We are living in a digital space – a space where millions of people are using social media daily. For instance marketers are using social media to interact with customers through their brands. Most influential brands TCS, Wipro, HCL, Flipkart, Amazon, Oyo, and many others are expanding their reach and business on LinkedIn.
Did you know 61 million LinkedIn users are senior level influencer’s and 40 million are in decision-making positions? 92% of B2B marketers include LinkedIn in their digital marketing mix.
This figure itself is enough to tell the popularity of LinkedIn for digital marketing.
If you’re not using LinkedIn as part of your sales and marketing strategy in your B2B or B2C business, you’re missing out on a big opportunity.
Adding LinkedIn to your marketing strategy can do wonder to expand your network, find potential clients, reach customers and create a reputation for your brand and your business.
Why some brands and business are growing and succeeding in a big way?
Why some struggle to attract visitors?
Well, the answer is simple but very true.
In other words it’s the outreach strategy that actually works for them.
Your well-planned strategy can connect you with influencer’s, clients, brand ambassadors and anyone else who could be vital in marketing your brand or business.
1. Create an Impression with Company Page
Whether you work for a large company or own your own small business, a company LinkedIn page is essential for brand awareness and connecting with people.
Many businesses are missing an important marketing tool by not having a company LinkedIn page.
Create the first impression through your company page that makes people feel comfortable trusting you. Complete your profile.
Make sure your page has the following items completely filled out:
- Logo
- Company description
- Website URL
- Company size
- Industry
- Company type
- Location
Add to it your accomplishments too.
Why you have to do this?
Because, a company page helps LinkedIn members learn about your business,brand, and job opportunities with your company.
It also establishes your credibility.
Optimize your company page so when people search for product or service they can reach you.
It helps you gain exposure and visibility among the people. For search optimization, incorporate keywords into the company profile information representing who you are and what you do.
2. Create Eye-Catching Profile Banner
Explore a fantastic feature of your LinkedIn profile that’s free to brand, customize and personalize- the profile banner. We all know it’s there.
But if you’re on LinkedIn to grow your business, your profile banner has so much more branding potential and power. So instead of just representing them graphically.
We can leverage our photograph and frame our ideas with catchy copy writing. It provides us a prime opportunity to brand your business and its expertise.
Here are 3 ways you can use profile banner more effectively
*Promote Upcoming Events: Many members are keen on networking and value seminars and educational opportunities.
*Highlight Your Contact Information: Making it easy for people to get in touch means they’re more likely to contact you.
*Showcase Industry Accreditation’s, Memberships & Qualifications: These highlight your level of expertise and could be the deciding factor for some of your customers.
Therefore, use the banner area to show off the personality of you and your brand. Give them a reason to keep scrolling through your profile.
3. Get Creative with Content
It’s no wonder LinkedIn has quickly become the go-to content publishing platform for marketers.
Because the people you’re looking to market to are just like you and me. To connect to people, you got to produce content.
Write contents in the form of articles, short posts, videos, slides, raw documentary style, and professional style. Create contents that add value to your target market. That’s what you got to do.
And you got to add value because LinkedIn is a content platform so create creative, rich and engaging content.
Produce content that speaks to your audience and clients and tells about who you’re because that’s what people resonate with.
Publish relevant posts to encourage viral likes, shares, and comments. Posts that feel like spam will not get shared and, in fact, could result in your business losing followers and also stop just spamming people with messages on LinkedIn for your sales pitches.
We’ve found that LinkedIn content performs really well if it includes the following:
- Descriptive caption
- Eye-catching images
- Hashtags
- Add Emojis, Questions, Bullet
4. Focus to Converse
One-sided conversations are no fun! It’s boring, Right.
Make your audience to converse with your content.
You don’t have to be always promotional to sell your brand and services.
Focus on humanizing the conversations and develop the art to ask thoughtful questions to involve your audience and followers rather than using a statement-oriented copy.
Join groups related to your business and your interests. Discussion participation can help establish you as an expert in your field.
When the audience participates in conversation it reflects their engagement. Here are a few best practices for engaging effectively in groups:
- Use groups as a forum for discussion
- Use groups as a catalyst for thought leadership and community.
- Spark conversations about industry trends and challenges.
Such conversations are helpful for tracking success.
5. Start Connecting, Build Relationship
Successful businesses are built on good relationships, and your first step to building relationships is finding a pathway to connect with people.
One of the most influential groups of people that can help you with your LinkedIn marketing is your colleagues and employees.
You can start with your own contact list. Invite your colleagues, clients, customers, and others you’ve done business with who fit into your target audience profile.
Promote your company page and updates in your blog posts, emails, newsletters, and website, and directly an ask people to follow it
6. Cross Promotion Strategy
There’s no point to growing your page with only LinkedIn marketing strategy. Great marketing comes from working smartly and effectively to succeed in a highly competitive business environment.
You need to promote your company page beyond LinkedIn with a few cross-promotion strategies in order to experience the maximum growth rate.
Link your LinkedIn company page from your website, blogs, email signatures, marketing communications, and other social media platforms.
Add social media navigation or “Follow” button to your website for long-term success and reach.
7. Advertise on LinkedIn
Everyone talks about the power of Facebook ads, but the LinkedIn ad platform is even more powerful considering the demographic of influencer’s and decision makers who are the LinkedIn user.
Advertising on LinkedIn helps businesses of any size achieve their goals.
When you want to reach the right audience, generate quality traffic and leads you can’t afford to miss the opportunity of advertising on LinkedIn.
LinkedIn offers several different self-service advertising solutions for your brand and business growth.
*Sponsored content:
Understand it as a promotional post to reach a wider audience organically. You’re promoting an article or post from your company page that appears in the LinkedIn feed. Sponsored content help you raise awareness, build relationships, and drive quality leads.
*Text Ads:
These are the tiny little ads that appear on the LinkedIn homepage, profile pages, Groups pages, search results pages, and more. These are pay-per-click or CPM ads. LinkedIn text ads are the fastest way to get your business in front of the world’s largest professional network.
With text ads, you can target a premium professional audience and drive high-quality leads to your business—all on a budget that works for you.
*Sponsored InMail:
Similar to email marketing, sponsored InMail helps to send personalized ads to LinkedIn members’ inboxes. Messages are only delivered when members are active on LinkedIn, making them likely to be noticed.
Sponsored InMail is a great way to increase your marketing reach on LinkedIn. You can send personalized messages to the audiences that matter most to your business. You can reach all of your potential audience with a sponsored email that increases 100% deliver ability and lead generation.
*Video Ads:
While it may be true videos are always appealing and best to capture people’s attention. Video ads on LinkedIn is a great way to drive growth at every stage of the sales cycle. You need to tailor your video campaigns to build brand awareness, drive website traffic, or generate leads.
Finally,
A powerful LinkedIn Marketing Plan is the best way to go forward.
Don’t just sign up for LinkedIn because everyone is doing it or it’s a professionals network.
Do use LinkedIn for business to establish your credibility, build relationships and generate higher sales and leads.