Hi!

In our July Comm Convo -- led by BioPharma Dive reporter Gwen Wu -- our panelists, Chloe Kirk, Ph.D. (BiotechTV), Ben McLeod (Convey Bio + The Biotech Voyager), and Liz Puzio (Simtra BioPharma Solutions), discussed how we can help scientists and executives communicate with more credibility without over-managing what they say.

Our top 10 takeaways from Why Only Some Platforms Are Trusted When Everyone Has One:

1. Separate the executive from the corporate microphone. Trust slips for leaders who speak only through press releases and staged clips, and holds better when those same people engage their audience directly and a bit more unfiltered.

2. Match the messenger to what the audience already knows. Public audiences with a lower baseline tend to trust scientists explaining the work directly; industry audiences respond to executives on strategy and to scientists offering peer credibility.

3. Give a scientist a public voice and trust tends to follow. A recent Pew survey found 74% of people still trust scientists even as 45% think they cannot communicate, and following even one scientist online moved trust in science to 84%.

4. Put the person doing the work in front of the reporter. Journalists often want the scientist closest to the data for a clearer story, and the belief that reporters expect the CEO is usually a holdover worth retiring.

5. Build relationships with internal voices long before you need a quote. The communicators who can call on a scientist or executive at short notice usually spent months earning that trust first, understanding each person's point of view well before any media moment.

6. Co-create talking points and let spokespeople use their own words. Audiences nowadays sense a script quickly, so a more effective prep approach leaves an executive with three or four points to make in their own words, shaped through a couple of working sessions.

7. Treat comms training as a missing scientific skill. Many scientists communicate publicly with no formal training; sometimes the strongest help a comms team can offer is basic instruction and support unlearning the jargon-heavy habits academia rewards.

8. Let the process of actually doing science build the trust. Audiences have grown skeptical of clean A-to-B stories, and showing the non-linear process, including what did not work, tends to read as more honest and gives reporters real texture.

9. Stop waiting for new data to earn the right to speak. Process stories, a scientist's path, or a long-tenured employee all carry news to various audiences, and incremental data releases tend to read as background that rarely performs.

10. Choose each platform by the mindset and purpose it serves. LinkedIn fits industry and professional readers, short-form social reaches broader and younger audiences with inspirational content, and podcasts, YouTube, and Substack hold the deeper educational material.

Thanks again to our panelists for the discussion. If you missed it, T2B Pro and Student members can watch the replay here.​

Lynnea

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