How to Harness the Power of LinkedIn to Grow Your Business

How to Harness the Power of LinkedIn to Grow Your Business

Similar to other popular social media platforms, LinkedIn is the place where users connect with each other. But unlike other platforms, LinkedIn has earned its reputation as the “more serious” social website; it is not for those who simply want to post pictures of their new goldfish and get more Likes, but for professionals to develop strong networks and establish credibility among partners and competitors alike. Instead of being an easy-going social media, LinkedIn acts as publishing or editorial channel. When used properly, it can be the foundation for business and professionals to start an exponential growth.

As of September 2016, there are more than 460 million accounts on LinkedIn; 106 million of which are active users. The way LinkedIn works is just about the same as other social media. You create a profile, publish it, and try as best as you can to build a network with all tools provided. With such a massive amount of accounts, you will need to do just a bit more than anybody else to make your profile effective. An account should not sit dormant; it must be active and dynamic to amplify its effects. LinkedIn is mainly filled with employers, job seekers, and business owners, so you need to get serious and creative to take all potential networking advantages. LinkedIn also has dedicated company page separate from personal profile. There are many ways to intensify LinkedIn’s networking benefits, and here are some of the best you can try.

1: Build Quality Networks

LinkedIn allows you to send someone a request to connect, but it does not mean that you can randomly send requests to just about anybody and wish for optimum results. It is good to have more people connected to your profile, yet it is better if all of them are quality people with legit background. Before you send requests to others, please make sure to check the summary of their career history and their connections (150 or more connections should be the bare minimum requirement). Profile picture also plays a role; if the picture looks professional, the person probably is. Proper combination of all those three factors increases the chance of getting a response. Another good thing is that if you connect with a person who already has considerable connections, you can more easily expand your network afterward.

Connect with people relevant to your business, as they are more likely to expand their networks as well. Add them to your newsletter list, and if needs be, display your personal email and mailing address once they accept. If you are careful in choosing the right profiles to connect, chances are you get low unsubscribe rate. Once your requests get accepted, do a simple follow up by sending message. It can be a note to express your gratitude added with invitation to a meeting or other events that potential lead to fruitful relationship. Do not wait until people send you message; if you send the request to them, they expect you to do the follow up, not the other way around.

2: Advanced Search 

If you are a business owner and want to develop wider customer base, use the Advanced Search feature. It allows you to filter search results by industry, position in company, demographic, company size, etc. Instead of just browsing through millions of names and profiles, Advanced Search is more time-efficient. Consider LinkedIn a marketing tool; if you have the money to invest a little bit more, sign up for Premium option to get more tools to reach more potential customers.

3: Alumni Groups

For first-time users, LinkedIn provides the best tool to start your way up quickly: Alumni Group. Even if you did not know everyone in college or high school, the Alumni Group at least gives you chance to connect to people who knew enough about you. It means they are willingly to connect and help expand your networks/business. There must be at least several of those who knew you back then, and it should be easier to introduce your products/services to them. Also, Alumni Group presents new opportunities to build new professional relationships with old friends.

4: Blog on LinkedIn

Regardless of how small or big your brand is at current date, online presence helps elevate your popularity and friendliness to potential customers. One of the best things about LinkedIn is how easy it is to use the platform for blogging (LinkedIn Pulse). You can even use the same content on both your blog and LinkedIn page, as you will connect with different people in each platform. Each time you post something on LinkedIn Pulse, your connections receive a notification. Well-crafted content that provides useful ideas or insights worth reading can only gives a boost to your credibility.

For business owners, blogging has always been a content marketing tool that helps increase credibility. As long as you post quality contents relevant to your business, people will think of you as an authority in the field; you know enough about your products/services and convince people that you can help them. Blogging is not just about posting articles and images, but you can also post PDFs and slideshow presentations. The main point is to showcase your works, achievements, and ideas. If you appear to have the necessary expertise in the business niche, clients and other brands are more likely willing to work with you.

In times when you have nothing substantial to post, you can stay active by commenting in groups. Join as many groups as possible, as long as you can manage to stay active in all of them. Sometimes, you also have to take the imitative to start discussion. Do not just be a commenter, but also a thread starter.

5: Profiles’ Email Addresses

If you take a closer look at how profiles are created on LinkedIn, you may notice that some (if not most) users associate their emails with LinkedIn accounts. The good thing is that you can contact those connections directly without going through the platform over and over again. In case your connections are in a country where email works differently (for example in China where censorship is more prevalent), communicating through LinkedIn will do.

The caveat is that LinkedIn does not allow you to only download the email address of a profile, which is understandable, and you must export the entire library of connections at once. To do this, follow these steps: Connections → Settings → Advanced Settings → Export LinkedIn Connections. You can download the contacts in .VSF or .CSV format and integrate them with the email agent of your choice such as Gmail, Outlook Express, Microsoft Outlook, Yahoo, or Address Books (in Mac OS). Because you have to download them all at once, you may need to sort them manually later based on company, business fields, professions, and so on.

6: Targeted Ads

When it comes to ads targeting, Facebook was probably the first to cross the mind. However, LinkedIn provides the same feature with improved accuracy. Custom ad settings allow you to target very specific details such as job title at certain companies and areas of business. Once you figure out the list of companies with which you want to do business, create professional banner ads to attract their attentions.

Let us not forget that the whole idea of LinkedIn to facilitate everyone’s needs to build strong networks and develop businesses, so it is only fair to also contribute to others. The goal of LinkedIn is to make meaningful connection to grow not only your own business, but also others. Connect with people who will benefit from knowing you as well; that way, your professional networks will grow stronger and products/service should give more values to customers. LinkedIn is not meant for your own interests, but the entire business world where owners, customers, and partners can build long-term community to benefit everyone involved. LinkedIn has a lot of potentials, and it is only true if you take advantage of them in appropriate way.

Hope this was Helpful....

xoxo Haley Fox

Internet Coaching Club