Is your company on LinkedIn? Yes? Good.
If you said no – we can understand the reluctance to create another social profile that requires time and effort to use successfully. If you are – is your business taking full advantage of the platform?
LinkedIn for Business Stats
- 61 million senior-level business influencers use LinkedIn
- 93% of B2B Marketers use LinkedIn for organic social marketing
- 82% of B2B marketers claim to have the greatest success with LinkedIn
- 75% of B2B marketers choose LinkedIn for paid social campaigns
What more convincing do you need? So, bookmark this page and come back once your business profile has been setup.
Ready to go? Great! Just remember, LinkedIn is a professional networking site and unlike Facebook, is business-oriented. Here are our best tips on how to properly use LinkedIn.
1. Add Your Services
LinkedIn offers a clear-cut spot for your company’s services or products. You are able to add a photo and description for each and link back to the specific landing page on your website. LinkedIn is for business…so showcase your business!
2. Add a Showcase Page
Speaking of “showcasing your services,” once you have your main brand page established, consider adding Showcase Pages. These specialized pages allow a business to highlight specific products or services.
Scenario
Imagine a company that produces computer hardware components, but some are for consumer products, and some of the components are used exclusively for government contractors. The company could create separate Showcase Pages for those two business streams.
3. Upload a Banner Photo
Similar to Facebook, LinkedIn provides a space for a smaller profile picture and a larger banner photo. Utilize this banner photo to showcase your products, services, company culture, announcements, etc. Please, just do not leave it blank.
4. Update Daily
No, creating a LinkedIn page is not enough. No one will know it exists if you do not maintain it. Updating daily with interesting and relevant content will increase your brand awareness and your credibility.
Many marketers, both on LinkedIn and other platforms, adhere to the 4-1-1 rule. (That doesn’t stand for calling information and asking for marketing tips.)
The 4-1-1 rule provides guidelines for sharing three types of content, suggesting you can drive engagement and thought leadership by posting
- 4 pieces of curated content: external articles, podcasts, blog posts, images, and videos that educate and engage your audience, sharing relevant knowledge about your industry
- 1 piece of original content: a thought leadership article, informative graphic, an explainer video – any piece of originally produced content that has a goal of informing rather than selling
- 1 piece of promotional content – a specific call to action aimed at selling your products and services
5. Promote Conversation
Imagine being stuck at a party with someone who just monologues at you. No matter how useful the information. At some point, you will tune them out or make a plan to escape.
Don’t be a bad party guest on LinkedIn – it is after all a “social” platform. Instead, mix questions into your daily updates and spark a conversation or a debate among your followers. Not only will you promote engagement, you could also learn something along the way!
6. Always Include an Image
People are skimming LinkedIn; they are not reading every individual update. Thus, you must grab their attention with a photo. Posts with an image have a 98% higher comment rate. Comments are engagement, and engagement leads to sales!
7. Utilize Paid Campaigns
More marketers are acknowledging the importance of setting aside a social media budget that allows for paid advertisements and sponsored updates. LinkedIn has both. The special value that LinkedIn offers is the amount of data they have on B2B audiences. This data allows you to target your B2B advertising campaign to reach the most specific audience possible. LinkedIn provides targeting options based on all of the following factors:
- Location
- Job functions
- Job title
- Seniority
- Degree type
- Skills
- Company name
- Company size
- Industry type
- Professional or personal interest
8. Regularly Review your Analytics
Your analytics are there for a reason, and they are pretty awesome! LinkedIn’s free analytics tell you the number of impressions a post received (how many times someone saw your post), how many of those were unique impressions (people who have never seen your content before), and the engagement each post got (likes, clicks, comments, shares). Review these analytics, record them, and study the changes over time.
9. Encourage Your Employees to Connect
Your employees should be on LinkedIn. Assuming they are, ask them to follow the company page. This will increase your follower base, put faces to the brand, and put forth the fact that your employees support the company.
There is so much more to learn from LinkedIn and these are just a few of the top tips for running your company page. If you do not have the time or resources to manage your social media campaign, a third-party social media management team, like Informatics Inc., can assist.
Launch a LinkedIn Strategy that Works
Our social media marketing experts can get you started and develop unique content your audience will love!
