Microsoft

Key objective: Drive our strategic presence on the global stage. I lead the teams that shape our storytelling and ensure that our content strategies resonate with target audiences.

I lead content, social, and integrated marketing teams for Microsoft Advertising products as part of Microsoft AI.

Head of Content, Social, & Integrated Marketing

Salesforce

I managed integrated marketing strategy, messaging, tactics, measurement, and team members on our unified brand content and social team.

As a leader on our global brand team, I collaborated with industry advisors, campaigns/demand gen, creative, events, social, email, product, and other teams to deliver a best-in-class integrated marketing strategy for Salesforce — with a special focus on content. A big part of my focus was the on-demand Dreamforce experience, streaming on Salesforce+.

Since YouTube is the world’s #2 search engine and our audience spends more time watching video than ever before, I also developed an end-to-end creation, promotion, and measurement strategy for YouTube that helped us get the most out of every video we create. I orchestrated audience development and creative promotion for our videos, with the help of a broad team.

With my team’s help, our video content was plugged into the entire Salesforce content ecosystem, while always driving to key next steps and encouraging reengagement and subscription every step of the way.

I also brought an industry- and customer marketing-first mindset to all our marketing programs.

Senior Director, Content Strategy: Brand Marketing Team

In this role, I led and executed an integrated marketing strategy for Salesforce – specifically Sales Cloud, our flagship solution. I championed the power of a unified brand message across the company, working with execs, product marketers, demand gen marketers, social creators, writers, SEO experts, and more to create what really matters to industry and practitioner audiences.

My team also included our social media and community marketing efforts and team.

My primary responsibilities:

* Create high-priority branded marketing assets that align to key business priorities
* Leverage data and research to develop new marketing themes and quarterly calendars, which align to cross-functional priorities and newsworthy moments in time
* Collaborate with industry advisors, product marketing, demand gen, brand, PR, industry, SEO, and digital teams to develop marketing programs that support every stage of the customer journey
* Support the development of content roadmaps that connect the dots across integrated marketing to deliver a unified and coherent experience to target audiences
* Pilot new content formats and distribution models — like streaming video, interactive digital experiences, and influencer-led programs — to meet our audience wherever they are 
* Audit and refresh old content, based on past performance and emerging priorities 
* Analyze content analytics via a robust performance dashboard, building on the success of what’s relevant to our core audience and learning from what’s not

Senior Director, Content Strategy

As part of Salesforce’s brand marketing team, I was a key leader of marketing messaging in this role. Worked cross-functionally and with executive leadership to create an audience-first content and marketing strategy. That strategy incorporated blog, digital and web, video, SEO, long-form content, email, social media, sales-facing content, and beyond. 

Piloted a new integrated campaign planning process that involved more of the right stakeholders in our content planning process for greater success. Adopted a new content dashboard, increasing team accountability to our metrics. Led a team of creators and marketers to plan, develop, and distribute our messaging.

Director, Content Strategy

I created award-winning educational content and research programs for Salesforce’s retail and consumer goods verticals. This role supported both sales and marketing, giving me a front-row seat to sales conversations and customer success.

The data-driven content I created won coverage in top-tier publications like USA Today, CNBC, and WSJ. I also inspired and educated Salesforce customers by presenting our content and thought leadership in 1:1 and 1:many settings.

In summer 2019, my work was recognized by the Content Marketing Institute, which named me Finalist for B2B Content Marketer for the Year. I also earned Finalist for Best In-Person Event Content Marketing Strategy.

Key responsibilities included:

* Create original, data-driven research reports about consumer trends, from ideation to content strategy to publication
* Present thought leadership content in-person to top Salesforce customers — including many Fortune 100 companies — and virtually via videos, webinars, executive meetings, conference sessions, and podcasts
* Develop sales-supporting enablement content and toolkits for key verticals and markets
* Position content and insights for executives in keynote presentations, slide decks, and third-party articles
* Write and edit team blog posts, video scripts, reports, and contributed media bylines
* Plan insights content strategy before, during, and after key events, including Dreamforce, NRF, World Tours, and Shoptalk

Senior Manager, Strategy & Insights: Retail and Consumer Goods

As part of Salesforce's industries team for retail and consumer goods and in a sales-supporting role, I created storytelling narratives that won industry awards and drove business impact.

In this role, I managed and presented marketing research to top retail and consumer goods Salesforce customers at nationwide events and managed marketing programs shared with top-tier partners and agencies.

Other key functions of this position included sales enablement, slide creation and messaging for executives, and measuring content performance.

Manager, Strategy & Insights, Retail and Consumer Goods

I led content innovation and strategy for our brand across emerging media formats, including podcasting, interactive websites, and video. The podcast I hosted and produced won two awards from the Content Marketing Institute. I produced and scripted this “edutaining” audio show for two years, managed the editorial and guest calendar, and earned more than 100,000 subscribers.

Additional responsibilities also included writing and editing content for interactive infographics and microsites, YouTube videos, e-books and blog posts across multiple product lines, and more.

I was also was responsible for sharing thought leadership content with Salesforce customers and executives at speaking engagements including World Tours, Dreamforce, webinars, and external conferences. Two of my favorite presentations were our State of Marketing research and my Podcasting 101 talk to aspiring audio content creators.

Content Innovation Lead: Marketing Cloud

In this role, I planned, wrote, and edited content marketing pieces for Salesforce's corporate brand, content, and social team. I worked on content in a wealth of formats: whitepapers, e-books, blog posts, infographics, podcasts, SlideShares, and videos, to name a few.

I piloted a new Dreamforce keynote ebook highlighting Marc Benioff’s biggest announcements. This ebook was released via text message to Dreamforce attendees in real time and earned record downloads.

During this time, I also began co-hosting and producing Salesforce Marketing Cloud's podcast, the Marketing Cloudcast.

My role also included writing bylined articles for outlets like Venture Beat and interviewing industry thought leaders for the Salesforce blog. A personal highlight was getting the chance to interview author John Green before Connections.

At nationwide events and conferences, I presented sessions on social media and email marketing, and I also hosted interviews with Salesforce customers and partners on Salesforce Live broadcasts.

Global Content Lead: Marketing Cloud

I wrote and edited key content marketing assets for ExactTarget. I worked there for four months pre-acquisition by Salesforce. Content types included blog posts, e-books, research reports, infographic copy, SlideShares, and video ads.

Some highlights from my time in this role were writing the company's first State of Marketing report; assisting with content strategy and creation for South America, Europe, and Australia; and writing ExactTarget's top three most highly trafficked and shared blog posts of all time.

Content Development Specialist: Marketing Cloud

PANBlast, a division of PAN (formerly, BLASTmedia)

At a PR and social media agency, I managed social, video, and editorial strategy for global brands.

I wrote search-optimized content for blogs, wrote scripts for YouTube videos, managed YouTube channels, coordinated sponsored content and influencer opportunities on social, and managed daily posts and community management across Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

I also ran paid media campaigns across social, especially Meta and YouTube. 

I was the day-to-day communications lead for my clients, and I worked closely with PR leadership to ensure my content plans amplified PR efforts.

In addition to my client duties, I was the editorial lead for the corporate agency blog and managed a content intern. I also developed presentations on writing and social media careers to present to university students.

Content Marketing and Social Strategist

Wiley

As an editor for the bestselling “For Dummies” book series, I edited tables of contents and full chapters to bring "For Dummies" books to life. I ensured all books followed Dummies brand, voice, and tone guidelines while leading author management, art, technical editing, copyediting, and deadlines for my titles. In short, I managed all aspects of these books from start to finish.

A sample of titles I edited: Catholicism For Dummies (2E), Hypertension Cookbook For Dummies, Success as a Mediator For Dummies.

Editor, For Dummies

Heartland Film

Wrote and edited content for the film festival website. Built film screening schedules and provided support to on-site filmmakers. Marketed trailers, festival attendance, and festival community.

Film Festival Associate

Anderson University

Wrote for the Anderson University alumni website and blog; managed University social (Twitter and LinkedIn) accounts; produced PowerPoint presentations for campus events.

Media Coordinator

Coached undergraduate and graduate students in the production of excellent essays. Aided students with writing technique, citations, style, etc. Provided feedback to improve students' future essays instead of just editing their current essay.

Writing Tutor

Edited short-form fiction and poetry, wrote biographical summaries for authors, designed promotional materials and magazine cover for Anderson University's yearly literary arts magazine.

Copyeditor and Art Director, Campus Arts Magazine

Walt Disney World

Acted in every Disney World park for thousands of guests as a character performer.

Created magical moments for families from around the world. 

Trained in makeup artistry by Disney makeup team. Trained in character backstory by character performance team.

The best part? Receiving handmade gifts from kids who visited me at the parks, and hugs from the ones who waited their whole vacation for our little meet and greet!

Earned Disney language certification in German, Spanish, and Portuguese.

Performer

WXIN TV

Wrote and edited news stories, conducted and transcribed interviews, generated story ideas. I joined reporters and videographers on daily shoots around Indiana to help interview subjects, create the story narrative, and practice on-camera news delivery.

Nightly News Intern

Hi! My name is pronounced like Micah with an H. For 15 years, my thing has been innovative content that grows brands.

Get in touch with me at young.heike@gmail.com.

I’ve been lucky enough to…

- Manage social media accounts for brands with millions of followers
- Create written and multimedia content that influenced millions of $$$$ in Salesforce revenue
- Consult brands like Disney, Clorox, and L’Oréal on marketing strategy
- Ghostwrite for top execs in print and digital 

My work has been featured in USA Today, CNBC, Forbes, AdWeek, VentureBeat, Entrepreneur, eMarketer, Business Insider, Media Post, and more. 

For two years, I produced and co-hosted an award-winning marketing podcast for Salesforce. It won Best Podcast and Best Content Marketing Multi-Year Program from the Content Marketing Institute.

My team at Salesforce ran our YouTube channel (800k+ subscribers) and branded video content that grew our audience across channels, partnerships (like CNBC and Formula 1), and events (like Dreamforce).

I love content marketing — especially when it pushes the status quo and says something that makes my audience go, “I’ve never thought about it like that before.”

So, how'd I end up here? I started my career in book publishing as a development editor for the "For Dummies" series at Wiley. I managed every aspect of a book's creation: editing Tables of Contents, researching competing books, editing all chapters for overall theme and voice, managing art programs (including photo shoots and illustrations), and providing author guidance.

From there, I moved into social media and multimedia content creation in the agency world at BLASTmedia (now PANblast). This role allowed me to polish my content creation skills on a number of digital platforms, including video. I planned and created content for Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, and beyond.

I then entered tech and joined ExactTarget's content marketing team as the first official content marketing hire. I subsequently joined Salesforce through ExactTarget's acquisition. I worked in ascending content leadership roles at Salesforce for 11 years.

And then… a new adventure! I joined Microsoft in summer 2024 to lead content, social, and integrated marketing.

I've hinted at this, but it's finally real... I'm open for business as a consultant for your brand and speaker for your events. 🤩

After 15 years of experience as an award-winning marketing leader, as 2x head of content for Microsoft and Salesforce, as a speaker to global audiences... I'm ready to pioneer new things with you.

Here's where I can jump in with your team:

CONSULTING PARTNERSHIPS: I'll partner with you on unifying your content and integrated marketing strategy. We'll boost your performance on social, grow your executive and employee thought leadership, and figure out what you can STOP doing to drive more impact.

SPEAKING: I'll speak at your events about content voice, building a culture of creators, and how to adapt your paid/owned/earned media to perform in a totally chaotic media environment. (Plus not burn out your team in the process!)

TRAINING: I've been training execs and employees on building a winning personal brand on LinkedIn and other social channels. Never filmed a lo-fi video of yourself before? Feeling cringe and embarrassed about how to start? No problem. I've created a playbook for teams exactly like yours.

I'm starting all of this in 2026, and it's going to be a wild ride!

There are two main ways you can help me today.

1) Reach out to me young.heike@gmail.com if you think we should partner in one of these areas.

2) Subscribe to my newsletter! This is the single best way to support my work other than hiring me :) https://lnkd.in/gw3X7b3c 

Let's go!

Heike Young

Head of content 2x, Microsoft and Salesforce | Creator, LinkedIn and TikTok | Marketing consultant | Speaker

I had to get out my gloves for these artifacts!

I recently had a young person ask how I use AI for my LinkedIn posts, and how I recommend they use it for theirs. Here is what I said:

Short answer, I don’t use AI to write my text posts or video scripts on here.

For years, I worked at companies at the center of the AI movement (Microsoft, Salesforce), and using AI was critical to the job.

Posting on LinkedIn started off as a creative, AI-free break for me. Now I’m in a flow state, so I just keep doing what works.

But in terms of people just starting their careers, would I recommend using AI to write your posts?

I would NOT recommend that. This is why:

Posting and commenting on LinkedIn is one way you practice networking.

Networking is a skill.

If you figure out how to post on LinkedIn in your early-career years, you are gonna have a much easier time:

🤝 Coming up with small talk when you meet new people at a conference.

🍎 Introducing yourself to a new coworker when you see them in the break room for the first time.

💻 Entertaining people in a meeting when you’re hosting 6 people, but the main stakeholder is 7 minutes late.

By learning how to post on LinkedIn without relying on AI, you are figuring out how to come up with small talk.

Ad lib. 

Find common ground between different seniority levels and professions.

And ultimately network, which will serve you your entire career.

Because when Sam, one of your new clients, comes up to you and says hi at the industry conference, you can’t ask chatGPT what to say to Sam.

Btw, a lot of people I know and respect have created impressive systems where AI takes their ideas and lived experiences and makes them into LinkedIn post drafts. This is not about that.

This is about what I think will help young people learn. I’d love to see more young folks take advantage of LinkedIn!

So much incredible free opportunity on here.

I talk about content creation and strategy in my newsletter. A new one’s dropping today around 8 Pacific. Subscribe: https://lnkd.in/gUWqFrY7

Exit through our gift shop, where you can buy little sweet treats, just as they would have existed back then.

I’ve been waiting to post this for a while. Today, I’m announcing something big with Hootsuite!

I’ve spent years trying to help brand teams run employee advocacy programs.

But I’ve run into a lot of issues along the way.

Like leaders that were too focused on the brand’s themes, pillars, and campaigns instead of what the audience actually cares about.

Or campaigns that were planned in the brand’s silo, away from the timely and relevant moments happening in the audience’s day-to-day.

Another toughie: When everyone’s convinced only high-level execs should be involved, but the program leaves out many region-specific and SME voices.

I found out Hootsuite (the first social platform I ever used) felt exactly the same way.

So together, we created a free framework to get you started: It’s a 60-Day Employee Advocacy Challenge.

This is a framework YOU can steal to kick off this effort inside your team.

Grab it here: https://lnkd.in/gPrk9F63

Hootsuite has its own employee advocacy tool. When it’s time to scale, the right tools can empower your team and make all the difference!

#HootsuitePartner

Brand partnership • Head of content 2x, Microsoft and Salesforce | Creator, LinkedIn and TikTok | Marketing consultant | Speaker

One thing I love about marketing is: No matter how long you’ve done it, you can always learn something new. I did that recently:

I’ve been in the game for 15+ years, but for the first time, I just launched a newsletter. By myself!

Without a big enterprise team at Microsoft or Salesforce behind me.

I had launched newsletters inside corporate engines before, and I had a whole team of designers, copywriters, deliverability experts, and analysts behind me.

This was uhhhhhhh very different. 😂 

Bascally a skeleton crew of me and beehiiv on late nights, telling myself it would never be ready.

👊 But I did it, and now I have something I’m really proud of: https://lnkd.in/gmkkfwut 

In addition to the 65% open rate I’m seeing over my first two editions, I am getting incredible feedback:

“Everything you’re saying about content and social is SO true”

“This made my day”

“This made me feel seen!”

I want to shout out a few people who helped me make this a reality:

Isabel Sterne 🟡 was an amazing design collaborator and helped me bring my ideas to life. She created all the design assets for launch, like logos and banners. She offers a variety of personal branding services, and I highly endorse her!

Aneesh Lal ⭐️ encouraged me to do this for most of 2025. He saw how this would be complementary to the rest of my offerings, and I am so excited to be working with him more in 2026 (more on that soon).

Devin Reed’s 📈 newsletter has been inspiring me since 2023 and was a big part of why I decided to do this. I literally have had screenshots of it saved in my phone for years. I never would have done this without his shining example.

The third newsletter will be out soon, so please subscribe at the link above if you haven’t yet!

And I’d be honored if you’d share with someone who’d love it, if you’re already in! 🧐

Some of the best creators for your brand are already in your org chart right now.

But they lack the permission, tools, and strategies to create high-performing content aligned with your business goals.

I’m big on employee-generated content (EGC) for B2B organic marketing in 2026. I’ve personally seen it work wonders. Examples below.

I think a lot of brands will kick off and evolve these programs *next year.*

The time is ripe for EGC because it’s:

💵 Low-cost (your main cost is time spent)

📈 High-performing (individual profiles get much better reach and engagement than brand accounts on social)

🏃‍♀️ Fast to execute (you can get it out much faster than traditional campaigns… and we all know everyone’s being asked to move fast)

🤖 Naturally human (people post how they actually talk, which performs better anyway)

Implementing this as a strategic lever of your marketing program isn’t just telling people to post on LinkedIn and calling it a day.

Instead, you’d build an EGC program with governance, strategy, and KPIs.

Real examples:

When I worked at Salesforce, we shifted the Sales Cloud newsletter to be voiced by a real internal sales leader. Turns out he got way more opens than “Sales Cloud by Salesforce” in the inbox.

At Microsoft, we created an employee influencer program on LinkedIn and empowered employees to create their own videos about our products.

This led to content that outperformed our brand channel benchmarks by hundreds of percentage points and garnered millions of views on LinkedIn.

Will you be trying this in 2026? What other questions can I answer about this strategy?

One of the best leaders I ever worked for gave me some productivity advice. I still think about it 12 years later:

"This project is gonna require some deep work. So go into your hidey hole. That can be at home or the office. Wherever works for you." 🤯

It felt radical to be given permission to be productive however I saw fit.

In this day-in-the-life video, I show you what my productivity looks like today.

This was sponsored by my awesome brand partner Logitech for Business.

I was honored to partner with them to get the word out about their Logitech Zone Wireless 2 ES for Business headset, because one of the big ways I reach a creative flow state is by having comfy noise-canceling headphones.

I neeeeed a combo of quiet, music, and other ambient noise to get my work done.

The Logitech Zone Wireless 2 ES for Business headset is the one you’ll see me wearing all throughout this video, from the gym to the coffee shop to my home office.

It’s the ideal productivity partner where you’re switching between different calls, devices, and locations throughout the day. The battery also lasts forever, which is ideal for working parents like me who don’t have time to charge anything during the day (or sometimes even at night, let’s be honest).

Watch the video to see the headset in action! And check it out here. https://lnkd.in/gKMd96qH

What ingredient (be it technology or another habit) do you personally need to reach your most creative and efficient flow state?

#LogitechPartner

Warning. Do not read these three content fails from my LinkedIn account in 2025 if you get easily anxious!

I’m pulling back the curtain on what really goes on with sponsored content via three chaotic tales.

Hold on to your hats. 😂

1) Last January, Clay hired me and some other creators to do LinkedIn posts announcing their big funding round.

I worked with Obaid Durrani on the campaign, and the idea we landed on for my post was “How companies expect you to react to their funding round."

Our script was all approved and filmed. 

It included one joke about a funding round led by a specific VC and dollar amount.

But THE DAY BEFORE this video launched, another tech company announced their funding round led by that exact VC in that exact amount 😳 

We worked fast to cut and edit around that part of the video. I definitely didn't want it to seem like I was making a joke at anybody's expense.

It got 400+ likes even with that part missing, so I'd say it was a win for pivoting and resilience. https://lnkd.in/gKkpnY9f

2) I was working on a video for Tofu that was super hard to film.

I wanted it to be set in a public bathroom. This was important to my vision.

Turns out public bathrooms are difficult to film in, for various reasons.

I found one to use but I had limited time inside. I basically had to go in, shoot, and get out.

Unfortunately the audio my mic captured was mostly TERRIBLE quality. Yet there was no way I could go back and reshoot.

So... I ended up rerecording some of the audio, and dubbing it over myself. I did it a million times to get it as close to my lips moving as possible.

The video got over 300 organic likes, and nobody ever commented on the audio. Another win. https://lnkd.in/gxHTTNHW

3) I made a video for Slate that everybody signed off on, talking about the biggest time-wasters for social teams.

The Slate team and I had all carefully reviewed the video. So on the go-live date, I posted it and went about my day.

Unfortunately, a crazy audio issue happened that I've never seen on LinkedIn before or since...

When uploaded, LinkedIn added some kind of audio glitch that unsynced the audio for 10-15 seconds in the middle of the video.

I had no clue until somebody DM'ed me and let me know.

The video was already getting some great engagement. I hated to delete and repost, but that's what had to be done.

The reposted version still got great engagement from the target audience, even though we lost a bit of early momentum. https://lnkd.in/ggmfMe4F

If you wanna get into content creation, be ready to pivot, stay resilient, and be flexible!

"We are living in one moment. There’s so much history before and after us.” I'm super proud of my video series being featured in Fast Company!

With this series, my goal was to give people a moment in their day to take a new perspective on their daily work.

Clearly it struck a chord, with over a million views and comments that have been nicer than anything I've ever read about my work before. (To the person who said "hang this in the Louvre..." I love you forever lol)

One more quote from the piece:

“When viewing [our daily jobs] from the future as a detached museum docent, what is striking?” Young continues. “What little, mundane details seem quaint, absurd, or even grotesque?”

I hope to inspire some thinking about our daily work with these videos, because how we feel about it matters.

Huge thanks to Eve Upton-Clark for highlighting these videos! As a content creator, I am the writer, actor, foley artist, prop master, producer, cinematographer, editor, and director for my work. So it means a lot when something I made is highlighted in this way.

One of the best possible ways for me to end 2025!

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