This is the pre-eminent global social networking website targeted towards companies and industry professionals looking to make new business contacts or keep in touch with previous or current colleagues, affiliates, and clients.
Most professional people will have heard of LinkedIn if they have not yet signed up or expanded their profile greater than a basic listing.
LinkedIn enables members to prescribe customisable profiles detail their accomplishments, experience and professional recognition as well as provide contemporary information and marketing material. The majority of LinkedIn income is provided by the recruitment advertisers found throughout the site.
Members can search through profiles if they are looking to recruit new members and they can also search for jobs for themselves. There profile serves as a CV for anybody who is interested in them, as indeed if you have not yet figured it out every person and especially professionals, are in fact a brand.
Small businesses are catching on fast to the power of LinkedIn and I personally know of one major regional employer that encourages all of it’s executives to try to recruit through the platform, for the common good of the company.
Where social media provides the platforms form the majority of people LinkedIn was born of the need to serve professionals and companies. Without it other social media sites would become choked and overcrowded with the 20 million members of LinkedIn that are specifically looking for business connections.
LinkedIn has the facility for business owners to set up a company page which can assist them in locating talent by accessing their profiles and sending discrete messages or even advertising.
By sharing articles, blog posts or news items in the many groups (now over 1 1/2 million) as well as providing comments, advice, opinion and related other material, LinkedIn members can not only deal with and contact worldwide interested parties, but can also enhance their credibility in their local or national arena.
Whilst these three social networking platforms form the basis or foundation of social media it's important to remember to maintain your presence on the sites. It also just as vital to remember that other, new social networking sites may emerge that may be better suited to your industry; however their lifespan may also be relatively short. Networks such as friends star and MySpace would obviously not be suitable places for businesses to engage potential clients with today whereas in the early part of the first decade in the 21st-century they were quite useful.
Tips for Using LinkedIn as a Company
Building a profile on LinkedIn that showcases your products or services and lists your employees, upcoming events and news or status updates can provide followers of your company with valuable information similar to Twitter and Facebook.
In the company pages there is also the facility to post job advertisements so that your followers can approach you directly, combined with the job advertisements in the various groups you become a member of makes LinkedIn and excellent and cost-effective place for recruiting great candidates.
On Creating your LinkedIn page:
Provide your product or service with a direct contact. The product pages permit you to assign members of your organisation enabling any interested customer to know precisely who to contact. This small but vital open door element is a great way to start the conversation between potential customers and your product or sales management or even support staff that can then filter the enquiry more effectively.
Videos can now be posted directly onto LinkedIn in your products and services pages and the best visibility is obviously to place them next to any descriptions and recommendations or endorsements.
Offers and promotions in the promo box enable you to provide contests and competitions or discounts or time bound or particular promotions and you can use this area to create traffic pointed to your website or blog for additional information.
Recommendations and endorsements can be utilised after you've created your products and services page and this gives customers or employees a forum to discuss your offerings to the market and encourages diverse conversations or relating to knowing your customer better.
LinkedIn and SEO
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is a buzz word in today's online marketing toolbox and LinkedIn has exceptionally well with properly organised and optimised pages which then benefit your company by providing the highest possible visibility to the search engines.
Additionally your employees or staff can boost the SEO effectiveness of your company pages by using the following tips;
• upload a professional headshot photo
• Include keywords in job position title
• Link to company blog under “Websites”
• Add Twitter handles as required
• Claim a unique URL and then embed it into email signature blocks
• Write each person’s summary in the first person and include keywords but try to add an element of your own character.
• List key services/products as a bullet list on your ‘About” Section to make it easy to read, but beware there are only 1,480 characters allowed.
• Make sure to add plenty of skills in the “Skills” section
• Move any recommendations closer to the top
An effective and very easy way to build your professional network is to use “Shared Connections” to get introductions to people and companies you may wish to target. A key capability of LinkedIn is its ability to connect you to a larger network of people through your own 1st, 2nd and third level connections. You can even connect and send messages to anyone outside of your direct network through introductions and using the groups effectively. When implementing your network marketing by identifying potential prospects don’t forget that you will normally be allowed a limit of 3,000 connections. Too many people that say they don’t know you or report you as spam will freeze your account, normally for up to 6 months.
Build a LinkedIn Group
LinkedIn Groups are an excellent way to demonstrate and promote your skills and competences around a specific area, provide a thought leadership as well as gain potential insight into customer’s problems and challenges to assist you in developing solutions.
You need to actively monitor the group and provide comments and relevant questions to keep the conversation going and encourage your customers as much as you can to participate again by possibly running competitions or prize draws etc.
To identify groups you may wish to partake in to establish your credibility is easy. You simply need to make a list of keywords that relate to your particular industry or prospect category and search for them using the search bar at the top. Once you have chosen to join the group, some may be automatic and others may be moderated by the organiser, so be prepared for rejection if you have joined a competitor's group accidentally.
Encourage Participation
Your employees, if you have them, are well placed in LinkedIn to promote your brand and their personal specialities or niche expertise. Employees should also contribute to your blogs and encourage them to link these blogs to their status updates. The more people that are singing the same song from the pews of your church create a greater belief in your company being caring and able to provide solutions.
Link with me on LinkedIn uk.linkedin.com/leewerrell
TopTip #51 – Client Focused Profile
Similar with other types of social networking sites, you have to first sign up and create your business profile. However, since LinkedIn has so many fields allotted for your personal, business or employment background, make sure that you do not end up making just a resume instead of an interesting profile. Focus your profile to your target clients. Create a description which would let the viewer know what your company is all about, what benefits will they gain if they choose your products and services as well as inform them why your company is the best. Make a great start by creating a profile which will have a great impact and leave a good impression.
TopTip #52 – Get Connected
You can find new clients by making use of its search function. You can also use this feature in finding the profiles of your business partners. Get as much connection as you can for you to enjoy the great benefits which LinkedIn will offer.
TopTip #53 – Choose Wisely
You can choose whoever you would like to connect to but you have to be careful when choosing them. You need to make connections to those whom you think you can create or develop a great business relationship. Your connections must be productive and efficient. The deeper the connections you have with your network the better.
TopTip #54 – Give and Receive Recommendations
This is one thing which would greatly benefit your company and let your potential clients know that you are doing a great job. You simply cannot beg for recommendations. Instead, what you can do is give a recommendation to a person or business which you have worked with. Once you do this, they will be given a notification if that company would also like to give you a good recommendation which they will probably be doing too. You can also use this same process with endorsements. Great endorsements and recommendations mean making a better impression to your target clients.
TopTip #55 – Targeted Groups Are Useful Too
The groups in this particular type of social networking site each share the same interests. They share current events and join discussions about their common interests. You can use these groups and choose those which you find interesting, groups which have members who are also your target customers and groups which you think has interests that are beneficial for the products and services which you are offering. You can build your credibility through these groups and increase the odds of finding your prospective customers.
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TopTip #56 – Interesting and Informative Status Updates
Constantly remind your clients about what you do by posting status updates about your company. This is a great yet subtle way of informing them once again about what you can give and what benefits they can get. It’s a great way of sending out a reminder without being too pushy.
TopTip #57 – Read the Updates of Others
Watch out for the status updates of other individuals. You will never know, you may find that great opportunity to get in touch with them and discuss more about how the both of you can benefit from what you can offer them. Specifically keep an eye on those status updates which are related to the type of business which you are promoting. Once you get a hold of the person of interest, initiate a fruitful conversation and start establishing a good business relationship.
TopTip #58 – Connect It with Other Social Media
Several successful online entrepreneurs have proven that they receive more interaction if their other social media profiles are connected to it. Once they see the post you have published on twitter for instance. This is a good tip which you may want to give a try.
TopTip #59 – Add Applications
Much like other social networking sites, there are several applications which you can integrate to your LinkedIn account. These apps will help you market your business on a whole new different level. Since there are several of these available, you will surely find that one which will suit the type of business which you are trying to promote.
TopTip #60 – Be Found
Make sure that your LinkedIn profile is searchable by optimizing it. This will allow other potential clients to find you, your company and the products or services which you are offering.
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