Don't let marketing or leadership stifle you on Linkedin

LinkedIn particularly is getting the most censor because it’s probably the only social network that the company is paying for employees to have an upgraded version of or Sales Navigator license. 

This makes both managers and reps feel there is a level of control given over to their current employer, and they should only be posting within company guidelines. 

But corporations do not own a salesperson’s profile (that will go with them to their next job for one), and these companies are missing out on the potential reach and exposure to buyers their 100s to 1000s of reps could be getting for the company

Sales teams as a whole can reach more people than Marketing can ever reach organically. And they can reach them in a more human way.

Across the board - B2C and B2B - buyers are more likely to trust individuals than a corporate brand, whether the individual is a family member, friend, reviewer, influencer, or John Smith on LinkedIn who makes a strong case. 

1. 92% of consumers trust recommendations from others, even people they don’t know, over branded content. 
2. According to the Edelman report, 63 percent of consumers trust influencers’ opinions of products “much more” than what brands say about themselves,
3. 51% of survey respondents say they trust user images because they're more authentic and trustworthy than brand-owned creative. (Brief from Mobile Marketer.)
4. In another survey, some 44% of the respondents across 5 markets use reviews for brand information, with 7 in 10 of these trusting the information they find.

Think of what this could mean if a company is able to get 100s-1000s of reps posting on LinkedIn consistently! 

You may be thinking, “Hey Jake, salespeople posting about a company is still a company posting.” You’re correct. That is what corporations need to get away from. They need to stop using reps to repost their company content elsewhere and empower them to just talk to their audience. 

Empowering reps to build an intentional (mostly uncensored) digital presence, means companies will have the opportunity to leverage a personal connection through their employees that they just can’t do as a brand. 

To help shatter this misconception, I’m going to break down what’s currently happening today, what corporations should be doing with LinkedIn, and how we get there. 

What corporations are doing today on LinkedIn

Again, many corporate heads and marketing departments aren’t against a digital presence approach on Linkedin. They just want it to fit into this cookie-cutter box that they’re used to. They’re used to the mouthpiece being Marketing and the Sales team being more behind the veil.

LinkedIn forces Sales to the forefront.

Add this “because it’s always been done this way” mentality with the fact that companies pay for upgraded LinkedIn accounts, and you get these Sales managers and leaders pushing back on their people and questioning when they put out content that isn’t “approved.” I cannot tell you how many hundreds of times I’ve heard this. But it isn’t these managers’ fault for following the rules and processes that they feel were placed on them and policed by their Marketing counterparts.

Marketing’s job moving forward has to be to educate Sales (and their own Marketing team) about this shift and opportunity that is LinkedIn: a platform that’s craving content, professional content, and content from real people.

What corporations should be doing

What if Marketing empowered their Sales team to create and engage? Not by giving them blog posts already posted in the company feed and not by giving them “pre-approved” content. That’s not teaching reps anything about how to connect with buyers on LinkedIn. 

“Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.”

It’s the same idea here. The corporations that figure this out and start shifting Marketing’s role to one that empowers are going to destroy on LinkedIn. 

Say your company has 100, 200, 1,000 sales reps with 2,000 connections each. If every single day, these 1000 sales reps connect with a potential 2,000 buyers in their circle with content - that’s A LOT of people. That’s 2 million potential buyers your company could be touching every day. The opportunity here is ridiculous.

How much do you spend on 2 million impressions on LinkedIn? $100,000? You could be getting these impressions for free, organically.

Here’s how we get there

Smart, forward-thinking corporations and marketers are going to figure this out and breakaway from this fallacy to control every rep’s content. Instead, they’ll be teaching them HOW to post. Teaching them what thought leadership looks like. Maybe start to provide regular courses to their teams on topics like “How to be a 27-Year-Old Thought Leader in Our Space.” Etc.

I remember when I was 26, I had a big packet of industries given to me to study and learn, and it was just a part of my onboarding. Why not make engaging on LinkedIn with these industries a part of onboarding? The Sales team is going to be talking to these buyers anyway. Why not empower them with more relevant talk tracks for online conversations?

I’m telling you. Your sales team can reach way more people one-to-one than Marketing ever can. This is our chance to reach buyers in a more authentic, human way.

Here’s how you get there

Cut the red tape and make this change in your Marketing and Sales organizations. Even if it’s not how things have always been done - especially if it’s not how things have always been done. 

From the data I referenced earlier, multiple surveys and studies say trust is more likely to be established between real people, not between a person and a brand. You have intelligent, capable people on your team. Let them build trust and relationships through LinkedIn. Let them build personal connections with buyers, become trusted advisors, and thought leaders in your space. The modern buyer is a digital buyer, and LinkedIn is where they’re at. 

-Jake Dunlap