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Brian Hastie

Views, likes and comments don’t tell the whole story when it comes to founders' most “successful” content. Hear why now:

Helping busy CEOs create all their short-form content from a monthly 1 hr interview. -> Demandii.com + podcaster and writer about all things tech and pop culture

Everyone digests information in different ways. That’s why over-indexing on one type of content can be a mistake for founders creating a personal brand:

I was in the middle of a content creation session with a SaaS founder. We were looking over his metrics. His image post impressions were higher than his video ones.

“Why should we bother with videos?” he asked. 
“Images clearly do better, man. We should just lean into that and forget everything else.”

Sure, the data suggested it would be a good idea.

But views, comments and likes aren’t the only indicator that their content was working.

There’s also the human aspect.

So I asked him this:
“When you get on calls with prospects, what do they bring up?”

He thought for a moment and said:
“They tell me they saw my videos on LinkedIn.”

Here’s the actual insight:
Impressions don’t equal impact.

Don’t drop a type of content from your rotation just because the numbers look low.

Only drop it if your customers never bring it up.

No alternative text description for this image

Most marketing advisors will tell you to "humanize" your brand by following viral trends and create content around that.

They want you to be the dancing bear.

They tell you to point at text bubbles, jump into TikTok dances, and use trending audio to "hack" the algorithm.

This is the fastest way to kill your authority.

At Demandii, I work with talented founders and CEOs who spend their lives speaking on major stages. They are brilliant, technical, and respected in their field. Then they get online and try to become entertainers.

The result? A massive "authority gap."

When a prospect sees you on a stage giving a keynote, then sees you online doing a viral dance, the continuity is broken. They don't think you are relatable. They think you are desperate for attention.

Stop trying to be an entertainer. Start being an operator.

Great founder-led content is just a Micro-TED Talk. It is a 60-second window into your methodology.

I have seen this play out dozens of times. The founders who win do not have the most views. They have the most "earned perspective." They show up in the feed exactly how they show up on stage.

If it does not convert, it is just noise.

The ideal content strategy for founders isn’t just about consistency in posting. It’s also about knowing when to go broad vs. niche with your pieces.

Evergreen vs. topical content: Which type should founders be creating for their personal brand?

How can founders get their new enterprise reps to close deals faster?

I've spoken to many owners who realize that their "Founder’s Brain" is the bottleneck that stops their best insights from reaching the new hires who need them most.

Luckily, slashing ramp-up time is simple if you know where to start. And unlike traditional sales trainers, this won’t cost you $50,000 in consulting fees.

Instead, use this dead-simple Content-to-Onboarding Flywheel for faster revenue.

Step 1: Record and transcribe
Capture every video, podcast, or internal briefing where you explain the "why" behind your product. 
Use a tool like Otter or Descript to turn these into searchable text so your team can study the exact phrasing that resonates with a C-suite buyer. 
Tip: Don't overthink the production quality; the raw insight is more valuable to a new hire than a polished studio video.

Step 2: Create "Verbal Brand" Scripts
Take those transcriptions and highlight the specific metaphors or analogies you use to simplify complex enterprise problems. 
Give these to your new reps and tell them to "make them their own" while keeping the core logic intact. 
Mistake to avoid: Do not force them to memorize a rigid script word-for-word, as they will sound like a robot during high-stakes negotiations.

Step 3: Deploy for Continuity
Share these content-based scripts across Sales, Marketing, and Customer Success to ensure the promise made in the first meeting matches the delivery in the final one. 
When everyone uses the same "verbal brand," the buyer feels a sense of security that your company actually knows what it's doing. 
Quick example: If your CEO calls your security feature "The Digital Moat" in a video, every rep and account manager should use that exact phrase.

The big benefit is that your new hires will sound like 10-year veterans in their very first week.

We saw this work wonders at Demandii. Originally, our founder Matt was the only one who could explain our unique edge to prospects. 

We started transcribing his videos and handing them to the team as playbooks for our verbal brand

Now, our entire team speaks with the same voice, ensuring that what Matt promises during a sales call is exactly what we deliver when we work with a client. 

It turned our employee onboarding process from a game of "telephone" into a repeatable system for happy customers.

Founders: Want your content to hit the right audience? Then there’s two things you need to do to make that happen:

Founders and CEOs: Feel like your content isn’t connecting with your audience? It may not actually be a messaging problem. Find out what you should do about this:

Founders: Virality is a vanity metric that’s costing you enterprise deals.

Your marketing team is happy because the "engagement" graph is up. The emojis are flowing. The comments are "Great post!" 

But... your CRM is silent.

Your pipeline's not moving.

Your prospects aren't advancing.

Here is the hard truth: 
Exciting content attracts the masses. Relevant content attracts the buyer.

In the Mid-Market and Enterprise world, your prospect isn't looking for a "quick cut" video or a "B-roll explosion." They are looking for a reason to trust you with a six-figure problem.

When you chase virality, you aren't building authority. 

You’re building a circus.

The shift (based on having worked with dozens of founders and CEOs who have been able to close more sales with their content): Stop trying to be "interesting" to everyone. Start being indispensable to the person who can actually sign the check.

The "boring" truth: Consistency in your methodology beats a one-hit-wonder viral video every time.

If your content is getting likes but no discovery calls, it’s time to audit the intent.

If founders approached growing their audience on LinkedIn with the same focus they bring to product, they’d see movement fast. (It's hard to hear... but true.)

Many founders post and hope the right people notice.
That isn’t distribution, though. 

It’s just a fancy way of guessing if what you're saying will hit.

Most people on LinkedIn aren’t actually connected to their ideal buyers.

They’re connected to colleagues, peers, friends, family.

Some guy they met at a conference like 10 years ago.

Maybe an old classmate they hadn’t thought of since adding them in 2017.

LinkedIn's algorithm is simple.
It shows your content to your first connections first.

So being connected to prospective buyers is the gateway to getting better content/audience fit.

If you’re serious about founder-led content, do this:

Set aside ten minutes a day.
Add twenty people who fit your buyer profile.
CEOs. RevOps leads. Sales directors. HR founders. Whoever you sell to.

Do it every day, not only when you feel like it.

(You also have to pair this with LinkedIn ads to guarantee an audience, but that’s a discussion for another day…)

After a month, you’ll notice the people in your feed change along with the conversations you attract.

This is one of the simplest ways to grow here.

Founders: Here’s why your LinkedIn content shouldn’t just live and die on the platform (and how to get more out of each asset you create):

Hi, I’m Abby. I help you stop winging it with your personal brand, by pairing content strategy with media coaching so you sound as good out loud as you do in your head!

Abby S.

There is a new-ish trend on LinkedIn, and I call it Facebook-ification.
It is when "storytelling" turns into oversharing because being vulnerable feels like the shortcut to being liked.

And I am watching a lot of smart founders confuse the two.

At this point, LinkedIn is starting to feel like a mix of:
• Facebook in 2010
• MySpace in 2006
• and a therapy circle no one asked to join

Here are 4 real business issues with this, and why it has me cringing so much.

1. LinkedIn is not for impressing our inner circle.
It is a professional network for earning trust with people who don't know us yet.

2. A CEO's job on LinkedIn is to turn strangers into customers, not collect comments for being "so real." 

3.  Our actual buyers are not looking for some vulnerable personal diary 24/7.
They care about: Strategy. Proof. Value.

4. The goal for CEOs is to be remembered for the right thing, like adding insight, not the vulnerable chaotic thing.

But I'm seeing so much mixed messaging, which, by the way, is hurting the bottom line.

That is why at Demandii we push storytelling with structured frameworks. This looks like content that builds authority, connection, engagement, and proof.

And look, I'm not knocking being relatable, I'm just saying it does not translate to being reputable OR credible.

So, while the goal is to aim for it all, we always want to lead with reputation + value first. 

PS. Yes, this image fully inspired the post.

PPS. Just remember that being relatable is not the goal on LinkedIn - there are other platforms for that.   

PPPS. Not sure how to get your content and lead gen goals aligned? Shoot me a DM, and we'll talk.

Abby E. Schachter

I help busy B2B CEOs create all their snackable LinkedIn content from a 1-hour monthly interview. -> Demandii.com

This copywriting framework is my absolute favorite to use with my CEO clients because it forces us to stick with a story their ideal buyer connects with. 

It's called P.A.S and is a mini, more potent (IMO) version of the 'why' framework.

→ P – What’s the problem your buyer is living with?
→ A – Why does it suck? What’s it costing them?
→ S – How do you help? What’s the move forward?

And we pretty much build every video and every piece of content around this.

If it fits in PAS, it ships. If not, we redo.
Simple as that. 

The goal is to show how our expertise will make our audience's life better; but we can only do that with proof, and the proof is in the value we add with our storytelling.

CEOs, this kinda sucks but it's true: likeability on its own doesn’t equal trust. 
It means people enjoy your content.
Trust is when they believe you can solve the problem.

Some of the best founders I know, post from the trenches. 
It performs. People relate.

But it positions them as “one of us,” not “the way out.”
That’s why engagement doesn’t turn into leads.

At Demandii, we build content strategy frameworks  for our clients that shift their ideal buyers' perception from: “I relate to you” → “I trust you to lead me out.”

The key is to turn a service offer into strategic content that consistently shows off YOUR expertise by showing:

1-The path forward
2-What you see that others miss
3-Evidence that you  solve problems
4-How you've helped others just like them
5-And a very, very obvious reason to DM you

So, the next time you're stressing over a post with tons of likes but no leads, remember this: Connection without competence doesn’t convert.

LinkedIn marketing isn't about vanity metrics like likes and comments anymore.
Because here's what actually matters in 2026: Dark social intent.
And let me tell ya,  Dark social is sooooo underrated. 

I've seen countless founders chasing viral posts that get thousands of likes but zero new deals...

While others with less engagement are closing mid-market contracts because they pay attention to who is "lurking" in the shadows.

Here's how you can do this too:

1- Tracking profile visits over post likes. 
↳ Most of your buyers won't comment, but they will check your "About" section after reading a sharp insight.

2- Creating for the "Save" and the "Share."
 ↳ Your ideal buyer is secretly sharing your content via DMs with their internal team to build a business case.

3. Opinionated insights over generic advice. 
↳ Stop trying to please the algorithm and start challenging the industry status quo.

High reach doesn't matter if it's the wrong people watching BUT when we focus on shadow consumption first, the pipeline will follow.

CEOs: The LinkedIn posts that "fail" on day one are often the ones that close the deal six months later.

Well that's been my experience.

And it's because we are "baiting" the 95% of the market that isn't ready to buy today. 

They are lurking. They are watching. They are "human-ing" just like us.

If you delete the post, you delete the trail of breadcrumbs they were following to trust you.

Believe me, I know how low engagement feels like a bruise to the ego, but "likes" don't reveal who is secretly reading. 

Here is what we need to pay attention to instead:

1. The "Lurker" is the Decision Maker

I’ve seen CEOs get zero engagement from a target account for months, only to have a VP of Sales quote a specific "low-performing" post during a high-stakes discovery call. If that post had been deleted because it "tanked," that connection never happens.


2. Conversations > Conversions

Winning CEOs stop treating LinkedIn like a vending machine and start treating it like a cocktail party. When you focus on starting a dialogue rather than just forcing a conversion, you build actual rapport.


3. Warming the Cold

I’ve watched cold outbound response rates double simply because a prospect "saw the CEO’s name somewhere recently." That "somewhere" was usually a post the CEO almost deleted because it only got five likes.


So, just remember, if you give your content (and your audience) time, they will convert.

Okay? Okay!
 
PS. Demandii Iis really good at this if you need help.

CEOs  I know you're used to competence and being really good at what you do. So personal branding can feel weirdly exposing because you’re building a new skill in public.

So not only are you learning something new … You’re learning where people can see the reps in real-time. It's gross. 

Which is why I tell my founder clients: embrace the suck.
Super comforting, eh? 

Look, I know it’s not what a CEO  like yourself wants to hear,  but it’s what  YOU need to hear… because it’s the reality. 

I've seen it play out hundreds of times.

The first reps are awkward. 
You’ll overthink everything. 
You’ll want to quit.

Don’t. Reps compound.

And every time you show up, you get a little better.
Even 1% a day? That adds up fast.

And like, #StevenBartlett says in this super astute post, “embarrassment” is the entry fee. And it's worth it.

Brand partnership • Founder of Steven.com

Embarrassment is the price of entry - and most people just aren’t willing to pay it. 

they never hit record, write the post, or launch the thing… because the thought of “Dave from work” seeing it and making a snide comment is too much. 

that's so tragic to me.

how much potential are we wasting because we’re scared of what Jenny from our hometown, our mum, or - worst of all - our supposed "friends" might think? 

so many people hold their potential back because they’re scared of what some half-friend on Facebook might think - someone they haven’t properly spoken to since Year 11

I don't think anything holds us back from the life we could have lived more than the opinions of people who don’t even know us.

pressing record that first time felt cringey, awkward, and exposing - but discomfort has so often been a doorway, so I'm ok with it now. I'm okay with people thinking what they wanna think and saying what they wanna say. 

at the end of the day, I'm going to die someday - and so are you. 

So you might as well live.

Too many people wait until they feel ready, polished, or ‘credible’ enough to start but every good thing that's happened in my life started with me accepting that I would have to inevitably "practice in public" - be bad at something in front of the world before I'd figured it out

are you willing to practice in public? 

It's one of the reasons I invested in Stan - because the world needs more creators who launch before they feel ready. I didn't back them just because it's a creator tool. I backed them because they also remove the technical friction so you can get out of your own way.

P.S, don’t be a Dave. Clap and encourage when you see someone practising in public!

We live in a world of instant everything:
-Meals + groceries on demand
-Same-day shipping
-Instant messages

So when our content takes months to show results, what do we do? 

↳ Blame the algorithm
↳ Panic, the content sucks
↳ Pull the plug on the whole thing

And it makes TOTAL sense to feel this way.

However, a feeling isn't data. 

I sat with a CEO who was ready to quit personal branding because he didn't see a lead in 60 days and felt embarrassed that his LI posts weren't getting more than 5+ likes. 

I showed him the receipts: 4 VPs from his "dream" accounts were lurking on his profile every week.

He was focused on the "Decision" phase, but his buyers were still in "Discovery."

If you’re only posting to get an instant lead, you’re going to pivot too fast and break the trust you're building.

That post you wrote today? It's "bait" for the 95% who aren't ready to buy yet. Stay helpful, stay human, and stay top of mind.

I promise, the ROI will come, but only if you don't pull the plug too early.

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