LinkedIn Marketing Made Easy: A Step-by-Step Guide

How to quickly attract and convert high-value leads your business needs right now

Reports show that 65% of businesses say generating traffic and leads is their top marketing challenge. (quicksprout.com)

So how can we solve your lead generation problems so that you can easily attract and convert high-value leads for your business in 2021?

If I were to focus on just one online platform in 2021 then it would be LinkedIn. If you want to start generating targeted leads on LinkedIn for free every day, it’s 100% possible.

Here is my proven 5-step formula for easily generating high-value leads using LinkedIn for free.

Why LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is often overlooked by entrepreneurs and consultants when it comes to digital marketing. 

There are typically 3 myths that stop marketers from using LinkedIn over other more popular platforms:

Myth #1 – It’s mainly a career and job recruiting network. It can’t be used for lead generation.

Myth #2 – It’s too small. You’re better off on larger networks like Facebook and Instagram to generate leads.

Myth #3 – You can only connect with people you know personally.

None of these could be further from the truth.

LinkedIn is the world’s premier business network with over 760 million people across 200 countries. Here are some impressive statistics about why you want to be on LinkedIn:

• 75% of all registered LinkedIn users have incomes over $50,000, and 44% have incomes over $75,000. (neilpatel.com)
• 60% of decision-makers are on LinkedIn and 40% of millionaires use LinkedIn.

That’s impressive. You have both high-income and key decision-makers on one professional platform. This is important if you want to sell high-ticket products or services. 

Lastly, LinkedIn outperforms rather social networks for lead generation according to a study by Hubspot involving over 5000+ businesses, both for B2B and B2C firms.

So How Do You Use LinkedIn for Business?

So let’s help you set up an easy to use the system to attract and convert high-value clients using LinkedIn.

Step 1: Optimise your profile

If you want to be visible and credible on LinkedIn be sure to optimise your profile. If you are an All-Star profile on LinkedIn then you get 3x more traffic and profile views. Here are 5 of the most important parts of your profile that you need to get right to make it irresistible to your ideal future clients.

1. Your Profile’s Visual appeal– The first thing a prospect will see is your profile photo and your profile background. 
2. Your LinkedIn Headline– These are the series of words that come below your picture. Many people mistakenly just have their company name and job title. Use these 240 characters (not words) judiciously as they will determine how you show up in LinkedIn’s search algorithm. Think in terms of SEO and use keywords that you’d like to be found under.

Over 6.7 billion searches are being done on LinkedIn every year. Are you showing up? 

3. The About Section– The About Section is a key area that helps you convey your authority, credibility and expertise. Don’t make it like a CV about you. Instead focus on the type of ideal clients you help, what problems you solve, the solutions you provide and most importantly the kind of results you help achieve.  

• The first two sentences are the most important. Put your elevator pitch here. Make it client focussed. If this grabs the prospect’s attention then they will click on read more.
• Use the full 2600 characters that LinkedIn provides. Use icons and easy to read paragraphs. Have a clear call to action. How can people get in touch with you? Add your email id and phone number. Make it easy for people to reach you.  

4. Your Featured Section– You can add up to 5 media-rich links just under your About section. Consider putting PDF documents, video links or images with links to landing pages or your websites. Here are some I recommend:

• Lead Magnet
• Testimonial Video
• Product Hero Shot or PDF brochure with link to your landing page
• Google reviews or testimonial screenshot
• Case study
• Your popular LinkedIn post highlighting your expertise

5. Your Recommendations– This is social proof that you are good. Like Google reviews, LinkedIn recommendations matter. Have at least 5 recommendations from current or past satisfied clients.

Step 2: Prospect strategically

So what’s your LinkedIn biggest secret weapon?

Specificity.

LinkedIn allows you to build a pipeline of leads of hyper-targeted leads. This is the only social network that allows you to hyper-target at a depth unparalleled by other social networks. The more specific you are about your ideal clients you are the easier it is to find them on LinkedIn.

The free version of LinkedIn allows you to use 8 key filters in the advanced search fields including:

• The degree of connections 1st, 2nd and 3rd.
• The Job Title
• The type of industry and service
• The geographic location of the prospect
• The current company they work in by name
• The past company they have worked in by name
• The school or university they have attended.
• profile language

For example, if you want to find the CEO of a Software company based in Mumbai that attended an Ivy League school you can. That’s the power of LinkedIn.

No wonder Microsoft paid US$26 billion to buy LinkedIn.

This is why LinkedIn is the perfect option for highly targeted communication efforts to a very specific “micro” demographic with better opportunities for high conversion rates. (neilpatel.com)

With LinkedIn’s advanced search you can begin to quickly build a highly targeted network of prospects.

It’s best to start with second-degree connections. Set daily connection goals and send a personalised note with each connection request to get a high connection acceptance rate. 50 connection requests per day is a good number to aim for.

A 40% connection acceptance rate is good. Build your network proactively and strategically. You can have up to 30,000 first degree connections.

Step 3: Engage before connecting

Once you have shortlisted good prospects on LinkedIn, begin to engage with their content. Leave meaningful comments on their posts. This is a simple and powerful way to quickly become visible to prospects before sending them a connection request.

Thereafter, engage new connections with short conversational messages which elicit a response. It’s important that you don’t rush the process and immediately sell. 

You have to get new connections to get to know, like and trust you. I call it the KLT factor. This is one of the most important principles of social selling to your network.

You can’t rush it. It’s just like when you meet someone at an offline networking event. You need to have some small talk where you get to know each other. You can’t just meet someone and hand them your sales brochure after saying hello! 

Be generous and focus on helping people in your network. Ask for permission to qualify if the new connection is interested in a free resource that can potentially help them. This is a great time to share a valuable lead magnet or article.

Build credibility and trust in the process.

Step 4: Publish relevant content

Now you’ll have a powerful network, it’s time to showcase your authority and expertise by publishing posts relevant to your network. This will build your credibility and trust.

One of the most powerful features on LinkedIn is its publishing platform. (quicksprout.com)

99% of people on LinkedIn are lurkers. 1% of users create content. Compared to other social networks, LinkedIn offers a much higher organic reach.

Unpack your intellectual property through 3 types of content:

(a) Problem aware content – make prospects aware of the problems that they face. You will often be able to articulate the problems they face better. This builds empathy and will get your prospects attention.

(b) Solution aware content – this type of content makes prospects aware of the solutions you provide to their problems. 

(c) Results aware content – everyone finally gets paid for the results they help others achieve. It could be for their health, wealth, business or relationships. Show your network what kind of results you help your ideal prospects achieve.

A case study is the best way to showcase all 3 types of content in one real-life example. Publishing content will help you generate incoming leads.

LinkedIn gives you a variety of ways to post your expertise from text-only posts, image posts, video posts, live streaming (you need to apply for this), LinkedIn stories, polls, document posts and articles. Quality content helps you get noticed and build trust quickly. 

When creating content follow the 5 W’s of content marketing:

1. Who is the audience for this content?
2. Why do they care about it?
3. What will they learn from it?
4. How does it benefit them?
5. Where will they apply this information?

Here is a simple content formula that produces results: 60:30:10

Create 60% inspirational and anecdotal posts. 30% to showcase your expertise and 10% outright promotion of a specific offer. Unfortunately, some people get these figures mixed up to their detriment. 

Mix up the type of posts and be consistent.

“If content is king. Context is King Kong then consistency is the mother of King Kong!”

– Jeff Young

Step 5: Use direct messaging to convert contacts into contracts

“Conversation is the new lead.”

Ryan Deiss, Digital marketing expert,

Use the LinkedIn direct messaging system to start and nurture conversations.

There are 5 key stages of turning a new connection to a happy client:

1. They get to know you.
2. They get to like you.
3. They get to trust you.
4. You get them to qualify themselves as a prospect.
5. You convert them into a client. 

You can’t jump from 1 straight to 5. It is a sequential process.

It’s a social selling skill that can be learned. Keep things conversational and short. Deliver value and keep prospects engaged by asking relevant questions. Keep things focussed on your contact and not yourself.

Be authentic and helpful to keep the conversation moving forward from one stage to the next.

Keep track of your conversations on a simple excel sheet or a CRM. LinkedIn’s messaging system can be clunky.

Pro-tip: Communicate using technicolour. One way to stand out is by using things like GIFS, personal videos and voice messages. This will help you stand out from the sea of people who are too salesy and spammy.

Once you get prospects to step 4 then get them off LinkedIn and onto a Zoom call or a 1-1 meeting. The key to social media is to get them off social media. This is a point people often miss. For me, email works really well.

Messaging is a sure-fire way to proactively generate a lucrative pipeline of qualified leads. Rather than focusing on the ROI of networking, focus instead on the Return on Relationships (ROR). High-value products and services may require a longer time to fructify and therefore relationships are the foundation of these sales.

In Conclusion

Take these 5 steps and you will consistently generate leads using LinkedIn:

1. Optimise your LinkedIn profile
2. Prospect strategically
3. Engage before connecting
4. Publish relevant content
5. Use direct messaging to convert connections to clients

If you do these 5 steps consistently it will

• Elevate your personal brand and build trust quickly so that you shorten the sales cycle
• You will have top of mind awareness in your network which will result in referrals and direct business.
• You will be able to build a lucrative pipeline of qualified leads.
• Create new opportunities and profitable partnerships.

Want help to attract and convert high-value leads for your business? Book a free strategy call with me by clicking HERE.