and setbacks. People who are Pooh’s help keep teams motivated and productive while Eeyore’s “woe is me” attitude may permeate the team and cripple them

Able to build on ideas: She is able to listen to and “riff” of another’s idea in order to make it better or move its execution forward.

Recognizes strengths in others: He shows a genuine interest in others, even those he may not work closely with. He proactively seeks out to learn from subject matter experts on topics within and beyond his job description

Team dynamics are an important part of today’s work environment. Leaders who are able to identify behaviors which display “team aptitude” will be more effective in developing and coaching their teams.

CMO's - Are You Part of the Problem?

Spencer Stuart recently released their 2016 CMO Summit Survey  --  a survey of more than 150 marketing leaders across industries to learn what skills they prioritize, how they are developing talent and what they are doing to build their own careers.

The skills CMOs need on their teams

A review of the summary findings, showed no surprises in the skills CMOs said they needed on their marketing teams:

1. Digital Marketing (incl Social) (62%)
2. Data Analytics and Insights  (49%)
3. Strategic Thinking (42%)

Also not surprising, it was these same three skills that CMOs indicated were the most difficult to find when hiring, albeit in a slightly different order:

1. Data Analytics and Insights (57%)
2. Strategic Thinking (51%)
3. Digital Marketing (incl Social) (45%)

CMOs tell us their strengths

When these same CMO’s were asked their greatest strengths as marketing leaders, their top 3 strengths were:

1. Strategic Thinking (71%)
2. Driving Results (64%)
3. Empowering Team Members (40%)

Data and analytics, as well as digital marketing were significantly further down on the list -- both under 20%.

As a marketing leader who is actually strong in data analytics and insights, it was this final nugget that brought the “difficulty in hiring talent with these skills” situation into crystal clear focus for me.

The CMO's greatest strength is their Achilles heel

I’ll spell it out:

Marketing professionals (both junior and senior) with these desired skills (to varying degrees) exist out there in the world.

Marketing professionals with the aptitude and attitude to build and develop these desired skills also exist out there in the world.

Marketing professionals will choose to work in organizations where their talents and strengths are recognized, appreciated and valued by leadership

Marketing professionals will choose to work in organizations that enable them to develop the highly valued skills needed for career advancement

Marketing organizations led by CMO’s who are not strong in desired skills will not attract marketing professionals (junior or senior) with those skills nor those with the aptitude for those skills BECAUSE the CMO is not strong.

Are you with me now?

It is the CMO who sets the vision, drives the culture and sets the priorities for their marketing organization. Where the CMO is not strong, that inexperience likely prevents him from effectively evaluating experienced, talented candidates in that area. Additionally, the candidate herself will likely perceive the CMO’s inexperience negatively -- as a challenge versus an opportunity. The CMO’s lack of understanding of the candidate’s area of focus will likely lead to less of his attention, less support and fewer opportunities for future visibility and career development.

And what about the 71% of CMO’s claiming a strength in strategic thinking and 64% with a strength in driving results? If this strategic strength is so prevalent at the top, why aren’t we seeing more marketing professionals with strategic thinking skills? Why aren’t their “empower team member” efforts succeeding here? Additionally, truly strategic thinkers with talents at driving results would be able to successfully develop the needed skills and evolve their teams.

Chicken or Egg?

Where CMO’s have been unable to achieve that evolution, my suggestion is to take a moment of self-reflection and look closely at the role they themselves may be playing in stagnating the talent on their Marketing team.  Accepting the reality of what may be behind the “skill shortage” challenge they are experiencing may be a first step toward a solution.

Customer Journey Maps - Are You Using Them Correctly?

Customer Journey Maps are often vilified as a marketing buzzword that organizations love to hate. I understand where the sentiment comes from, I truly do. Too many of us have been held hostage by bad ones where a too expensive, overly-complex, multi-month mapping initiative with sticky notes on the walls ended up being shelved, forgotten and never used.

But bad apples shouldn’t spoil the bunch. A previous poor execution isn’t a good enough reason to lambast such an important tool. There are too many benefits to an organization having a common view into how a buyer buys and how a user (if different from the buyer as in many B2B SaaS sales) adopts.

Is the name part of the problem?

I’ve often thought that part of the CJM’s image problem may be in its name.

“Customer” doesn’t wholly reflect the complexities of many B2B sales where the person making the buying decision is often removed from the day-to-day users adopting the solution.

Then the word “journey” implies a level of conscious awareness or forethought on behalf of the buyer that they are on their way somewhere and heading toward a particular destination. We know this just isn’t the case, buyers gain awareness of solutions and head down buying paths in unintentional ways.

Finally, the term “map” implies a level of concreteness in a step by step progression and a level permanence in the landscape. Neither fits what we understand as the circuitous route a buyer may take toward a solution, nor does it take into account the ever growing ways buyers will choose interact with your brand. There are, literally, an infinite number of paths.

If I stipulate that we know the buyer or user won’t ever take a perfectly linear path down our funnel; and if I further stipulate that we won’t ever be able to accurately predict each and every potential path - does this mean any CJM is worthless?

Customer Journey Maps Are Useful As Constructs

Of course not. Despite its stipulated weaknesses, CJMs can be very useful tools in organizations. Its power comes from it being a construct.

The human brain loves to organize things -- we’re evolutionarily wired to categorize. This ability to categorize has helped us humans to quickly make sense of new, complex things in order to keep us alive and safe.

We’ve already established that a buyer’s actual path to purchase and adoption is circuitous, complex with an infinite array of alternatives. Add to that the complexity that in most organizations, there are different teams involved with sales and adoption including marketing, sales, product, and customer success to name just a few. Organizations need everyone rowing in the same direction and aligning their efforts for maximum benefit. And that alignment is near impossible if every different person has a unique point of view around how a buyer comes to buy and how a user adopts.

Given the innate complexity of both a buyer’s path and the organization -- and given our brain’s proclivity to categorize -- it’s useful to employ constructs like a CJM as a tool to align your organization’s people and resources around a common strategy.

And when the business goal is team alignment, a jointly created consensus hypothesis of the top segment’s journey may not necessarily reflect “truth” of the marketplace out the gate, the act of creating a view of the journey among all the stakeholders will generate the needed alignment for short term action and provide the forum for its future refinement.

3 Top Uses For Your Customer Journey Map

Your Customer Journey Map is a tool to drive strategy development and initiative prioritization. A Journey, as a construct, can be a powerful tool to align different teams in your organization around a common goal.

Get clear on what do we ‘know’ vs what ‘we think we know’. The journey construct is a way for an organization to put their “pink elephants” on the table and understand what is “known” about their buyers or users and what is still a hypothesis. I’ve seen organizations hold onto an old or unproven notions as fact for far too long because there hasn’t been a forum to review and reset.

It doesn’t mean all questions have to be answered before using the journey to set strategy. It just means it’s important to be clear on what is “known” and what is believed. This understanding drives identification of testing opportunities and identifies the best places to revisit if targets aren’t being achieved.

Align Sales and Marketing teams on lead scoring. There is always a (healthy) tension around the relative quality of leads generated by Marketing for Sales follow-up. Often this tension lies with each team having a different point of view of where a lead ought to be their “journey” before it’s appropriate for a Sales touch. Having both Marketing and Sales share a common view of the buyer’s journey helps to align lead scoring and appropriate budgeting and staffing within each department.

Identify both the micro and macro opportunities. Journey constructs are a great way to identify both micro and macro optimization opportunities. Micro opportunities include things like testing new messaging in email nurturing or different conversion page designs or even new content for specific segments. These are the kind of opportunities that every team can find and participate in.

Macro opportunities tend to broader in scope and may include brand new business models, new partnerships or changes in pricing/packaging. These are important outcomes of an organization truly understanding the needs and pain points of their market’s buyers and users.

I admit that in conversations with my sales and product colleagues, I sometimes choose not to even call it a “journey” because it’s such a loaded term. I’ll innocently refer to what we’re doing as our working together to build a “flow chart” or “whiteboard diagram” to get everyone on the same page.

However you have to do it, I recommend you don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. A customer journey map -- when used correctly in your organization as a construct and a tool -- is a great way to align cross-functional teams as well as inform marketing activities and resources.