Here’s how you can build a successful LinkedIn marketing strategy for your brand.
LinkedIn is the most important social media platform among professionals and it has become increasingly popular during the past few years.
Individuals and as well, companies, use LinkedIn to get in contact with each other.
People use it to promote themselves and share personal skills, certifications and CVs while companies are here to recruit new employees and share the best of their values and their most valuable news, that could be of interest to professionals.
LinkedIn, however, can give you more than a perspective on possible future employees or the employment market in general.
It can prove to be quite good for marketing as well and sometimes, even better than other social media networks since it addresses professionals.
Why use LinkedIn as a marketing channel?
There are many reasons why LinkedIn is one of the best marketing channels. I will not mention all of them but instead, choose the best three which should convince you right away.
1. LinkedIn is a business friendly social platform
All the other social media platforms were created to serve individuals and businesses. LinkedIn, on the other hand, was created with business professionals in mind.
As of consequence, it has an easier to understand and master algorithm that allows you to get into contact with other companies and professionals and reach out to an online presence that will help your own brand.
2. LinkedIn increases credibility
Compared to Facebook, LinkedIn has only a fraction of the market share. However, being focused on professional development, this social media platform was slightly overlooked by most of the businesses and thus, the competition is not fierce.
You can achieve great things if you stick to your values and goals and fight with lesser competition than on other similar channels.
People share personal profiles on LinkedIn, more personal than they do it on Facebook, for example. Here’s a simple example you can use. I win a local award for the #2 best marketing podcast. So I post it on LinkedIn:
Thus, there’s an opportunity to form more intimate connections with each other and this opportunity can be exploited by marketers who can form similar relationships with their audience.
3. LinkedIn can direct traffic to your website
The platform allows you to share posts and include personal links inside them. There may not be all members of your audience who will click on that link but, if your content is good enough, they might share it across the platform and increase your organic reach.
Unlike Facebook, LinkedIn will deliver your message to all your followers and fans which means that it will be way easier to extend your reach and deliver your message in order to build a consistent marketing strategy without spending too much.
In fact, you can do it without even having a budget for this.
Linkedin marketing strategy tips
Now that we know where we are and why to choose LinkedIn as your main content marketing channel, it’s time to dig deeper and learn how your main goals can be achieved. Here are some of the best tips I can give you at this moment:
1. Update your company page
The first thing you need to do is to make sure your company page is ready for your marketing campaigns. This means that you need to take care of a lot of stuff, starting with the basic info and up to the branding elements.
Here are some good pieces of advice to take into account:
A. Name and description:
This is where you start with your LinkedIn marketing strategy. Use your company name and describe as good as possible who you are or what you do. It may not be a long text here but it should contain the main keywords you want to market for or use with your strategy.
Here’s a simple example from Greenhouse Software:
B. Informational branding elements:
Your LinkedIn page should include as well an “about” section where you can give the audience some more precise information on your company, more precise than what you gave them inside the initial description.
Here, you can include a link to your website, and if necessary, the local address, contact email address or contact phone.
Here’s a good example from Buzzsumo.
C. Visual branding elements:
At this point, you have everything you need text-wise. The final step of the initial setup process is to design a banner and add a logo. My advice is to design a banner in line with your branding elements such as fonts, colors and images.
Make sure the two elements (logo and banner) fit well together and that they attract the audience.
Gong.io, gives us a great example of visual branding elements.
And, they manage to mix together very well, in a colorful style, the banner and the logo.
You can use Bannersnack to create a professional Linkedin banner.
2. Create content to engage
Ultimately, content is created and shared in order to be red or viewed by an audience. However, you should also think about engaging people into your stories and make them part of them. In order to achieve this, you need to be open to trying new things and at the same time, to commit on creating the right type of content for your chosen audience. What are your options here?
A. Visuals
LinkedIn is a professional network but nevertheless, it is a social media network as well. And, social media strategies include the dissemination of visuals as the most powerful type that is able to attract both mobile and desktop users.
You can share the traditional funny visuals from time to time but, for your regular posts, I suggest creating something that really matters for your audience. In this category, you can include graphs and charts, full or minimized infographics.
Here’s an example of a post of this sorts from Bannersnack’s LinkedIn page:
b. Videos
Your LinkedIn media marketing strategy should not end with creating awesome static visual posts. Yes, you can also share videos and here, you get two choices:
b.1. Live Videos
It’s not advisable to start with them because you need a stable and loyal audience in order to share live videos. However, after you build a community, you can keep them engaged by announcing when you will transmit live and what. If you are consistent in this, your audience will include your posts in their daily schedule and become regulars on your page which is great for marketing.
A good example in this case comes from Herb May, who shares live interviews just like the one linked within this paragraph. He is focusing on business development and sponsor coverage and uses social media platforms such as LinkedIn to market himself and what he is doing.
b.2. – Video Content
While live videos are there only for a short period of time, regular video content posts are not perennial as they remain on your account page as long as you want them to.
Thus, they are available to the audience forever, as a form of green content should you decide to make them that way.
Create informative videos or videos that can help your audience learn new things or learn about your services or products. This is the easiest way to add value to your content and transform it into a green content.
Here’s an example from Bannersnack:
b.3. Snippet Videos From Other Content
Also, you can create short videos and use them as advertising materials for your text based posts or audio podcasts that are shared on your main websites or blogs. Post them on LinkedIn an announce to your audience the exact time of your releases.
A good example in this case comes from the page of Music Business Podcast. The linked post from LinkedIn shows a very simple and yet effective snippet video that promotes one of their episodes to whomever is interested.
c. Write and share articles
Another great strategy on LinkedIn and as a matter of fact on any other social media channel or blog, is to create, post and share valuable articles to your audience. It should be a part of your LinkedIn content marketing strategy.
You can write about virtually anything as long as it fits your brand strategy and your audience’s needs and interests. I cannot tell you what topics to choose and how frequently to post. These are things you need to figure out by yourself. I can tell you, however, that the more you share valuable information, the easier will be for you to attract new audiences from all around the world, even people who do not know your brand, products or services. Your fans will dig your content, share it and promote it to their peers and colleagues.
Here’s an example from Gabriel Ciordas:
Also, you can choose to promote your CEO articles on your business page as well and use them as a content strategy for your LinkedIn marketing efforts.
d. Share .pdfs (.docs)
Free downloadable materials and digital resources are always a great choice when it comes to content marketing and customer retention. On LinkedIn, since this is a professional digital social media channel, these kinds of resources will prove to be even more effective than on other channels which are focused rather on leisure than business.
You can make studies, write research papers and collect valuable data, create a digital magazine or article, save it as a PDF and share it later on LinkedIn as a free resource material for your audience.
People love free stuff and when the free stuff ads value to their lives, they love it even more.
e. Post comment on other posts
You can achieve a lt by creating and publishing content be it textual, audio or visual. However, when you want to create a strong LinkedIn marketing strategy, you should think about expanding yur audience and reaching to other LinkedIn users on a constant basis. How can you do this for free?
Well, you can search for relevant articles published by third party users or brands and comment on them.
People who read these articles will see your comments and sometimes, they will follow you or your links. Here’s a personal example:
Other actions you can take in order to improve your LinkedIn marketing strategy:
Apart from the strategies already mentioned in so far, I will list, in short, a few other guidelines that can help you improve your LinkedIn marketing strategy. Here are my personal additions:
Start a B2B group
Like on Facebook or any other social media network, people come on LinkedIn not only to promote themselves but also to get informed and meet people who share their interests. Thus, they join discussion groups and become active members of them. You can profit from this and create your own branded discussion group, invite people to join, engage in active conversations with them and share valuable ideas, materials and data with the community.
How to start your own group?
Well, just like on any other social media platforms, the process is easy and fast.
There is also a quick tutorial available on the platform which I will resume here by mentioning the most important steps:
First, you need to access your main LinkedIn groups page and click on creating a New Group. The button is available on the right side of the page.
Then, you will have to fill in the requested information and, under group discoverability, to make sure you check the “Listed” option. This is important if you want your group to be public and not private and I would recommend you to make it public at least at first.
Also, under “group invitations”, you can allow other members to invite new people into the group and thus, expand your audience. The final step would be to click on the “create” button and let the page work for you from now on.
Incorporate Linkedin Ads
As all other digital channels, LinkedIn allows you to create and publish ads in order to promote your content, your brand, products or services.
You can promote your content to targeted audiences on all digital devices, including desktop and mobile, deliver personalized ads to LinkedIn desktops through sponsored inMail or publish text and contextual ads in a minute.
Use Advanced Search
LinkedIn advanced search allows you to identify the exact type of people you want to engage in your strategy and become an active part of your audience. In order to get there, click on the “search” bar available on the top left side of the LinkedIn header, choose people and go to the advanced option.
There are a lot of demographics options there, you can target virtually anyone depending on location, interests, where they work and so on:
Conclusion
LinkedIn is a powerful, professional based and continuously growing social media platform.
People come to LinkedIn to promote themselves, to find useful information about companies and brands and to enjoy a professionally based community where they can share their experiences with their peers.
As of consequence, LinkedIn can prove to be quite good for content marketing, whether you are at the beginning of your journey or promoting an already established brand on the market. With this article, I presented you some of my personal choices in this area and tried to give you some useful insights on how to use the platform and how the make the best out of your Linkedin marketing strategy.
Do you use LinkedIn as your main marketing channel? If so, what other strategies are you currently using and to what extent?
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