Linkedin is the world’s premier business network with 722 million active users as of January 2022. It is a great place for networking, growing business, building brand awareness, and relationships with customers. Business owners even grow their email marketing list with their professional connections and network.
Linkedin members have double the buying power compared to the mix of organic traffic you get from other sources which makes your marketing efforts more successful and targeted. There are 87 million professionals on LinkedIn with 11 million in decision-making positions. Leaders, speakers, and top management are accessible over this platform, the community is business-oriented, the audience is relevant and decision-making is much quicker.
Businesses of all levels can gain from this social media platform and if your marketing budget is high then you must seek social media services from an SEO agency to build your reputation in a short period of time. But in case you are a budding entrepreneur and own a small business then the below-mentioned LinkedIn strategies can help you grow your brand and establish partnerships to get leads.
- Create a company page and Optimize it
It might sound obvious but yes many small enterprise owners neglect to create social media profiles for their companies. While creating one on Linkedin you can choose from 4 different categories:
- Small Business (Less than 200 followers)
- Mid-level Business (More than 200 followers)
- Showcase Page
- Educational Institution
Fill in the required company details and choose a brand URL. Company details include a link to your website, industry, company type, size, company logo, and tagline. A complete company profile attracts more visitors. Increase your visibility by using links to your blogs, company profile, and personal profile. Associate with keywords in the headline, summary, and work experience summary on the profile page.
- Build followers
Your LinkedIn marketing strategy should connect to your website beyond external links to content. You should cross-market by using LinkedIn follow button on your website. Nobody will land on your Linkedin profile unless you tell them to start building followers by navigating your existing viewers from your website to your LinkedIn page.
Share your new page on your personal profile and ask your connections to follow. Ask your employees to edit their profile descriptions and add a link to your company profile. This will allow their contacts to also find and follow you and with that, it also shows the number of employees your company has which also establishes credibility on the platform.
From your page, send invites to your connections to follow but make sure not to spam or exceed the limit.
- Linkedin ads
You can choose from various ads format on LinkedIn :
- Sponsored text ads
- Sponsored posts
- Sponsored messaging
- Dynamic ads that include user details
- Sponsored job ad listing
- Photo carousel ads
Make a LinkedIn marketing strategy that provides answers around your ads budget, your target audience, and your goal. What will be the purpose of this page: recruiting or lead generation or sharing technical posts that otherwise don’t perform well on Facebook and Instagram? What are your competitors doing on LinkedIn and how your content can surpass theirs? Also create a content plan like how often your will post, the topics you will cover in a week/month, etc.
- Posting Thought Leadership
Zero down to what kind of audience can convert into high-quality customers for your business and create content around them. Post daily status updates and weekly LinkedIn blog posts on your company page. Send monthly emails to share what kind of problems your company has solved and how they can be benefited from your services or products.
Linkedin allows the posting of long-form content that business leaders have used to build influential thought leadership reputations. Long-form content if used properly can make you an innovative leader and expert in your niche. One should post thought leadership content usually from the CEO’s profile and then share it on the company’s profile to add more credibility. Stick with such content for long enough to build momentum and interest in your niche as B2B decision makers give a lot of weightage to such content and are willing to associate with companies that post such content.
- Use Sponsored updates
Businesses pay to push their posts onto a LinkedIn individual’s feed. This pay-per-click or pay-per-impression feature offers demographics similar to other social media platforms like age, gender, location, etc. but there is a prominent key differentiation that it allows customizing on basis of company name, job title, job function, schools, groups, etc. A sponsored post is an excellent way to even promote thought leadership content over LinkedIn curbing all the noise of irrelevant companies and audiences with its targetted audience and strong call to action. People never liked promotions and advertising but rather want useful information available for free. So promoting your business’s whitepaper, case studies, and guide through a sponsored update can target a niche audience, gain more visitors and if your content is compelling enough, generate leads too.
- Create & Join groups
Join relevant LinkedIn groups in your niche to target customers and build a lasting relationship with them. These groups offer a platform to raise queries, and suggestions and interact with the company. Businesses can expand their content reach and boost their visibility by engaging in meaningful discussions in such groups.
Avoid posting too much self-promotional content in the beginning as it won’t lead to quality conversation, instead small businesses can begin by exploring what their target demographics are talking about. Gradually increase your reputation and credibility by posting informative content like blog posts and company newsletters to engage group members. You can even message the group members, Linkedin email adds up quickly, a great way to save money when building relationships with potential clients.
Similarly, you can even create your own group around your company’s offerings, services, and products. Invite members from other groups leaving your competitors to join your group too. In this group, you get to demonstrate your value and expertise which can be shown to only picked invited members filtered by job title and designation that makes your prospect list. This way you will have all your proverbial fish in the same barrel.
- Launch a showcase
Another LinkedIn strategy that is highly effective and should be explored involves creating a showcase page. These pages are niche profiles that are used to market a product or service, a sub-brand, or a specific category within the company. It is usually an extension of the company’s page that allows to create of a page for a particular subject. It can target specific customer segments to help achieve higher engagement and conversion. On these pages, you can post custom and relevant content for an earmarked customer segment.
These pages help create a separate follower community for the effective distribution of the brand messages. Small businesses can leverage this feature to directly target the right audience. Currently, you can create 10 showcase pages under one company page.
