Continuing to Grow & Excel on LinkedIn

Are you on LinkedIn looking for growth? I previously published the article, “How to Grow & Excel on LinkedIn for newer people who have joined the platform and needed the basics of how to build their profile and get their foundation set. This is a follow up piece where I will be building on what I’ve already shared.  If you have not read it yet, find the link to it down at the bottom in the references section. I suggest you read that one first and then continue with this one, as they build upon each other. The information can completely change your user experience and success on LinkedIn as a whole.

The purpose of this article will be to help those who have a better grasp of how LinkedIn works and help them take things to the next level or beyond. I wrote this piece with professionals who already have a few thousand connections but want to know how to grow and get much more out of their social media efforts on LinkedIn. The people I have in mind ask me things like: How do you build a bigger network? How do you manage a larger network? What is the secret to achieving your goals on LinkedIn? Can you have fun and grow at the same time?

This article is meant to address these questions and more. 

The Algorithm

If you’ve been on LinkedIn for a while and grown to a few thousand or more, the odds are you’ve read something about the algorithm, especially as the platform switched from universal algorithm rules to individual AI (artificial intelligence) driven algorithm scores. What is the Algorithm and How Does it Work? The definition of an algorithm is: “a process or set of rules to be followed in calculations or other problem-solving operations, especially by a computer.”  Each social media website has a unique algorithm to determine what to show their users when they visit the website. What you see and what I see at the same moment will not be the same thing on LinkedIn. In fact it would be very different most likely. That isn’t the case on all websites, for example if you were to visit ESPN or CNN or The Weather Channel’s websites, we’d see very much the same things. But on social media, the algorithm makes a huge impact on what you see.

So how does LinkedIn determine what you see in your feed? The answer is that they score what those in your network have posted, and show the highest rated posts, along with test posts, promoted posts and things their AI think you’ll be interested in based on your past interactions. How does LinkedIn score posts? Well they don’t share that information publicly so there’s no sure fire way to know. LinkedIn does give us clues to what works in some of their articles, so you can always search there but often if you want to know what works, simply look around and see what others who have large response rates are doing. I share tips on a regular basis too in an attempt to help.

How to Get Larger Post Responses

Posting on LinkedIn can help you in a variety of ways, as you inform people about what you do or how you can help them, share your opinions and even ask others for help. When you post, there are some things you can do to help increase your odds of being seen. I talk about smart tagging a bit later in this article. I also mentioned the use of hash tags in the previous article. Beyond those two things, you want to do a few very helpful things such as:

1.  Ask a question. A great way to get engagement is to ask your audience and open ended question.

2.  Keep post length down and don’t clump everything together

3.  Use bullet points but don’t use too many different types in one post.

4.  Mix up your content type: Text only, Photo, Short Video, Article, Sharing other people’s great content. Find what your audience responds to best.

5.  Always be positive

6.  Like and comment on your own post right away. This is still new and somewhat troubling to me, but it helps to get engagement right away.

7.  Respond to all comments with a like and a comment. It helps to encourage people and reward them for their engagement, also the AI is looking for active conversations, (think of a beach ball) the more a post is being engaged with, the wider the algorithm will spread the post throughout LinkedIn.

8.  Delete troll comments. A troll comment will kill a post quicker than anything I know. Don’t let it sit. Just delete it.

9.  Relevant and topical posts rule the day. Not sure what to post about? Try searching on LinkedIn for trending topics. Write things that interest others and it’ll likely do better.

10. Find a way to help others. If your posts help others, they will be more likely to engage in them.

LinkedIn Frequency

In my previous article I talked at length about how to engage and the importance of engaging. Growth is directly tied to engagement. Part of that is frequency. How often you visit and engage on LinkedIn will have a huge impact on how fast you grow. The more frequently and consistently you engage, the more rapidly you will add followers and 1st level connections. I visit LinkedIn and engage daily. I typically use my computer to create a good post in the early morning, before work starts and then I engage in the comments as I get ready for work via my cell phone. I repeat the process at lunch and before dinner. Sometimes I do it before I go to sleep too because I have a global network who are working while I sleep.

If you visit less often, your growth will take longer. Like most things, the more time you invest, the faster you will receive the payout.

Caution: Don’t start a post and then disappear for hours or days. You need to nurture the post for at least an hour after you publish it. Why? Two reasons, first, if you engage with posts in the first hour, and create a frenzy, the post can start to sustain itself. Second, if you post and disappear, your audience will think you don’t care about their thoughts / comments / questions and will be less likely to engage with you on future posts. You want to encourage participation not discourage it.

Contribution / Comment Ratio

So when you visit, how should you divide your time? You can build a network by writing original posts, sharing images or videos and then engaging in the comments. You could also spend all of your time simply engaging in the comments of other people’s posts. I have found the best growth method is to do both. I typically spend about 80% of my time engaging in comments and 20% of writing new content. If you do the same, I’m sure you’ll do very well cultivating a healthy network and adding more followers, just like I have.

You should always try to answer or respond to everyone who comments on your posts. This is not easy the more you contribute, so if you find yourself behind the eight ball and unable to keep up, reduce the amount of original posts and spend more time commenting and engaging in the comments of other people’s posts. Why? You never want people to think you are arrogant or that you feel you’re too good for them. 

I never want anyone to feel that way. If you come across that way, you can damage your reputation. You should also make sure to thank anyone who shares your post. I give them a like and a thank you for sharing comment. I also try to circle back and engage with those who compliment me for the post in their shared comments. You can meet a lot of new and great connections in the comment section of someone else who shared your post.

Share Only Topnotch Posts

I don’t over share other people’s work on LinkedIn. For one, so many people are regurgitating the same tired information, I don’t want to bore my audience. Secondly, because I post regularly and frequently, I want to make sure I have time to keep up with my own content. Sharing isn’t bad, in fact when I see something I believe is really good, I don’t mind sharing it. I will always introduce the post or tell my audience why I shared it from someone else. My rule of thumb is, only share the best of the best and make sure I let my network know why I shared it. Then I make sure I treat it as any other of my posts and monitor the comments, responding to everyone, to help let them know I appreciate their engagement.

Limitations and Advice

So if you are bumping up against the limitations of the platform, you want to be careful so you don’t get locked out of your account. To protect yourself, you want to be as efficient as possible in getting where you want to go and keeping your page visits down. Watch this video to help you insulate yourself from potential headaches as you grow: https://youtu.be/tQgwdl-JOEg

Smart Tags

One of the things that helps to increase the response of a post is to include others from LinkedIn, into the conversation. You can simply type their name, which mentions them, but a smart tag is when it creates an active hyperlink to their profile and also it includes them in the notifications on the particular post. When you tag someone in the post, you’re building the audience before the post is released into the feed. The algorithm starts the post at a higher score, because it assumes that the people tagged are already participating in the post. Tagging a lot of people doesn’t guarantee it will be a big response, nor does it ensure how many will see it. The posts live and die based off of how people interact over a given period, but the higher your starting score, the more people are likely to see it when it is first posted. As long as people are engaging at a high rate, the algorithm will be happy and keep showing to more people in your network. 

Smart tagging is not hard, if their security settings allow it.  If you want to smart tag me in your post, you would type the @ symbol and then my name. So it would be @Ira Bowman. As soon as you type @ and a letter behind it, you’ll see a drop-down list appear. The more letters you type, the closer to my name the drop list will show you until eventually you see my name. Once you see my name, you can click on it and my name will appear in your post, in blue ink. That’s what you want to see.

Sometimes when you tag too many people and post it, all the tags will drop out. I don’t know what the hard tag limit is, as it seems to vary, but you can normally safely tag up to twenty people if you want to. I would recommend just doing 5 to 10 at a time though. You can also tag people in the comments of your post, but most will respond better if you tag them in the post at all.

Important to note, not everyone likes being tagged in posts. You should ask people if they mind being tagged in your posts before you do it. You don’t want to ruin a relationship because you make the wrong assumption. It’s best to only tag people in posts, even if they agree to be tagged, when they are truly relevant to the topic at hand. For example, if you want to tag me in a post, it should be about Print, Sales, LinkedIn, Parenting, Networking or the Bible primarily as those are my areas of expertise. You wouldn’t be doing me a favor to tag me in other types of posts if I am not it doesn’t pertain to me or one of my strengths.

Bookmarking Profiles

Did you know there are daily page count limitations on LinkedIn? If you visit too many pages (the actual number is not disclosed) on LinkedIn, you will get a warning message and if you don’t stop using the site for a while that day, they will actually lock you out of your account? I call it being in LinkedIn jail. The restriction is meant to protect us from robots and automation as LinkedIn wants to make sure real people are really the only ones using the website. It’s not a bad thing, but you need to be aware of it. 

With a free account, as many of us have, you are limited to how many free searches you can do in a 30-day period. LinkedIn doesn’t publish or share when directly asked how many searches anyone can do in a given month, but I typically run out of my free searching in about 5 days after a new month has started. 

Finally as your network grows, you’ll have more and more people in your feed and you might not (no offense intended) be as interested in what you see in the feed as you would be interested in seeing some of your select connections posts and articles. 

For all those reasons, bookmarking, or saving your preferred connections activity profile as a favorite on your web browser, will help you. Watch this quick video and I’ll teach you how: https://youtu.be/6R_I5VgkFTk

Prospecting / Finding Relevant Connections

For 9 years I used LinkedIn exclusively as a research tool. My goal was to learn more about companies and the employees who worked for them, so I could try and earn their business. One of the ways to maximize your search and not waste your free search limits, is to always take advantage when you can of the advanced search filters. Never include 1st degree people in your search for example, by picking the 3rd level connections. You want to always start with 3rd level in free searches as I explain in the video I will share with you in a second, because when you run out of free searches, you can no longer choose 3rd level again, until the following month when you get a reset.

You can use industry, job title, location, and a host of other things to help narrow down the search too. 

Don’t waste your free searches by being vague and then clicking through page after page of the results. Each click of “next” will count against your limit.

Watch this video for tips on how to search like a pro on LinkedIn: https://youtu.be/2li1KudsMtM

Message People for Free

I used to spend money for LinkedIn Premium, simply so I could send prospects messages on LinkedIn, via what they can an InMail. Now I have a free account because I learned how to message people for free, via a connection request or through common group membership, via the group membership directory. Want to learn how to do it and save money? Watch this video and I’ll teach you how: https://youtu.be/uyhseDPe2UQ

Adding New Connections

When you have a smaller network, I recommend that you add pretty much everyone, why, because you have 30,000 openings and the more 1st degree connections you have, the more 2nd and 3rd level connections you also have, which helps your posts and comments go much further. If you find a weirdo or a troll who is rude, you can remove them at any time. I think many are afraid of open networking because of the access you are giving them to your contact info, but I would say don’t share any contact information that you don’t want to be public, then you can add away and grow much faster.

A larger network will help your message travel farther. When you get to the maximum, then you’ll need to adjust your strategy about who you add and who you keep.

Weeding Network

As you grow and bump up against the network connection cap, one way you can make space is to pour through your connections and look at a couple things. Look at title, look at number of connections, look at number of mutual connections. Consider if you’ve ever interacted with any of them on the platform.

Take all of that into consideration and then remove the redundant ones, who you never interact with. So for example, let’s say you have one who has 139 mutual connections and a title of something that’s common and they’ve never interacted with you, and another who has 2 mutual connections, the same title and has never interacted with you and they both have roughly the same network size. Who do you remove? I remove the one with the 139 mutual connections as a connection, then I go and follow them right away. The removed connection then stays in my feed but I open a connection slot. 

Why do I not keep the one with more mutual connections and remove the other? Because they have less mutual connections with me, they are actually helping me reach more people. 2nd level and third level connections are valuable. I want to reach as many parts of LinkedIn as I can. So having high mutual connections is not as helpful as someone with few or no mutual connections. That is counter intuitive and many struggle with it, but the less commonality, the more extra exposure a connection offers you. Mutual connections are common branches. You want to find new branches. The more branches the better.

Connection Requests

Who do you add as a connection request? When you open slots, you want to consider a few things: Where are they from? What do they do? How many mutual connections do they have? Are they a potential future customer? Do they engage with your posts already? You have to determine what makes a connection more valuable to you.

Things to help you choose:

Location is important for two reasons, the time zone and the exposure of people that it brings. Hypothetically let’s say you’re from Australia and that you have limited connections in the UAE. If you accept a connection request from there, you’ll now have a better shot of getting engagement from many professionals in that region. You’d be picking up value by adding the new connection from the UAE, the larger their network the more exposure you’d be adding.

Why does that matter? Think of your posts like a beach ball that are bounced in the air. If you don’t have all the time zones covered, your beach ball will eventually fall to the ground because there won’t be anyone in a time zone that is awake to keep interacting with your post. I have the globe covered in spades and can keep a post active when I’m asleep just as easy as when I’m awake. If you want bigger vanity metrics, this is key.

What they do is important because you can tap into other pockets of users, by diversifying your network. If you have 300 recruiters in your network and no hairdressers, and you get a request from a recruiter and a hairdresser, you should go with the hairdresser all other things being equal.

You want diversity, not conformity.

Potential customers always take precedence. Why? You’re building a network auspiciously to generate revenue. If your prospect sends you a connection request, ALWAYS MAKE ROOM.

Wrapping it Up

Making the most of LinkedIn isn’t that hard if you follow the steps in my previous article and combine it with what I just taught you here. You can manage your time wisely, make the most of your connections and grow like a weed. If you have a specific question, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me in the comments. I respond to almost all of them. Follow me for more. I suggest you also join my group #ProjectHelpYouGrow here: https://www.dhirubhai.net/groups/13615449/ as my group members always get priority on LinkedIn from me.

Thank you for reading. I appreciate your feedback and if you liked it, please consider sharing it here on LinkedIn too.

Resources to Reference:

1.      How to Grow & Excel on LinkedIn: https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/how-grow-excel-linkedin-ira-bowman/

2.      Ira Bowman’s profile page: https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/ira-bowman/

3.      Ira Bowman’s YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjsuVOVx3vG5jYCH5xPs3bg

4.      Maximizing Post Performance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vuz5hK5-1Pg

5.      Page Visit Limitation Advice: https://youtu.be/tQgwdl-JOEg

6.      How to Bookmark Favorite LinkedIn Connections or Contributors: https://youtu.be/6R_I5VgkFTk

7.      How to Message People for Free on LinkedIn: https://youtu.be/uyhseDPe2UQ

8.      Join #ProjectHelpYouGrow on LinkedIn: https://www.dhirubhai.net/groups/13615449/

9. Free Job Search Assistance: https://ProjectHelpYouGrow.com