THE 3 BEST WAYS TO LEVERAGE LINKEDIN IN VERY LITTLE TIME

It is beyond important nowadays to work smarter and not harder.

All too often, we get sucked into the "scroll holes" of social media, and sometimes it's hard to get out.

What I have found is that when you have a system or a structure in place regarding how you utilize social media, you will be on your way to setting yourself up for success.

In regards to LinkedIn specifically, there are 3 ways to leverage the platform that takes little to no time at all:

1. Block out time each morning to do the things you need to do to move your business forward:

Here is an example of what I do:

Send out my targeted connections:

To have any of this process work for you, you must have the right people in your network to whom you are connected to. How do you expect to book quality calls if you don't have quality connections?

The other thing to remember is who and how many people you connect with.

Your connections should be either:

• Your ideal client avatar
• Power partner for business referrals and collaborations

Additionally, never forget that we all have a 100 connection sent per week limit, so don't go over that number, or you will get restricted.

Once you have the right people in your network, it's time to connect with them. As I have mentioned in prior training, podcast episodes, and newsletter editions, follow my "magic formula".....

• State their name in a relaxed and connectable
• Creating a relatable connecting point between you and the other person (state the obvious connection)
• Finish with a simple CTA (call to action to hop on a call or zoom)

Many people don't fully appreciate LinkedIn's "push notifications" magic. This is LinkedIn's way of saying, "Hey! Stay in touch with your connections". How do they do that? By letting you know who is celebrating a birthday, who is having a work anniversary, who just got promoted, and who changed a job position.

All you have to do is click the button that LinkedIn provides for you that says, "Say Happy Birthday", "Say Congrats", etc. This is a simple and effective way to keep the relationship building and even wrap back around to hop on another call or set one up that hasn't been able to happen yet.

I have spoken about this numerous times before that your content must either educate your audience or inform your audience. You are looking to build the "know, like, and trust", and one of the easiest ways to do that is to produce a piece of value-added content at least 3x per week.

It doesn't matter if it's a general post, video, article, newsletter edition, or a poll. Just make sure whatever you create leaves your network better and pours significant value into their lives.

Support those to whom you are connected to. As much as you focus on producing content, you must also recognize those in your network doing the same thing. Something I do daily is find 2 of my connections that have produced a piece of content that I truly resonate with and support them and the content by liking and commenting.

Just to be clear, I am not writing, "Great post!" or " high five emoji". What I am writing is a significant contribution to their post. I will go above and beyond to add additional value to what they have already spoken about to bring more relevance to the post and my comment.

This is a very simple way to pay it forward but to get additional eyeballs on your profile and content by supporting others.

2. Plan your content ahead of time, so you aren't thinking about what it is that you want to post:

What you first need to consider is what does your audience need to hear from you? What are their pain points? What are they struggling with? What can you help them accomplish?

Once you have in mind what it is you want to speak on, I have a 5 step process to creating and crafting an engaging post that leaves your ideal client audience better:

• Create a thought-provoking title:

This will ensure that the reader not only knows what you are going to talk about, but when it's very thought-provoking and engaging, it stops that person in their tracks.....And that is what you want.

You want something attention-grabbing such as, "6 WAYS TO GROW YOUR BUSINESS ON LINKEDIN RIGHT NOW!" If someone stumbles upon this post that truly wants to grow their business using LinkedIn, you better believe they will read it.

• Relate the content to yourself first:

You will always get someone to engage with you as the reader if they know the person who created the content has been there and done that.

All too often, we tend to just advise without truly relating it back to ourselves. The reader wants to know that the person who wrote the post experienced what they are going through right now. The reader wants to know the person who created the post and understand where they are coming from.

You are more likely to get a raving fan if you make sure that what you post relates back to you and your journey, how you overcame it, and how someone else can do the same.

• Give some tangible tips or how-tos:

"How-To" and "List" posts get 3-5x more engagement than a basic motivational or inspirational quote post. We forget that there are 2 main reasons why people are on LinkedIn.

• They want to network and collaborate with others
• People want to be educated and informed about something related to themselves and their business journey.

So give people what they want. Give 3 or 4 tangible tips or takeaways that can be immediately applied to their lives and their businesses.

This will bring the reader back time and time again because they know every time you produce a piece of content, it is going to teach them something of value.

• End with a call to action:

I have said it before, but I will remind you again: "Questions lead to answers, and statements lead to nowhere". You have to A.S.K to G.E.T, you have to ask to get.

One of the simplest and easiest ways to create engagement in your content is simply asking the reader to take action.

"What tip did you find most helpful?"

"Which of the mentioned tips will you apply right away?"

"What was your biggest takeaway from the post?"

If you want to find out what the reader thinks, simply just ask a question at the end of your post.

• Finish by using targeting hashtags:

Using specific hashtags will allow you to position yourself in the newsfeeds of the people with whom you want to see your content.

Many people on LinkedIn now "follow" certain hashtags to ensure they see that content before anything else in their newsfeed. Take full advantage of this. If you are going to finish your piece of content with hashtags, make sure you do these 3 things:

• Make sure you use no less than 3 and no more than 5 to take full advantage of the visibility they create.
• Make sure you use hashtags related to your content or hashtags that your ideal audience would be following.
• Make sure that one of your hashtags is your own personal hashtag for branding purposes. For example, my personal hashtag is #linkedleads . When people follow your personal hashtag, you will get first visibility with each of those people each time you post a new piece of content and each time you use that specific hashtag.

3. Use a content scheduling tool like the one we have (BYOB social) to take the content creation piece off of your plate:

Why would you want to use a content scheduler like "BYOB Social"?

-From Lone Fir Creative (https://www.lonefircreative.com/)

"Social media is all about strategy. Looking at posting times, audience, and what kind of content you are putting out is important in creating a successful social media presence. Content scheduling allows you to get a birds-ey view of the content you publish.

Another benefit of content scheduling is planning out promotions, ads, and posts in advance to ensure they all correspond and are sent out promptly. This will enable you to reach your specific target market by scheduling all posts and social media updates during selective times during your promotion. By planning out your promotions in advance, you have a better chance of reaching more of your target market, staying on track with posts, and creating a successful promotion for your business.

We are all busy and looking for ways to save time. Content scheduling can help with that! Yes, sitting down and creating a month’s worth of content will take time initially, but once that is done, the benefits outweigh the initial effort. Here are some of those benefits:

• Plan posts months in advance
• Be active online even when you’re not physically available
• Get the freedom to focus on other aspects of your business

It is a proven fact that certain times of the day are more conducive to creative writing. The benefit of creating all of your content at once is that you can select a time when you are feeling most creative to sit down and create relevant, diverse, and authentic content for your business.

*Pro Tip: We follow the 70-20-10 Rule for content creation, meaning 70% of the content should be interesting, inspiring, entertaining, and useful for the primary base of your audience. 20% of your content should be concentrated on promotional offerings, whether it be an invitation to an event, a donation request, or some other call-to-action. 10% of your content should be reposted or shared from other accounts, blogs, or content sources, allowing you to show that your Social Media strategy actually is social, building trust and a sense of reciprocity with your followers and influencers.

Scheduling out your content in advance also helps you to stay organized. If you are working with a marketing team or graphic designers, you can create or request graphics beforehand, and your design team will be grateful to have more time to work on them. This will also allow you to write down any important dates and holidays in advance, so you don’t forget to post for them. National Donut Day may not seem important?but plan a day to grab some donuts for your team, take a picture, and share it on Donut Day to show off your business's personality and really get in touch with your followers. People will “eat it up”!

To take advantage of social media's benefits, creating quality content and post frequently is important. It helps your business stay relevant, and posting consistently reflects well on your brand. Spreading out your content throughout the month keeps readers engaged and returning for more which in turn helps to create brand awareness and loyalty, build trust, and present your business as an industry leader. To do this, create a calendar and schedule your content to go out frequently.

We recommend using your content calendar or scheduling tool to keep track of each post’s progress. This will allow you to see what types of content resonate with your audience and which do not. Keeping track of these metrics will allow you to hone in on what types of posts to create in future months.

Another benefit of content scheduling is that you can reuse content that you’ve already written. Say you have a blog post that really resonated with your audience and received much engagement -- You would want to re-post that at a later date. Not only do you know it works, but if you wait a few months, you could potentially reach a whole new section of your audience! This kind of content is called Evergreen content.

Much like the way evergreen trees retain their leaves all year round, this content is always interesting to viewers. Keep in mind that not every post you write will be evergreen content, but when you come across a great and successful post, keep it in your content bank for reposting later!"

Which would help you most leverage LinkedIn better?