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The bigger you get, the harder it becomes to stay human. But staying human is exactly what your audience craves most.
Find your customers on Roku this Black Friday
As with any digital ad campaign, the important thing is to reach streaming audiences who will convert. To that end, Roku’s self-service Ads Manager stands ready with powerful segmentation and targeting options. After all, you know your customers, and we know our streaming audience.
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Once you’ve done this, then you can easily set up A/B tests to flight different creative variants and Black Friday offers. If you’re a Shopify brand, you can even run shoppable ads directly on-screen so viewers can purchase with just a click of their Roku remote.
Bonus: we’re gifting you $5K in ad credits when you spend your first $5K on Roku Ads Manager. Just sign up and use code GET5K. Terms apply.
The Authenticity Crisis Is Real (And Getting Worse)
If you're a social media manager, you're fighting a war on two fronts.
Front #1: Your executives want scale. More content. More platforms. More reach. More everything.
Front #2: Your audience wants authenticity. Real stories. Genuine moments. Less everything that feels corporate.
The numbers tell the whole story: 38% of consumers are less likely to purchase from brands using AI-generated content (Bazaarvoice, July 2025)
But here's the kicker: Most brands still chase the polished approach when they scale.
Why? Because authenticity feels risky when you're managing bigger budgets and more stakeholders.
When you're presenting to the C-suite, "let's post more messy, unfiltered content" doesn't sound like a winning strategy.
But it is.
The Authentic Scaling Framework
Step 1: Build Your Internal Creator Network
Stop thinking about employees as risk management. Start thinking about them as your secret weapon.
Here's why this works:
Employees have a collective following that’s probably much larger than your brand account.
Content shared by employees receives more engagement than content shared through branded channels.
Consumers trust content from friends, colleagues, and family above brand messages
But here's the part most managers miss: Most employees already use social media personally, and some are already posting about your company.
They're doing it anyway. Your job is to make it strategic.
Action items to help:
Identify 5-10 employees who are already active on social media
Ask them to share ONE behind-the-scenes moment this month
Create a simple content calendar they can opt into (not mandate)
Set up a Slack channel for sharing wins and content ideas
Step 2: Create Content Buckets
Authenticity doesn't mean no strategy. It means strategic spontaneity.
Most brands fail at authentic scaling because they think it's either "perfectly polished" or "complete chaos."
You need what I call "controlled chaos.” Content that feels spontaneous but follows proven frameworks.
Content buckets that work at scale:
"Monday Morning Reality Check" (employee coffee/commute stories)
"Failed Friday" (lessons from mistakes—builds incredible trust)
"Customer Hero Spotlight" (let your users tell their stories)
"Work in Progress Wednesday" (show the messy middle of projects)
Pro tip: Give your team frameworks, not scripts. "Share a work challenge you solved this week" gets better results than "Post about our product features."
Step 3: Implement the Authenticity Audit System
You can't manage what you don't measure.
2 Authenticity KPIs That Actually Matter: (These aren’t comprehensive, but they’ll get you started.)
Comment sentiment ratio (positive/negative/neutral comments)
Employee participation rate (% of employees creating content monthly)
Tool recommendation: Vista Social is a great place to get these metrics. First month free with this affiliate link. Set up monthly reports that go beyond vanity metrics.
Step 4: Scale with Systems, Not Scripts
When brands grow, they panic and create rigid content approval processes that kill spontaneity.
Don't do that.
Instead, create systems that maintain authenticity at scale:
The 24-Hour Content Flow:
Employees submit content ideas in your Slack channel
Marketing team provides feedback by EOD
Employee posts within 24 hours while the moment is still fresh
Marketing team amplifies the best-performing authentic posts with paid promotion
Guidelines, not gatekeeping:
"Share your genuine experience" ✅
"Don't share confidential information" ✅
"Make sure Sarah from marketing pre-approves every word" ❌
Legal protection without killing authenticity:
Create a simple one-page social media policy
Train employees on basics (no confidential info, be respectful)
Use monitoring tools to catch issues, not prevent posts
Common Scaling Authenticity Mistakes (And How to Avoid Them)
Mistake #1: "Our Legal Team Won't Let Us"
Solution: Start with a pilot program. Get 3 employees to share content for 30 days. Document the positive results. Use data to gradually expand guidelines.
Mistake #2: "We Can't Control the Message"
Solution: You can't control the message anyway. Customers are already talking about you online. The choice is: participate in authentic conversations or watch from the sidelines.
Mistake #3: "What if an Employee Says Something Wrong?"
Solution: Create clear guidelines and monitoring systems. But remember: authentic mistakes that you handle well often build MORE trust than perfect content that feels fake.
The bigger you get, the harder it becomes to stay human. But staying human is exactly what your audience craves most.
P.S. If you found this helpful, forward it to another social media manager who's struggling with the "authenticity vs. scale" challenge. We're all figuring this out together.
I’ve talked before about how my favorite tool for every SMM is Vista Social. If you’re interested in a demo of their employee advocacy tool (free trial, no credit card required) here’s an affiliate link.
It costs you nothing to use this link, but it helps me fund writing content like this.