When Brand Safety Becomes Brand Invisibility

[00:00:00] Why Safe Content Gets Ignored

Disagreement is not a failure of your content, it’s evidence that your content said something worth responding to.

And my friends, that is exactly what the algorithm rewards on social media.

​Hello, everyone. It’s Brooke Sellas back again with another episode of the Social Media CX Show. If you don’t know me, I’m Brooke Sellas, CEO of B Squared Media, author of Conversations That Connect, and someone who happens to have a lot of opinions, which, as you’re about to find out, is actually a competitive advantage.

We’re in week three of our May series on the Social Penetration Theory, which we are calling the Onion Theory, or the SPT for short. If you’re just joining us, here is the quick downlow, but I would recommend going to watch the other episodes. The SPT, or the Onion Theory, is a 1973 communication framework that says relationships deepen through four layers of progressive self-disclosure: cliches, facts, opinions, and feelings.

In week one, we talked about cliches, which are the surface layer conversations, and it’s where most branded content on social media sits. Week two, we talked about facts. They’re necessary, they’re credible, but they’re not sufficient for real engagement or meaningful engagement.

[00:01:31] The Opinion Layer Explained

Today, we’re going into layer three, which is opinions. And I’m gonna make you a promise right now. This is the episode that’s going to change how you think about your social media content forever.

Because opinions are where conversations actually start. Opinions are what the algorithm is desperately hungry for right now. And opinions are the layer where most brands, especially enterprise-sized brands, and especially financial services brands, go completely, utterly, painfully silent. And it’s costing them dearly.

So let’s get into it. In the Onion Theory, layer three is what they call effective exchange layer. This is where Altman and Taylor said something really important. This is the first layer where real intimacy begins. Now, we’re not talking about intimacy in the way we often think about it with relationships, but intimacy in the way of building a relationship and getting to trust, right?

There’s no information exchange. There’s no pleasantry. It’s just intimacy because we’re getting to our opinions, the psychographical data, the, the beliefs, the attitudes, the feelings, all of that that make up who we are. Sharing an opinion, as I’m sure you know, is an act of vulnerability. Because you’re not just stating a fact, “My name is Brooke.”

You’re taking a position, and, “I think your content probably sucks because it’s all cliché content.” Woo, big opinion, right? You’re saying, “This is what I think. This is where I stand. This is the hill I’m gonna die on,” and yes, I’m gonna die on this hill. But that vulnerability, that willingness to plant the flag, so to speak, is what invites other people to respond, because they want to give you their opinion on said thing.

Think about the conversations that you’ve had that you remember the most, the ones that kept going, the ones where you lost track of time, and it felt like you were there for five minutes, but you looked up and you were three hours into a conversation. The ones where you left feeling like you really connected with someone.

I bet you those weren’t conversations where someone recited facts to you. “Hello, my name is Brooke. Hello, I own B Squared Media. Hello, I’m talking to you on this podcast right now.” No. They were probably conversations where someone said something that made you think. Or disagree, maybe even really, really, really, really disagree. Or they made you lean in a little bit.

Like, “Wait a minute. What? Tell me more about that.” That is the opinion layer hard at work, and it works exactly the same way in real life on social media.

[00:04:37] Why Opinions Feel Risky for Brands

Now, if opinions are so powerful, if they’re what drives real meaningful engagement, real conversation, and real algorithm fighting content, why do most brands avoid opinions?

I know exactly why. I’m gonna give you the three reasons why, and I’m gonna name all three because I think they’re all worth examining. We’ve been working in social media for 20 years, so trust me, I know these excuses, reasons, inside and out. So here we go. Number one, fear of controversy. Brands are terrified of saying the wrong thing. Or maybe they’re terrified of alienating a segment of their audience.

Of course, they all worry about ending up in a PR crisis because someone on the social team posted an opinion that leadership didn’t approve of. And look, I totally get that. That is not an irrational fear, especially in those highly regulated brands like financial services, where every word is scrutinized.

But here’s what I want to push back on. There’s a difference between a controversial opinion and just regular old everyday opinions. You don’t have to weigh in on politics. You don’t have to take sides on hot button cultural issues. But have you noticed how many comments those types of content get?

Yeah, there’s a reason behind it. The algorithms push these things. You can have strong, clear, defensible opinions about your industry, or about how customers should be treated, or about what good social care looks like, hello, or about which metrics actually matter, without touching anything that would give your legal team a heart attack.

Opinions about your domain, those are not only safe, they’re essential.

Now, reason number two is approval culture. Oh boy, I love this one. In most enterprise organizations, really even the mid-market and sometimes the smaller guys, content has to go through multiple rounds of review before it gets posted.

We talk to legal, and compliance, and marketing, and leadership… and what happens during that process, every little edge, every little differentiator or opinion kind of gets sanded off. We’re just taking the sandpaper and we’re smoothing out those rough edges. Every strong claim gets softened. Every opinion gets watered down into something so carefully worded that it says absolutely nothing at all. Which ironically, is the most dangerous outcome of all, because content that says nothing generates nothing, and now we’re spending all of this time and money on social and getting nowhere.

[00:07:35] Engagement vs Applause

Hmm. Reason number three is that a lot of brands seem to mistake agreement for engagement. Mm-hmm. A lot of brands think engagement means everyone clapping along, lots of likes, lots of, “Great point. You’re amazing. You’re doing great, sweetie.” Lots of people nodding in agreement. But that’s not engagement, that’s applause.

Real engagement, the kind that drives reach through the algorithms, the kind that builds that community, the kind that moves people includes disagreement. We are humans. I don’t want to have you nod along and smile all the time. I want you to disagree with me. That’s how we get to know each other.

This is how we build trust, and loyalty, and relationships. Pushback is so important. When people say, “I see it differently,” or, “Have you considered this?” That is wonderful. This is how we grow and have more conversations and get to level four feelings, which will come next week.

[00:08:43] Why Disagreement Helps Content Perform

But disagreement is not a failure of your content, it’s evidence that your content said something worth responding to.

And my friends, that is exactly what the algorithm rewards on social media. Let me give you the data on this because I know some of you are looking for the receipts, which is, yes, me using facts to launch an opinion. Very meta, very intentional. LinkedIn engagement is up 33%, even as organic reach on LinkedIn, meaning, you know, the reach on your content that you’re posting, has collapsed by 71% since last year.

Facebook engagement is up 11%. Instagram engagement for creators who pivoted to conversation through their content is up 150%. So the platforms are not being subtle about what they want. They are actively and aggressively rewarding content that generates conversation, comments, replies, debates, discussions.

Why? Because it creates dwell time. And even though Americans spend around eight hours a day on social media platforms, they want you spending all 24 hours in your day on there. So anything that creates dwell time, meaning more time on their platform, is going to be rewarded and lifted up inside of that algorithm.

And LinkedIn, as I talked about on last week’s show, is now showing you comment-level impression data. Meaning your comments are now getting reach, and sometimes those comments are getting more reach than your actual posts. What does this tell you?

[00:10:26] What Social Algorithms Actually Reward

It tells you that the algorithm doesn’t care that you posted something, it cares that you said something worth responding to.

Cliches don’t do that. Facts alone don’t do that. Opinions absolutely do that. Because when you post a strong, clear, defensible opinion about something your audience cares about, when you plant that flag and you say, “I am gonna die on this hill,” you give people something to engage with. They can agree, they can disagree, they can build onto it, they can push back against it.

Literally, I spend all my time on LinkedIn, and this is exactly what I spend my time doing, engaging, agreeing, disagreeing, pushing back, building on. That is the currency of social media algorithms right now, and most brands are broke.

[00:11:17] How to Create Opinion-Driven Content

Okay, so practically speaking, how do you do this? How do you move from safe, factual content into opinion-driven content without losing your mind or getting in trouble by compliance or legal?

Here’s the thing no one tells you, by the way. You don’t have to start with a hot take, although I love hot takes. I actually call this non-controversial controversial content, ’cause I’ll do a hot take on something that’s not controversial at all.

It is to me, but it’s not, like, political or whatever. You can start with a poll. Every single social media platform has them, LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook. They’re built in, they’re easy, and they are hands down the lowest barrier to entry for getting your audience to actually talk back to you. Because here’s what a poll does that a regular post doesn’t.

It makes responding effortless. You’re not asking someone to compose content or fill in the right words, or you’re not worried about how you’re gonna sound. You’re just literally asking them to tap a button. That is it.

Now here’s the part I really want you to hear because the progression is what most people miss. Start easy and then go harder. So step one would be easy polls, binary choices, low stakes, no wrong answers kind of polls, right? The kind of poll where someone can respond without thinking too hard.

So like, I might say something like, “When a brand doesn’t respond to your comment, what do you do?” And then the poll questions would be move on or remember it forever, right? And people are going to engage on that poll, and I’m gonna get voice of customer data on whether people get upset by this or don’t.

It’s easy, it’s relatable, and almost everybody has an opinion on something like this. So the barrier to entry is basically zero. Now, step two would be going into harder polls because now you’re asking for a real position, something that requires a tiny bit of thought, something where the opinions aren’t equally comfortable.

So this one might look like, “Honest question. Does your brand treat social media as a customer experience channel or a content distribution channel?” Now people have to think. They have to be a little honest. Now the responses start to mean something, and the comments that follow mean even more. From there, we’re gonna go into fill-in-the-blank type questions because this is where you transform from multiple choice, kind of almost passive engagement with the tapping, to open responses, but with a scaffold that makes it easy.

So something would look like for me maybe “The biggest barrier to better social care at my organization is blank.” You’re still making it easy to respond because you’ve given them the whole sentence structure. But now they have to supply the substance, and what they supply is voice of customer data.

That also becomes your content ideas. It’s the exact language that your prospect used to describe their own pain. We can use this language in our marketing and sales messages to align closer with the customer.

[00:14:37] Training Your Audience to Respond

Finally, we get to step four which is just ask. This is where it gets really good and where I sit in social but only because I’ve been doing this for years.

But once your audience is in the habit of responding to you, once they trust that you’re going to read that comment and engage with it, because y’all, I see way too many social media experts putting out clickbait, comment bait, getting people to comment and then just going through and liking the post, not even engaging back.

Ew, ew. Stop that. That’s gross. Don’t do that, and don’t hang out with people who do it, especially not on social. So once they’re engaging, they’re responding, and you’ve conditioned them to do this, the key is to ask at this point and watch the comments roll in. So I could say something like, “What’s the one thing you wish your leadership understood about social media algorithms?”

No poll, no fill in the blank, just a direct, honest question from my audience. And they’ve learned to trust me, so they’re going to respond. That is the opinion layer fully activated. It’s really not that hard. And that, not coincidentally, is exactly what the algorithms are rewarding right now across every single platform.

So the progression isn’t complicated, but it does require a little bit of patience. You have to earn the right to ask hard questions by starting with the easy ones. If you remember the photo of the onion that I shared in the previous podcast episodes, which I’ll pop up on screen right now magically through the help of Sarah, my producer, you can see there, there’s breadth around the onion and depth.

It requires a little bit of patience. You have to show up consistently. You have to actually respond when people engage, which, surprise, is exactly what the Onion Theory has been telling us since 1973: relationships deepen gradually.

So does your audience’s willingness to talk back. So start with a poll, work your way into conversations, and never stop showing up when people respond. This is the whole thesis, by the way, of Talk Worthy Content. It’s how you move from cliches and facts, which most brands are very comfortable with, into opinions and feelings, which is where the real engagement lives.

[00:17:03] Conviction vs Controversial

And I wanna be really clear, this isn’t about being controversial, again, for the sake of controversy. We’re not doing that. It’s not about manufacturing drama or chasing engagement at the expense of your brand. It’s about having enough conviction in what you believe about your industry, your customers, your products, your services, your methodologies, whatever it is, to say it out loud, clearly, consistently, and in a way that invites real conversation.

That is what the algorithm rewards, it’s what builds community, and it’s what turns those followers that you’ve been working so hard to collect into actual advocates for your brand. Do you want followers or advocates? Hmm.

We built the Talk Worthy Content course to teach all of this. How to find your brand’s opinion layer, how to express it in a way that’s on brand and on message, how to structure content consistently that generates the kind of engagement that actually matters, and y’all, it is completely free.

It’s waiting for you at bsquared.media. Go to resources, courses, and then look at Talk Worthy Content. I’ll also link it in the show notes, which if wherever you’re watching or listening is the transcript on that platform.

Whew, we have come a long way so far this month. Layer one, cliches, the surface, where most brands are stuck.

Layer two, facts, the foundation. Necessary, but not sufficient. Layer three, opinions, the engine, where conversations actually start to get good. Next week we will go through layer four, which is the deepest layer, and the one that took us years to fully understand, which is feelings.

As always, thank you for being here today. If this episode gave you the permission you’ve been looking for to actually say something real on social, use it. Post that opinion, plant that flag, see what happens, and then come tell me all about it. Find me on LinkedIn, drop me a comment, send me a DM. Let’s have the conversation.

Find me so we can converse. Grab that free Talk Worthy content course, and hey, if you’re loving the May series, drop me a review. It takes 30 seconds, but it means the world to me. See you next week for the feelings layer. Bring your tissue. Just kidding, maybe. Until then, think conversation, not campaign.

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