Tapping in to the power of LinkedIn

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but LinkedIn has gone through a major transformation over the last few months. Yes, it continues to be the number one business-networking site, but its value reaches beyond posting jobs and resumes.

You can use LinkedIn to create and shape a social environment to support you and your company’s objectives. Here are a few possibilities:

• Generate leads, sales, business development
• Strengthen customer relationships
• Build your reputation as a subject matter expert and thought leader
• Support employee retention and recruitment

Getting started

Identify your audience. Who do you want to reach? LinkedIn has over 225 million users; who should you connect with and why? Answering those questions will help you focus on connecting with people and organizations that are important to you.

Tell them what they want to know. This is a business site and people are interested in information that matters to them. Choose topics that educate, inform, and help solve their problems.

Join group discussions. Search for groups that are relevant to your industry and those of your targeted audiences. Participate in the discussion by giving your opinion or insight on a specific topic. This builds your reputation as a subject matter expert and gets you noticed. NEVER promote your company or your services during group discussions. It will be considered spam and you could be asked to leave the group. Instead, talk about relevant topics and provide information that benefits your audience.

Create a company page. LinkedIn allows business owners to create company pages to promote their products/services and interact with their followers. It’s fine to talk about your latest client success and company news; although, do it in moderation. People can appreciate self-promotion occasionally, but will be turned off if it’s more than 30% of the time.

Engage, engage, engage. There’s a debate on how often you should be updating your status. It really depends on how serious you are about using social media to help you reach your objectives. Minimum interaction should be 3-5x week. Post updates on your company page weekly, but only if have something relevant to share.

Whether you are hunting for new customers, connecting with your industry, spreading your marketing message, or looking for information about someone or something, we recommend tapping in to the power of LinkedIn.

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