Five Ways to Optimize Your Business Page on LinkedIn

Having a strong online presence is incredibly important in our lives these days, not only personally, but professionally as well. LinkedIn is a great professional social media platform that you can use to network with other individuals who you might not connect otherwise. It is also a great resource for generating more engagement with your business if you know how to utilize it to its full potential. Below, we’ve given you five tips to optimize your business page on LinkedIn, in order to expand your reach and improve your personal brand.?

Choose The Right Profile and Cover Pictures

First impressions are very important, you’ve probably heard this before, and it rings true for your LinkedIn profile just as much as it does offline. In order to show that you are professional and competent, you need to pay close attention to your profile and cover pictures.?

For your profile picture, make sure you are wearing professional clothing, and that you are in front of a background that isn’t distracting or somehow inappropriate in a professional setting. If you can, have it taken with a high-quality camera, although cell phone cameras are getting to be higher quality with each new model, a real camera will ensure that you get the most professional shot. Be sure to shoot from the waist up, photos shot from far away will make less of an impact on those who visit your page.?

When it comes to cover photos, it varies depending on your specific business, but a good rule of thumb is to choose a high-quality photo that will not distract from the actual content on your page. It is also important that the photo is cropped to fit the correct dimensions, so that part of the photo won’t be cut off or distorted in a way that will make your page look unprofessional.?

Share Interesting and Relevant Content

Have you ever been to someone’s LinkedIn page hoping to learn something about them and their business, only to find their page littered with unimportant content and links to irrelevant articles that don’t tell you anything about them? Many people struggle with what exactly to post on LinkedIn, it can be difficult to know what to post in order to engage people visiting your page, while still keeping their content professional.?

Sharing industry knowledge is a great place to start when it comes to sharing content with those who will potentially be visiting your page. It’s always smart to be able to prove your credibility, and by proving you are an expert in your particular field, you are more likely to draw positive attention from people who are less experienced in your field but would like to learn more. This can easily transition into your becoming a thought leader, which will make you stand out to others and will positively affect your ability to network with people both in and out of your particular industry.?

Once you’ve established yourself, it is a good idea to begin sharing more personal content that can still be related to your business. Use your own judgment on how much you’d like to share, as LinkedIn is professional, it is not the place to post more casual family content like the type you might post on Facebook or Instagram. However, if you occasionally choose to share snippets of your home life with your followers, this will humanize you to people, and will further strengthen the relationship between you and anyone who may be browsing your page.?

Lastly, a good thing to remember is that if you want to post links to other content outside of LinkedIn, it is important that you add your own content with it, rather than posting just the link itself. Dropping random links onto your page is not only impersonal, but it can be unclear as to why you are sharing the link in the first place. Adding a bit of your own content to a link will likely draw more attention to the content you’ve linked, while also showing your followers why you chose to share that link with them.?

Join Groups to Expand Your Professional Network

Networking is a huge part of the corporate world, both online and offline, and LinkedIn is a great place to connect with people who run similar businesses to your own, who you might not meet otherwise. A great way to expand your professional network is to join a group on LinkedIn, you can join a group of people who are similar to you, or you can join groups with people who have businesses that are very different from your own.?

Utilize LinkedIn’s Features to Encourage Engagement

LinkedIn, like all social media sites, has many features you can use in order to draw more traffic and encourage engagement on your page. One simple feature you can easily utilize is commenting on other people’s content. By commenting, not only are you showing your interest in what they post, which might lead them to visit your page as well; but you are also drawing attention from their followers to your own profile. Be sure to comment something relevant, which will further encourage people to engage with you and your page.?

Perhaps the most important feature to utilize on LinkedIn, especially when making professional connections, is messaging people in the inbox feature, and messaging them back promptly. Don’t be afraid to reach out to someone you might want to learn from or to message someone you think might be a good addition to your professional network. If they respond, it is smart to respond to them within the week, though messaging them back before that would likely result in a quicker connection.?

Share Visual Content

With Generation Z entering the professional world, posting engaging visual content is more important than ever. In order to keep up with this generation, and to generate engagement from a younger audience to your page, you should concentrate on posting more visual content.?

Sharing videos, on relevant industry topics is a great way to start this, as those who interact with your page are more likely to watch a video that only lasts a few minutes, rather than read a long article that takes much longer to comprehend. A lot can be lost in writing, so a good way to ensure you are getting your point across is by posting clear, short, video content that will engage your followers and encourage traffic from those who are not already following you. When it comes to the actual content of your videos, make sure that they are on relevant topics, and that you begin them with a strong hook. People decide if they want to watch a video within three seconds, so it’s very important to grab your viewer’s attention so they don’t simply continue scrolling.?

Remember that when you post visual content, it is important if you are using hashtags to only use one. Bogging down your post with hashtags could take away the emphasis and importance of your content, and it could be distracting to your older followers who may not fully understand why you have an entire page of hashtags following your visual content. Although hashtags can be a good tool to draw more people to your page, it is important to use them sparingly, so as not to distract from the actual content.?

Another form of visual content you can utilize is blog posts, which combine visual elements with written content. Rather than posting a long article with no pictures or interesting visuals to keep a reader’s attention, blog posts can include visual aids which can help emphasize your points while ensuring your reader stays engaged with your content.?

LinkedIn is an important tool in the professional world, it can help you make connections, establish credibility, and reach people who might otherwise never know of you and your business. By keeping our tips in mind and utilizing LinkedIn to the fullest potential, you are likely to see your efforts pay off for your business.