Imagine showing up to a party, then standing in a corner, listening to bits and pieces of conversations around you and saying nothing until you leave at the end of the night. If you have a LinkedIn profile but you do not regularly contribute to the platform by sharing insightful news, publishing your own blogs or liking and commenting on other people’s posts, you’re essentially doing just that. Simply showing up on LinkedIn is not enough. You must engage and do more with the platform that just logging in occasionally.
Not only does being active on LinkedIn support your own personal brand, it also helps professionals to build credibility for their organisations. Whether you are in sales, marketing, human resources or another department, it’s necessary to have a presence on LinkedIn and to understand how best to manage your public persona on this channel. Read on to learn more about recommendations for networking on LinkedIn to build an audience for yourself and your brand.
There are many advantages of networking. The importance of networking lies in being able to reach numerous distinct audiences. Some of your contacts are likely customers of your organisation and LinkedIn gives you an opportunity to stay apprised of their updates and maintain these important relationships. Other contacts might be leads that you can warm up through regular engagement and content sharing.
Still others might be potential partners for your brand, like influencers, associations or corporate sponsors. And let’s not forget that LinkedIn is also a massive talent pool. By networking on LinkedIn, you can help attract new hires to your organisation who can help take innovation to the next level, which in turn supports product development, sales, marketing and more.
Consider the following best practices for networking and promoting content that reinforces your organisation’s messaging on social media channels like LinkedIn:
People don’t want to be bombarded with a lot of sales language when perusing LinkedIn. While it’s true that many prospects review company LinkedIn pages or even the profiles of CEOs, marketing managers and sales directors during the evaluation stage of the buyer’s journey, it’s important to focus first on thought leadership and on selling secondarily.
The content you share should be useful and memorable, whether it’s discussing an emerging trend, tips for overcoming a key business challenge or inspiring and heartwarming stories that bring people to the forefront. Taking this approach helps you to be seen as an influencer and approachable expert within your network. In the end, it supports sales by allowing you to jumpstart new conversations, gain more followers and share information that is consistent with your brand’s messaging.
B2B buyers consume an average of 13 pieces of content before making a purchase. Sharing both original and third-party content can help buyers make an informed decision, especially when multiple people are involved in selecting a service provider or solutions vendor. Reputable third parties can include trusted media outlets, national organisations and associations like public health agencies, well-established influencers and more.
In addition to sharing both your own content and third-party content, you must also create balance in the type of content you share. Content diversity is key to engaging users. For example, consider incorporating infographics, podcasts, blogs, videos, case studies, memes, e-books, survey results and media coverage like interviews and articles.
There are many different groups available on LinkedIn that can help you connect with other experts and share information on relevant topics. Some groups are developed and monitored by industry associations, while others are simply for like-minded people, such as sustainability enthusiasts.
Find groups that are likely to align with your target markets and request to become a member. Keep a pulse on the conversations that are happening in these groups. While you don’t want to post promotional content that could be flagged or ignored, there may be opportunities to offer counsel and recommendations in the comments of others’ posts or even in the form of best practices blogs or articles from your brand.
Brands that have a strong presence on social media position themselves as credible organisations and create opportunities to engage with prospects and customers on a more personal level. LinkedIn enables companies to share useful and relevant content, respond to questions and comments, gather insights straight from end users and promote products and services, both directly and indirectly.
Growing your professional network on LinkedIn and positioning yourself as an expert in your field is key for bringing the brand you represent to the forefront. It also helps to generate meaningful conversations with clients, prospects and partners that can lead to improved loyalty, increased sales and more.
Contact Mulberry to discuss how we can help you be seen as a thought leader on LinkedIn and beyond.
Jess Messenger is an Account Director at Mulberry Marketing Communications, an award-winning full-service B2B communications agency based in Chicago, London and Australia. She enjoys developing PR campaign strategies and writing for B2B audiences across numerous verticals such as retail, foodservice and healthcare.