67 | The Virtual Work Movement - Social Influence & Virtual Selling


Derek Russell | Digital Advisor, Innovation - US West & Retail/CPG | Microsoft

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Today's discussion is a recording of a session hosted by my friend and colleague, Andy Winskill, a Sr. Digital Advisor at Microsoft, who also leads a community of approximately 2700 employees at Microsoft, called the "Virtual Work Learning Group". The mission of the virtual work group is to empower everyone on the planet, to create engaging, meaningful, and impactful virtual work experiences, in an environment that enables us to do our best work. The community has featured talks from some amazing women and men around topics ranging from how to be a better storyteller, all the way to fine tuning remote presentation skills.

This episode features a presentation that I led around Social Influence and Virtual Selling. I am no longer in a sales organization, BUT, I do believe that everything any of us do at any capacity in our work, most likely demands for advocating our ideas and getting our perspective heard - this, I believe, will be a highly valuable skill as our ecosystems become more digital, and our thoughts and perspectives as knowledge workers and executives, become more valuable to the world.


***Navigate the episode***

[05:36] An introduction by Andy Winskill

[09:37] How the Virtual Work Learning Group session participants perceive social selling

[10:55] The mindsets to consider when looking to create a digital-brands on LinkedIn

[13:17] Why to focus on LinkedIn

[14:06] Social selling and the future of the digital relationships and thought leadership

[17:30] The three most critical things to help resonate with your audience

[20:59] The three most critical segments to have in place for successful content creation

[22:26] The two ways to approach creating content now

[26:37] Selling, is just the advocacy of ideas – a skill that we all must hone

[30:05] Have fun, while driving value

[32:46] Personality vs skill, how to determine what type of content creation strategy is best suited for you

[34:56] Determining time investment for content creation

[37:10] How to handle sharing things on LinkedIn and getting negative comments

[43:42] Overcoming your fears of posting on LinkedIn and social, and how to start “NOW”

[48:09] How to balance being a thought leader, while aligning content to employer or team values

[51:28] Comments about the LinkedIn algorithm, and the value of visibility


***Resources and Links***

MENTAL HEALTH AWARENESS MONTH - May 2021 | National Today - https://nationaltoday.com/mental-health-awareness-month/

A Mind That Found Itself by Clifford W. Beers - https://www.amazon.com/Found-Itself-Contemporary-Community-Health/dp/0822953242

Waking Up with Sam Harris - Discover your mind. | Waking Up - https://www.wakingup.com/

ROMWOD - https://romwod.com/

Andy Winskill | LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/awinskill/

Crushing It!: How Great Entrepreneurs Build Their Business and Influence—and How You Can, Too by Gary Vaynerchuk (goodreads.com) - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36045512-crushing-it

The Mel Robbins Show Podcast - https://www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/xs4iw-a0b6c/The-Mel-Robbins-Show-Podcast

Everything You Need to Know About LinkedIn Video - https://blog.hootsuite.com/linkedin-video/

Social media video tips & strategies - https://sproutsocial.com/insights/topics/social-media-video/