HOW TO GET LINKEDIN OPTIMIZED FOR 2020 - TOP 10 TIPS TO SHOWCASE YOUR BUSINESS

Recently, I was talking to my community about how: 'I feel that there is someone out there listening who is extremely spiritually open and I can see your third eye open. I can see your crown chakra open and how we're meant to be working together'.

I had three of you in particular message me and just pour your heart out as to just why you know that it was you. And isn't that just so interesting? I could feel your vibration and that your energy was just open and I could feel that. And each of you have gone on to sign in either to Amplify or to work with me in an hour of power. And all of you have said that you're gunning for working in the higher level Own Your Hustle Mastermind later on this year.

So this is just so cool. And I wanted to share it with the wider community that all of us have this ability to tap into a vibration around who's listening and who is there. I could go very deep here around the rituals of how I actually create my content, but also how I know who's around and who's watching and who's listening.

So when someone comes to me with a discovery call or an email or a message, it's not a surprise. It's almost like, 'Oh yeah, I've been expecting you (in a non creepy Adams family kind of way), my soul recognizes yours and you're here. I'm excited, let's talk.'

And it's just always such magic.

Last weekend, out of my very first mastermind kickoff calls I woke up to 21 Voxers. Over the weekend from my incredible ladies just talking about launches, talking about streamlining their business processes, talking about hiring and firing, talking about pulling together a brand new book. And everybody was just in conversation supporting each other. All the ladies have really different niches. I have one who's in the restaurant business. I have another who's an author, I have another who is a business and life coach. I have another who's like a speaker and a speaking coach. I have another who helps individuals launch products on Instagram and sell out their products. So these are just all the different industries that we come from. But we all share a real kindred connection with one another around our dreams and our aspirations and elevating each other's focus - I think this is really where there's so much power in that mastermind.

And my dreams have been realized and I had to share it with you because you have seen the growth that I've been on through on this journey and now I can hand on heart say I'm a Mastermind Host!

Don't give up on your dreams, my love.

I had only hoped for it to be a 'one day' thing. This past week became my reality -> a high level bad-ass mastermind host. Can I let you in on my next level dreams? We've already talked about a part of my dreams - wanting to manifest what's going on with my dream retreat home. But there's more and I know every time I share my desires in the real world, including voicing it in my room or on a podcast episode, the universe conspires to make it all happen with ease.

Can we just say this aloud now:

The universe conspires to make it all happen with ease.

And as I'm sharing my dreams, my next level dreams - really start to bring yours to mind and think about these moments where you get to grasp and anchor them again. Sometimes in our day to day lives it can get really crazy and busy and we get into the step-by-steps and the routine of why we do certain things and then we forget. So this is a reminder to ground into your next level dreams.

There are five that I want to share with you:

1. I want to buy two to three retreat homes around the world. Because my human design is a Manifesting Generator, I am designed to manifest very specifically. There's also a non-specific Manifester. So if you want to find out more about that, go and check out human design. And I've always known I've had to be quite specific with my dreams because I don't necessarily link to the big picture. Whereas some of you might just be able to call that in and it all just falls into place. So I know my three homes are going to be in California, in Bali, and in Sorento, Italy. Saying that last one gives me goosebumps!
2. Continue working with incredible clients. In my two masterminds I have Amplify, which is now enrolling and I also have my Own Your Hustle Mastermind, which is the 12 month high level container. So I will continue building that out and working with incredible clients in that mastermind space.
3. I'm creating a million dollar passive income funnel for LinkedIn Brand Boss. So we're kicking this project off with a team very shortly and are we talking all about funnels very soon. Right now I'm in the midst of building that out and hiring an incredible advisor to help us with this. So watch out. This is like next phase, next level goodness in our business.
4. I am also with the help of my mastermind client, hoping to write a book hopefully in the next year or so. I started the book writing process before we had left for the world, we were still in Docklands, I was writing the outline of my book and I got so confused with where to next and that just kind of went on the shelf. Pardon the pun. But I'm going to hiring on my own mastermind client, Claire to be a mentor for me because she's a bad ass at writing books in less than 90 days. And she specifically helps people write nonfiction books.
5. I want to continue growing out beautiful memberships. I have an incredible promo to come and join the Own Your Hustle Membership - $14 for 14 days and we have just unlocked so much goodness. You are the first to hear about this in the community. Not only do you get monthly classes, monthly live Q and A threads and you have me answering your questions. Live as your coach and the entire community. We have just put in so many courses in the membership itself including Ignite which is perfect for you if you are starting your coaching business and you're wanting to know where to begin. This is just one of those courses that has ignited, which is why I called it this, so many new coaching practices and also I've put in there LaunchedIn which is a really great baseline for you to begin your LinkedIn branding and personal branding journey. Anyway, that is all in the membership. You can come and check it out for $14 that is insane for 14 days. And then it rolls into a $97 membership, which is just so insane for the value that you're getting in there.

And my vow to you in that membership is to help you get to your first $5,000 a month and beyond, but also at the same time, helping you really align to what you're building and get really clear on your niche, your customer value proposition, your marketing and social media plan. So it is very strategic. This month we're talking all about selling and sales and how to actually elevate your sales pitches and how to actually start making those first couple of sales. So if that's for you, the membership is just going to be the absolute perfect fit.

But today I also wanted to be able to share with you my LinkedIn predictions for 2020 I probably should have written this in January, but you know a lot of us are saying that it feels like the year really started when Chinese New Year started. It really felt like when the lunar new year started was when all the energy cleared and we were like ready to go all in. Can I get like an amen to that?

Here are my top 10 predictions but also what's hot on LinkedIn.

So if you're just starting out or maybe you've given LinkedIn a bit of a go, this is going to be a really great article for you to see how you can change up your strategy to fit 2020 if that makes sense. Or even fine tune it. Just that little bit because it's like that 1% rule - like the English team in the Tour de France, they did this 1% change where they started to sleep on more comfortable pillows at night so all of their riders would get a better sleep. And with just that 1% change, they went on to win the Tour de France.

I just love that story so much. So this is like the analogy of like let's switch pillows and see what happens and if it makes a bigger change in your LinkedIn strategy down the track.

1 - ARTICLES

They have had an awesome revival. We try and post an article at least once a week or at least once a fortnight, which is based off a podcast actually. And it's how a lot of my listens happen organically and people find my podcast this way. But I've had over 10,000 new followers come through since upping our articles game. And it has also created deeper conversations in the DM and lots of shares of my articles as well. So whilst the likes and the comments seem lower off articles, the relationship and the conversation is a lot deeper thanks to articles.

So I'm pretty stoked about that. Shout out to the latest article on my feed today, which was a guest in our previous podcast episode - Gillian Mulholland is on fire with articles at the moment. So go and check out Gill's LinkedIn profile and you will see her recent articles that she's written about self love and being a badass and you know, just kicking butt with self-worth. Shout out Gill, love you so much!

2 - NEWSLETTERS

Newsletters are currently still in beta testing, much like LinkedIn live. I will get to LinkedIn live shortly. Beta testers for newsletters - I'm experiencing amazing results with connection outside of the LinkedIn platform. So I'm loving seeing these hit my inbox directly. You can actually subscribe through the platform and it's a really great feature if you don't have your own EDM system or strategy. I currently have mine through Kartra official and I love what Kartra does, so I don't need LinkedIn newsletters, but if you are just starting out, this could actually be a really great option for you. Newsletters are awesome because once someone subscribes off LinkedIn, they actually give you the the green light to show up in the inbox. And this is like your Gmail inbox, not your LinkedIn inbox.

So whenever I do subscribe to LinkedIn newsletters, I really mean that, I want to see their content - like Quentin Allums. If you don't know Quentin, he is a top voice on LinkedIn and he's just such a dude. I believe he's from Milwaukee and I love his articles so much about branding, personal branding in particular. So go and check out Quentin, type him in the search and subscribe to his newsletters. I highly recommend them.

3 - PICTURE POSTS

Chances are people are stopping to have a read over watching your videos read. Read that again, listen to that again. Chances are people are stopping to have a read of your picture posts, presuming that it's a picture alongside text over watching your videos. So the reason for this is videos can sometimes seem a little hard to stop in on when let's say you're at work. So thinking about your LinkedIn demographic, a lot of them are still in their nine to fives. They're not able to plug in and listen to what you're saying. So they might actually have the intention of wanting to watch your videos, but they scroll because they're not able to plug in at that period of time. But if it's a picture with a post, they're likely going to stop and have a quick scan. If it catches their eye, then they're going to want to read what's in the post and you have a lot more clickability as well through picture posts.

Gary Williams, he has a really cool background in startups and entrepreneurship. Recently he posted a really cool gallery post that showed up on my feed of a startup event that he ran last weekend. And that caught my eye. I flicked through the gallery, I could see a full house, I could see him on the stage, I could see his post about what he was doing in the startup community and it was just awesome. So it made me stop and read and click through and message him eventually and then tag him in into LinkedIn post to say, Gary, awesome dude.

I love seeing that. So consider putting in more picture posts if you're just doing pure video at this point in time.

4 - VIDEO POSTS

Especially if you are a newbie on LinkedIn, I still favor the video because the algorithm still will push your videos over the top of articles and newsletters at this point in time.

For those of you that have tested the waters with LinkedIn, but if you have never ever, ever posted, or if let's say you posted like six months ago, then you dropped off and you fell off the band bandwagon #brandwagon, you want to restart it, go with video posts and, but what I will say is please keep them really short under three minutes tops, three minutes tops. And if you're going with three minutes, please use subtitles.

The video that I saw on my feed today, it was from my private client, Erin O'Donoghue. Shout out Erin from the Hive, Erin and I had a chat last week on a 1:1 call and voilà Erin's video and her gorgeous face showed up on my feed. So welcome Erin! Brand new to LinkedIn. Applause there!

5 - VOICE DMS

It's such a game changer since it came out and no one is using it except me! I'm sure this is more people, but okay, so you know how you can voice people on Facebook and Instagram? Oh my gosh. You can do it on LinkedIn as well. Did you know this? It's free to use. I have no idea why more people aren't using this. Honestly. Every time I do it, we just have the best conversations on LinkedIn. If you're saying to me, 'Oh, LinkedIn, there just isn't a community there and it's really hard to get to know someone'. I bet you 1000% you've never used DM.

So give that a go. Try it out. The last beautiful person I messaged was Natasha Curry on there. We had a great chat so I'm very excited to see more of you or hear more of you. Use voice DMS in reply.

6 - DO NOT SPAM

Following on from the last point ... and I just highly doubt anyone in this community would be doing this ... if you are copying and pasting sales messages and just spamming everybody with common messages or worse paying for LinkedIn Sales Navigator, which is the LinkedIn CRM and just copy and pasting and just changing the fricking first name and doing a mail merge - stop.

I remember, I studied that in eCommerce when I was at uni in 2007 and I'm like 'Ewww that works?' And to this day I still think that no, stop with the cut and paste. Just go in with a voice message if you really want to connect with someone and if you really feel you can serve them.

If not in the beautiful words of Ariana Grande - Thank you. Next.

7 - EXCESSIVE TAGGING

Excessive tagging is so 2019.

So I got a message this morning and someone said to me, 'Hi Ruby, I've tagged you in my post. It'll be really great if you could show it some support'. So I was like, okay, cool, let me have a look. Went to the post and this person had tagged 70 people. 70 people. And of course the post had like mega low engagement because it just feels like a group spam box and it was yuck.

So I'm not a fan of tagging. I never have been. And I don't mean this in terms of quality tagging where you meaningfully tag someone and you go, I am so happy this week cause I got to meet Tom and I had an amazing conversation with Dan, which then led me to meeting Sarah and Sarah introduced me to this CEO of X company. And shout out to you Marian, and just meaningful tags and beautiful.

But when you're just slapping it on there, hoping that one person in that tag blah-blah-blah box actually likes your work so that it turns up onto their feed - I'm not a fan of it and I have never done it.

I've still managed to build a badass community and incredible audience and my business has just been going gangbusters due to LinkedIn from not tagging.

8 - CAPTIONS

I am a big fan of captions. I was very slow to the game here. Let's admit it. I was slow. I was just like, 'Oh the captions, I just can't be bothered'. Anyway, finally got to the first round of LinkedIn Brand Boss and someone said, 'Why don't you do captions?' And I'm like, cause I'm lazy. So I listened and by LinkedIn Brand Boss round two I was like, 'Okay, I use captions and I'm actually really big fan of add subtitles'.

So Add Subtitles is the one I use. Some people don't like it, some people find it clunky, some people can't use it. I don't know what's going on there. I've never had a problem. I use an Apple - I'm a die hard Apple fan. I know. I'm sorry. I just am. They've sucked me in so big time. Someone who's been on our podcast before Holly Stevens has actually just come up with a new app and it's called Subbly, which looks amazing. I haven't tried it but shout out to Holly. So happy to support other entrepreneurs for sure. So captions are great because coming back to point number four with video posts, if you are doing a three minute video, even like more than a one minute video, just try and use captions because it'll definitely get way more engagement.

9 - FOLLOW OVER CONNECT

It's a thing y'all, it's a thing. So you know the button, when you search somebody and it says connect, you can actually change that to follow. So for those of you that have worked out that LinkedIn is a thousand percent mega, super duper magnetic, creepy land where you get lots of weird marriage proposals and just super mega creepers and stalkers. This has changed a lot for me because I changed my button from connect to follow so people can no longer just directly message me and creep on me. And it's just really such an awful part about LinkedIn.

But I choose to overlook that and not focus on that because those people that don't deserve a mention at all. But yeah, so I've definitely had some very intense stalkers on LinkedIn very recently and I've just obviously blocked and they've come back as someone new. And then they've messaged me again and I've blocked ... There's this one person, one guy who keeps applying for my coaching and he does like 10 applications a day. It's disgusting. And the things that he says in there is really disgusting. And you know, I'm like blocking and blocking and blocking, unfortunately type form doesn't block email names and whatnot. So my team's all over that now. I didn't have to even look at them anymore.

And to generalize, I think a lot of women get it more than men. Maybe I'll get like told off for that, but I do hear a lot more of women coping it on LinkedIn. So I just changed my button over from follow to connect and my follow account has also gone up because of that.

10 - LINKEDIN LIVE

Okay so, biggest flop of 2019. I was so excited. You guys know how excited I was to be a beta tester for LinkedIn live. I was like, this is a game changer. The very first LinkedIn live I did was really, really seen and I think we had like 50,000 views on my live stream, which is absolutely amazing. So promising. I don't know what the hell happened. And this happened across the board. I mean at first I was like, 'Oh my gosh, what if it's just me?' But everybody else who was a beta tester experienced this where the engagement just dived, just dived.

I could speculate on why that is and why live streams at the moment aren't fully set up for LinkedIn. So if you are fully invested into a LinkedIn live strategy into 2020 I'm not going to say don't do it because obviously we always want to be at the forefront of it. And I'll continue doing them, but just not as often as I thought I was going to be in 2020 but just really think about other ways in which you can leverage the algorithm. But right now if we're talking about exchanging time for attention, it's likely not going to give you the results that you were hoping for.

But LinkedIn in general is freaking amazing.

It still continues to be my favorite platform and a surprising platform for leads and people that go ahead and find me and reach out to me, especially more so on the PR press, speaker level - those that are wanting to collaborate on podcasts, more B2B work, especially at a company level.

It's awesome.

So, Linkedin predictions of 2020. As more features come out, continue to tune back in here, especially if you're a coach, a service based entrepreneur, a side hustler and early stage entrepreneur who's wanting to really try out a different platform outside of Facebook and LinkedIn.

LinkedIn Brand Boss, we'll be opening up again very, very, very shortly in which I'll take you through the magic of LinkedIn and how to grow your business on there. But let me know what your thoughts are.

In the meantime, share this and let me know what are you going to try more of?

What are you going to give more of a go and what further questions do you have?

Love you guys so much.

And remember, you can absolutely Own Your Hustle.

x

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