Inside Elon Musk’s Covert PR Tactics

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Love it or loathe it, there’s no doubt that Elon Musk he is one of the most successful and influential businessmen of his generation, if not of all time.

Whether it’s news about one of his companies, gossip about his love life, or the reaction to his latest controversial tweet, rarely a week goes by without Musk’s name making headlines.

This is all the more impressive given how openly opposed Musk is to public relations and advertising, once tweeting that he doesn’t believe in “manipulate public opinion.” In 2020, he dissolved Tesla’s public relations departmentand its acquisition of Twitter in 2022 was infamous for eliminating thousands of jobs, many of which communications equipment.

Last month he also created an automatic poop emoji. response to all media requests sent to press@twitter.com.

press@twitter.com now auto-responds with ?

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 19, 2023

Related: Elon Musk accused of violating building codes and failing to pay severance pay, court claims

But if this tempts you to conclude that traditional public relations is no longer good for anything, think again. Musk is a media professional, but as a great magician, he doesn’t want to attract attention.

Reaching his current level of notoriety required time, patience, and a lot of strategic savvy. So instead of taking his public stance on PR at face value, let’s take a detailed look at the strategies Musk has employed to turn his brands into household names.

Musk’s (real) approach to media relations

Shutting down Tesla public relations department It was an unprecedented move in the automotive industry. But his decision was not made because Musk no longer wanted media coverage for his company. Instead, he no longer had to bother. In the last few months of Tesla’s press office, his public relations team was hit with hundreds of inquiries from journalists on a daily basis, something most companies can only dream of.

Musk has never neglected Tesla’s public relations. Rather, from his early days to this day, he has taken an extraordinarily hands-on approach to the company’s media strategy. Because of this, the coverage of him and his companies has skyrocketed over time.

The best-selling biography, Tesla, SpaceX and the search for a fantastic future, details how involved Musk was when the Tesla name began to gain attention, personally leading efforts to gain media attention and “fix” any negative press. He set a goal for the company to make a weekly announcement and personally wrote press releases and conducted media outreach to ensure he achieved the desired results. Musk was also known to seek news coverage of his companies at least once a day.

Related: Elon Musk says remote work is ‘morally wrong’, calls it ‘messy’

Here’s the first essential lesson for founders and CEOs: Musk understood that leaders must pay close attention to the stories they are sharing with the media, establish a consistent communication cadence, and build relationships with reporters.

Musk also knew (and knows) the importance of cultivating relationships with specific journalists.

For a reason he does not read publications but follows individual journalists. Instead of sending a lot of general information to the media, Musk gave certain reporters exclusive access to the information. This was the case with Kara Swisher, one of the most influential journalists in the industry to whom Musk used to give numerous interviews. (Their relationship of hers has since turned ice coldto say the least.)

Far from downplaying traditional public relations efforts, Musk was a master at spreading the story he wanted to tell through a constant stream of outreach. just take a look at Tesla Blogs and Announcements to see this first hand.

Run as a public relations professional, he knew that these communications and his media relations would help create a persistent buzz that would fuel buyer interest.

Musk sells the dream

Beyond the basics, Musk understood that when it comes to public relations, it’s much less about selling products than it is about selling impact and emotions. With spacexFor example, Musk has perfectly exemplified how to sell a dream through storytelling.

Related: ‘Think carefully’: Musk issues stern warning about new hires to Tesla employees

Advertisements have always been full of visionary language and bold ideas. in a interview 2011, Musk made waves with his hope of sending humans to Mars within 10 to 20 years. In 2019, following the trend of sustainability, he announced that he wanted to build the first sustainable city on mars.

As inspiring and memorable as those images are, the lucrative day-to-day operations at SpaceX are a bit more mundane. The company generates most of its revenue by sending satellites into space on behalf of the United States Government To provide high speed broadband internet to remote and rural areas around the world. But when SpaceX raised $750 million in its latest round of funding, satellites and broadband were not the main draw of the presentation. That’s because Musk knows that it’s the big dreams and challenging ideas that get people’s attention.

Business leaders should take note. When communicating your business ideas/projections, you need to stand out from the rest by highlighting the big vision behind your blueprint for success. Focus on your customers’ underlying passions and desires, what it is that makes them dream, and make sure the stories you’re telling resonate emotionally.

He controls the narrative, subtly.

Musk is clearly an expert in public relations, but he doesn’t need or want everyone to know it.

This is further demonstrated by the fact that it does not go completely silent over the radio. Instead, he makes sure (to the best of his ability) that the message he wants to convey is the story being covered, diverting attention from his lawsuits against British spelunkers or the Tesla purchase.

Related: Elon Musk calls San Francisco ‘post-apocalyptic’ as another major retailer leaves due to crime

For example, in December 2022 it launched a controversial poll on Twitter asking the public to decide if he should step down as CEO of the platform.

Should I resign as head of Twitter? I will stick to the results of this survey.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 18, 2022

After more than 17 million votes were cast with 57.5% of respondents voting to remove himMusk announced that he would resign “when a suitable replacement is found,” leaving many in doubt that he would deliver on the poll results as promised. However, he kept his word and appointed Linda Yaccarino as Twitter’s new CEO the 12th of May. The interesting thing here is that Musk He never intended to stay on as CEO in the first place.but his “public referendum” ensured that the issue dominated headlines for months.

Musk has also been interested in gaining attention for his continued public dispute with NPR after he assigned the news outlet, along with many others, the labels “government funded” and “state affiliated” on Twitter. While these tags have now been removed, the story continues to receive ongoing coverage thanks to new tidbits of information that Musk releases to the public.

These tags also prompted a surprise, impromptu interview with BBC reporter James Clayton on Twitter Spaces during which it became clear that Musk had no plans to be a passive participant, with Clayton commenting that in “several times he felt like he was trying to interview me.“

While no one can completely control media coverage, it’s important to engage with reporters to increase the likelihood that your business will get positive coverage. And, if there’s ever a PR crisis, having media relations means you’re more likely to deliver some form of damage control.

Musk knows that media coverage matters, and his brands are where they are today thanks to his knowledge of public relations. Building an ad pipeline, diverting the narrative towards positive stories, and creating a memorable vision are valuable ways to generate media coverage that doesn’t waver.