Fana Yohannes on Social Communications and Embracing the Algorithm

Mixing Board Studio Session

Fana Yohannes is the Founder and CEO of Flora by Fana, a modern day consultancy helping brands and creators reach next-gen audiences. She is also the Founder of Here2Help, an Instagram-based mentorship initiative founded in 2020 to help professionals who recently lost their job due to COVID layoffs rebuild, and gain access to mentors from a diverse range of backgrounds.

Before that she was Next-Gen Trends, Culture and Lifestyle Communications Lead at Instagram. Some of her highlights include leading consumer efforts for the launch of the Meta brand where she reached 63 million+ consumers through non-traditional social media campaigns to raise awareness about the brand launch. She was also a Public Relations Manager at Apple where she created Apple’s first-ever creator program, managing relationships with over 40 creators and top tech reviewers including, MKBHD, iJustine, and others.

In this Studio Session, Fana and Mixing Board Founder Sean Garrett talk about taking things one day at a time and finding your niche, why we should all be posting LinkedIn videos (especially from your car), how anyone can be a creator, and how to create consumable content that sparks conversation beyond our networks.

SG: What are you up to at this moment?

FY: I’m taking the learnings that I've gathered from the last decade in-house and applying them to brand clients that I enjoy working with, to creators that I enjoy helping, and to leaders that I admire. I want to help them find their voice and navigate the algorithm to tell their stories.

It's been really fun to – not start from total scratch – but build my own cookbook. I have the ingredients.

SG: What's in your cookbook?

FY: A couple of recipes, one of which is helping leaders embrace their journeys as creators. This requires a pinch of authenticity, a dash of storytelling, and a heaping serving of audacity to get over your cringe phase (we all have a cringe phase don’t worry!)

As comms professionals, we think, "Oh, creators, those are just influencers that are taking brand trips to Turks and Caicos, and trying to sell me makeup." That's not true. A creator can be anyone with a platform who has a message to share, that is creating engaging content – that could be video, podcasts, or a newsletter – with the goal of influencing their audience to take action.

I want to encourage more people, especially executives and thought leaders, to see themselves as creators, and learn about compelling formats to tell their own story on social media. We're in a time where the media are no longer the gatekeepers. You don't have to be verified on social media to be important. If you continuously show up on these platforms and algorithms, it has the potential to change the trajectory of your business and your strategic outcomes.

In terms of my recipes, it's creating playbooks for people and brands to succeed on these algorithms. I’m helping the little guy figure out how they can compete with larger brands on the organic platform (and visa versa in some cases). If you know how to create content that performs well, you have a shot of being seen. I want to democratize that, because there's a lot of secrets out there, and a lot of confusing information. I want to help people access the right information and have the right strategies in place to succeed.

SG: How much did the pandemic change your trajectory?

FY: If the pandemic didn't happen, I would probably still be in the New York Instagram office. I'd probably still be in my New York apartment, working in communications, trying to climb this corporate ladder, trying to gun for a covered IC/M position – something that we all do in the big tech industry. I would be comfortable with my steady income, and I probably wouldn’t have explored an LLC or doing my own thing.

I would think, "I have it made. I have the Instagram name. I have access to all these amazing opportunities and events," and without knowing it, I would still be operating in my comfort zone. It took a major life event to completely change my trajectory. I wrote a LinkedIn post about this recently,

Even amid the pandemic (some say the “end” during 2021), I built and lived the dream life I wanted and had planned for pre-COVID. It felt like a redemption run, I was back to normal and got to the finish line I had started in 2019. Now I have a different life that is not even close to what I had planned, and sometimes you just have to follow the version of yourself and redefine your values, and follow your gut.

Being able to operate now, in a real-time version of me, where I'm not planning two or three years in advance, it's an art form that many of us have learned. We used to plan one to three years ahead, where do I want to be? Then it slowly went from Q1, or Q2 to this month, to this week, to this day. We just have to take things one day at a time. I have no idea where I'll be five years from now, or even next week, but taking things one day at a time helps ground us in reality.

SG: Let's talk about your previous life, you have had a pretty crazy experience. Right after school, you went into Apple for more than six years, then after that, working for Instagram. Help the reader understand that context and that experience, especially at Apple, which has more money in the world to spend on anything. Why were they looking to you to help steer them towards the future?

FY: It's interesting that you bring up money, because what is very special about Apple that nobody knows about, is that budgets do not always exist. Not because they’re spending endless amounts of money, but because the company tries to focus on impactful moments that are not driven by endless spend. The most thoughtful campaigns don’t always have to be the most expensive.

I was an Apple PR intern who was hired full-time, probably one of the youngest staff members on the PR team ever. I was fresh out of college, did not have any agency experience. A lot of folks who were interns were hired back after working a year or two at agencies, or they went to other job roles and came back. I remember being the new kid sitting at the lunch table, to my left, we have somebody who launched the first iPod. To my right, we have somebody who has launched the first iPhone, using world-class PR and communication strategies. Then you have me, I have a seat at this lunch table, but I had to very quickly find my niche.

I came to realize that my niche was not tech communications. I realized quickly that I was not going to fight for the opportunity to pitch the Wall Street Journal, or the New York Times if somebody already had that established relationship. I know how to pick my battles. But I noticed an opportunity area in that there wasn't a next generation consumer communications team. So I started creating my own wins, doing things like securing trending articles on a weird dot com cat meme outlet called Buzzfeed, which was like the front page of the New York Times for millennials, at the time.

I'd work with this random kid named MKBHD, who was an up and coming tech YouTuber at the time. I managed to get him his first interview with an Apple executive.

What I really adored and cherished about my time at Apple was something that Steve Jobs had set in place, was that we do not pay for people to review our products. If you want to experience this magic, we will seed you product, and offer you access, but we're not going to pay for your opinion. Even though there's endless money and endless funds, I cut my teeth on building organic relationships.

I never touched a budget sheet until very late into my career. Of course, the landscape of the industry is changing especially when it comes to earned and organic media. At the end of the day, creators don't have an editorial board. They don't have the resources that traditional journalists do. My mindset has shifted about paying creators, because you do have to contribute to editorial costs and production costs. But you have to keep a fine line between paying for an opinion and building a relationship to encourage natural content conversations.

SG: It's never been a secret that Apple's pretty controlling in its communication, but yet here you are, going like, "Hey, let's talk to this influencer, talk to this blogger, and open things up a little bit here." How did you take them along on this journey? From – “We don't do that, we've never done that before," to "Sure, why not give it a try?"

FY: A lot of it came down to trust building with senior leadership. I had a great leader, Steve Dowling, who was really open-minded about what we want to do here that makes sense for us but gets great results. He, much like all Apple executives, was very protective about the Apple brand. I had to learn, at a very early time in my career, how to prioritize the brand vision while also creating opportunities that can push us forward in a relatable way. The secret to achieve that with a brand like Apple who can sometimes be set in their ways is to do a lot of research and identify opportunities that align with brand values.

My research started by studying everything from the way Apple positions product messaging in videos, which features were a priority to highlight, etc. Then I would look at creator research. When it came to creator research, it was never about performance metrics. We were never asked to "bring the biggest content creator that has 10 million followers on YouTube," because that person could be totally unhinged and not aligned with our brand. Also, it's my name on the line to vouch for them. It was always about – what is their thinking style? How have they talked about us before? Do they use our products? There are things that you have to think about, in terms of alignment, before you pitch this. What also helped us was to start small.

We used to bring creators in for coffee or an office tour (back when we worked in Infinite Loop and at times Apple Park as well), go to their city and meet them, go to Vidcon conferences, and sit down to have a conversation. We would take the time to literally go to different cities to meet content creators, have coffee with them, and say, "If you had this opportunity, what would that look like for you? What would you do with it? How can we collaborate?" Taking the time to really understand talent, and then taking those insights back to leadership, and saying, "I met this creator, and it would be a smart idea if we partnered with them in X, Y, and Z way, which will get us this result." Sometimes it just comes down to taking risks and seeing where things stick.

Sometimes my creator-first strategies would get me in trouble with… the Apple media circuit. For the launch of iPhone X back in 2017. I was in a strategy meeting ahead of the launch and we were sitting there talking about our broadcast strategy, and how we have to go all-in on a broadcast moment to announce this product. I don't even know where I got the courage to say this, but I said, "No one watches broadcast anymore. Maybe you do, but I do not. I don't watch broadcast. If we're trying to launch something big, we have to think differently."

I said, "Why don't we do a showroom with Instagram publishers and creators, and give them the opportunity to have a hands-on moment with this product first?" That idea was framed and brought into the right leadership structures, but it ultimately became the most exciting part of our launch strategy. We even added a component with our public figures team to have celebs like Mindy Kaling review iPhone X.

I don't know who thought of this, I definitely don't think it was my idea, but somewhere along the lines, the content embargo for journalists was set to go live after all of the social content, the creator content, and the public figure content. If you Google "iPhone X launch, John Gruber/ Daring Fireball, Mindy Kaling," you'll see there were many tech journalists who were like, "In the history of Apple, I cannot believe that they're prioritizing some no-name creators… or this high-snob-iety publisher to talk about the iPhone launch before tech reporters." I laugh about it now and proudly highlight it on my resume but at the time… I was genuinely wondering, "Am I in trouble?"

SG: Somehow Apple survived that moment.

FY: Not only did they survive, I think the Wall Street Journal said it was an industry-leading go-to-market strategy. I was like, "I'm not in trouble." Now you look at it and everyone is trying to get selfies with MKBHD at an Apple event, so it's fine.

SG: Then you found yourself at Instagram with this cool title, Next-Gen Trends, Culture, and Lifestyle Communications Lead. At that point, Instagram was pretty aware of its influence and impact on culture, but what did you see as you came in there? What did you find interesting about that role?

FY: So, this was a role that I created for myself. There were many amazing people who came before me who focused on teen and consumer communication. But I positioned myself as next-gen, because I feel like I didn't want to limit myself to just teens and wanted to bridge the world of teens and millennials. For me, next-gen communications means platform-driven, creator-driven, social-driven communications to reach all audience targets.

A lot of my primer for the role came from Apple. When I was at Apple,I was pitching Instagram publishers and social media editors in addition to traditional press. I already had this media list of Instagram publishers, so when I was interviewing at Instagram, I was like, "I'm really excited to have the opportunity to work with you guys and to pitch the Instagram publishers you’re working with. How's your media list looking?" They're like, "We don't have one." I soon learned that all of that work had previously been handled by the partnerships team. I was like, "Cool. So we're going to start pitching Instagram publishers. I can totally see us working with content creators as media if we take this approach that worked well at Apple."

This was totally new to the team. My North Star in this role was identifying the fact that traditional media was getting tired of the Facebook/Instagram narrative. During the pandemic, is where things really took off. Everyone was online, every celebrity is on Instagram, every creator is on Instagram, living their lives, sharing their experiences. Our executives also wanted to find a way to show up to talk about this cultural moment and the significance of it, but they didn't really feel like going to the New York Times. They wanted to find alternative means of communication to reach next-gen audiences.

I took this as a call to action to put together a media strategy that would allow us to get in front of places like The Shade Room, one of the largest Instagram publishers. The Shade Room had interviewed different political figures such as Joe Biden, but they never interviewed an executive. So I leveraged this as an opportunity to create Adam Mosseri's first Instagram live interview with the Shade Room. We also did something with Trevor Noah that had never been done before, we worked with a meme account called 9Gag which is one of the largest meme accounts on the platform with 55.5M followers.

SG: You're now taking your experience at those brands and applying it to what you’re doing as a consultant. What are people buying in 2025, and what should they be buying?

FY: In terms of what's selling, I am seeing the most engagement around social media communication, creator campaigns, and social media strategy. Your key areas of focus as a communications team should be planning your communications strategy to engage social-first publications and creators and creating a social media strategy for owned social media channels in collaboration with your social media team.

In terms of what communication teams should be buying — it’s all about creator strategy.

Organic and earned creator strategies are incredibly important to add value to brand awareness. This doesn’t necessarily mean traditional influencers, but thought leaders and commentators who have a video presence on socials.

Creators also mean your executive spokespeople. How are they showing up on socials? Do you have an exec social plan? Are you using that channel to amplify your messaging and diversifying your content strategy? Have you helped your executive team try to find their style on video?

SG: What are the biggest differences between social media communications and marketing?

FY: Many people think that my approach to social media communication is social media marketing. But in reality, this is foreshadowing what PR + Marketing relations will look like. The biggest rift with this currently, is that teams treat social media and communications like church and state.

Some people are like, "Oh, this is communications, and the social media team has their own thing." But the lines here are becoming blurred. We are shifting away from an SEO format to the algorithm. So you’re going to need to find ways to make sure your messaging shows up on socials through your media outreach or through collaboration on your owned social media channels.

SG: Why not just have them all on the same team?

FY: That's the ideal scenario, if you could have your social media team ladder up to comms. That's how it worked at Instagram, and it was great. But in most cases, they're laddering up to a marketing leader. There's different KPIs, there's different budgets and different expectations for content formats.

My advice would be to treat your social media team like you would a journalist. Do your homework to understand what kind of stories work on the platform, ask which content format styles are working well, and identify if sharing your news is a priority. Do not under any circumstances come to the social team with an asset you created without their input and ask them to post it. That’s how you get blocked so to speak. Also, much like pitching a journalist,, don’t take a no personally.

SG: That’s a really interesting point. If you think about coming at it now either from a communications framework or marketing background – I'm not saying anything bad about marketing, I'm just saying it's different. The requirements are different. Why does communications thinking better apply to what social media has become?

FY: As communicators, we are natively storytellers. I don't want to generalize the work that social media teams do, but a lot of the time, social media teams are beholden to content formats and metrics of performance. Communications has the opportunity to contribute the element of storytelling and messaging. Social media teams and communications teams have the same goal – we want to help elevate our brand, have brand awareness, and convert customers to increase sales. Being a communicator who can be a storyteller and someone who can put together messaging that reaches the right audiences, paired with the social media team that can be the vessel to help share your story, that’s a match made in heaven.

Let's not forget that we own the narrative to our brand stories now. Media is not the middleman. I would look at your social media team as pitching a broadcast team. You wouldn't tell the Today Show how to shoot your content, but you would work with a producer and try to see how you can shape it to the best possible outcome, that will be the best vision of your brand.

When we think about comms KPI wins like media monitoring, it's no different than social media listening, same with impressions and sentiment. Once we clarify that, it all makes sense.

SG: Do you think social media metrics, the way they've been built over time, run contrary to this, or are they supportive to basically playing this longer game of telling a story?

FY: I don't believe in dashboard metrics for performance measuring when you’re planning social media strategies or creator campaigns. They don’t tell the bigger picture and can sometimes mislead us.

Instead, I will manually look at posts and say, "How many comments did this get? What are the comments looking like? How many likes did this get.” I'm a very analog person when it comes to this. That's also because at Apple and for the most part at Instagram, we didn't really believe in dashboards (we did have access to dashboards at Instagram but they were too slow for me). It is subjective, but it really comes down to being able to own your storytelling and partnering with your social media team.

You have to think beyond the numbers and actually look into what performs well on the algorithm. This is a big part of why linear media is changing. You can’t work on a chronological timeline and expect that your content will be seen and measured based on sentiment. There is a lot of nuance.

SG: I'm so chronological.

FY: You were at Twitter when it was chronological, you're used to having a trending page and breaking news. I joined Instagram after it became an algorithm platform.

Most people reading this have a chronological mindset. When I started my career, news was on a set timeline. PR teams would start with embargoed news, a press release dropping at 6:00 or a keynote happening at 10:00. You identify a small group of journalists, you create your messaging, you curate your event, but ultimately, everything was about timing.

If we got our timing right and sent your news out early enough, people talk about it and create residual conversations — essentially we think our news will be seen. Now, at the state that we're in with the algorithm, your news is not going to be guaranteed to be seen. We're in an attention deficit economy, news is happening 24/7, every second of the day.

Timing is no longer rewarded on the feed or on any platform, that goes for LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, et cetera. It is about engagement. How many people are liking this? How many people are commenting on it? How many people are sharing it? How many people are taking what you shared and starting new conversations? Your goal, as a communications professional, is no longer about – who are the small trusted group of people that I can share this with. It's about how we break our messaging into consumable content that sparks conversation beyond our network.

SG: Let’s talk about LinkedIn? What attracts you to LinkedIn? What's happening on LinkedIn, and why is it relevant?

FY: Five years ago, LinkedIn was the graveyard, so to speak, where people would either go to say, "I'm thrilled and excited to announce that I have a new job," or "I am sad to share that my time here ended and I'm looking for a new job.” I actually built my networking collective Here2Help on Instagram because that’s where I felt next-gen talent were most active.

Fast forward a couple of years, LinkedIn is one of the most dynamic platforms for professionals at every level. I'm seeing a lot of early stage, or really young founders, build engagement and community on LinkedIn as well as established executives and leaders. There are about a billion users on LinkedIn globally, compared to nearly 611M on X. But in a remote hybrid work setting, it's the best way to build community amongst other colleagues and have visibility on what people are working on and sharing online, without knowing their personal business.

Here's where things get interesting. LinkedIn is now proposing this value proposition to users to create videos. I don’t know what LinkedIn’s product strategy is with video (remember when Newsletters were the next big thing last year?). But what I do know is that branding and videos will not be going away. The biggest hurdle that LinkedIn users, and what LinkedIn itself has to overcome, most leaders and executives don't see themselves as content creators and do not translate their thoughts from photos and text to video formats.

Which is ironic, because all a content creator is is someone with a platform that has the means to create content. Everyone has to start from somewhere. Many leaders wonder, "Oh, will I be cringe? Will I get negative comments?" Etc. I say, you’ve made it this far on Twitter or LinkedIn and you know this the internet, we know it's not Disneyland. You have to start somewhere, and there has never been a better time to start trying out video now, because this is the worst that it's going to be.

Also, LinkedIn is prioritizing engagement for people that create videos. Generally speaking, my LinkedIn videos see four to five times more engagement than my LinkedIn posts (from the POV of a small creator, everyone’s journey may be different).

One of my favorites that you should check out is John Gray, who is the President and COO at Blackstone. His videos are of him going on a run and giving a little life update like, "Oh, I went to an investor event with Marriott and we had a great conversation.” The key is to get to know what you do consistently and how you can show up in a way that's easy for you, easy to edit, and is relatable. That's it. For anyone thinking this has to be at a desk, no, it does not.

You might be able to write a post or share a photo, but in the age of Ai generated-content how do we know who is really talking here?

SG: Does it have to be in the driver's seat of my car?

FY: You know what, the car is actually the best content studio. Because it's relatable. Everyone has a car. I don't know if you have a Benz, a Lucid, or a Porsche, I can't really tell when you're in the interior. Filming in the car is a great natural transition in between the office and home that is relatable to everyone.

But filming at your office with a monotone backdrop or plaques on display… that makes me wonder, are you a hostage there? Do you leave your office? Do you enjoy the campus? Have you had lunch today? Do you eat? Are you human? Do you have any other interests? You’ve got to be out and about. The car actually provides a great relatable space as you start to build your comfort zone to find your content style.

SG: What advice are you giving the young version of you coming right out of college?

FY: I definitely had the famous quote from Steve Jobs, "Stay hungry, stay foolish," on my graduation cap. That is some unoriginal advice, that I did not come up with, but that one stuck with me. Open yourself to curiosity and asking questions and making mistakes, and learning along the way. I'm a lifelong learner and forever a student, I'm always learning. You have to approach everything with an adaptability mindset. I've never had a plan. I've never thought that I could achieve any of this, because I'm from a country that to this day, does not have widespread to the internet or social media. I'm creating new opportunities as they present themselves.

There's also something beautiful in this era that we're in, in that if anyone did want to be me, you'd have to understand that the future potential of what you're going to achieve has not been created yet. Always look for the areas of opportunities to innovate, even if something does not exist yet. You can’t create a plan for something that doesn't exist yet, so always be ready.

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