This is why building your personal brand and your network on LinkedIn is SO important right now

It is easy to think that building your personal brand and your network is only relevant for the self employed, or business’s owners, but right now, more than ever, I believe everyone, including those who are employed, including those who have ‘safe’ jobs, should invest some time in LinkedIn, every day.

So, I’m Stefan and I’m the author of Business Networking for Dummies. I have, I believe, a strong personal brand and pretty good brand awareness with the people I want to be aware of me.

But that’s me. I want people to buy my books and I want people to book me for speaking gigs, so of course I spend time on LinkedIn, because that is where I’m likely to be found.

But what about people who don’t sell books or talk for a living? What about people who have jobs right now? What’s the point of them spending any time on LinkedIn?

These are, in my opinion, some very solid reasons to do so, both for your current position, and to provide some insulation against any turbulence which might come in your career and, let’s face it, a load of people who thought they had ultra safe jobs at the beginning of the year now realise that nothing is as secure as it looked, so this is important.

Sales

Whatever your role in the company, if the people in that company have strong personal brands and a strong network on LinkedIn, it can improve sales. Think about it from a potential or even existing customers point of view. Every time they log onto LinkedIn, there is a post, or comment, or article from one supplier, and silence from the others. Imagine what that is doing for brand awareness? Imagine what it is doing for the relationship if someone isn’t just posting but actually reading and commenting on that customer’s posts, demonstrating that you’re interested in them too.

Something that has been said to me, by people who have booked me for speaking gigs, is that they couldn’t ignore me. When they spent time on LinkedIn, I was there. When they posted something on LinkedIn, I had read it and left a comment. When it came to arranging their conference, guess who was at the front of their minds?

Ten to twenty minutes a day, looking for posts from your contacts and looking for new contacts who might be customers or suppliers or referrers or ‘just’ contacts and commenting on them is all it needs to significantly increase your visibility, and ten to twenty minutes a day is much more than most people are doing.

Brand awareness

As well as being visible, what if you post too? Either your own thoughts on something relevant to your industry or profession, or just sharing a relevant news story, with a few words about your opinion on it. This gives your potential customers and network the chance to see who YOU are, it gives them the chance to agree or disagree (and by the way either of which is great for your reach and growing your network) and it keeps the conversation going.

Every big opportunity starts with a little conversation. These opportunities to start conversations, and to keep a conversation flowing that you’re started before are so often lost.

Imagine this, imagine that every interaction with a potential or existing customer was NOT you asking them if they wanted to buy from you. Imagine if a load of those interactions were about relevant business matters, or news, or just stuff happening in your industry. Imagine how much easier it is to have those sales conversations when the conversation is already warm.

And from your employer’s side too, if they are posting from their company page and not only do you share their posts, but you actually have an engaged network to share them to, how much more valuable is that to them? Your profile tells your network who you work for and you regularly share posts from them. That has huge value, even if your employer doesn’t immediately see it.

Personal brand awareness

Your personal brand matters. Just imagine from your existing employer’s point of view, if you have a strong personal brand and a strong network here on LinkedIn. That on it’s own makes you more valuable as an member of the team. Those connections, that you have nurtured, have value, particularly if they are YOUR connections and you have the relationship. Put you up against someone else in the organisation where every other measuring factor is broadly identical, and, your network gives you an advantage. Put bluntly, your employer won’t want to lose that.

And should the worst happen and you find yourself needing a new opportunity, how much simpler will that search be if a) you have build a large number of relevant connections in your industry and b) you’ve put effort into building a personal brand. You go from anonymous and the first time someone hears from you is when you’re looking for a job, to “oh yeah, I know Steve, he has commented on a load of my articles recently”, or “oh yeah, Sharon, she seems really up to date with what’s going on”.

I get the impression, and from what people have said to me, that they only consider LinkedIn useful if either someone owns their own business, or they’re looking for a job right now. Invest some time in it as a medium to long term plan instead, particularly if you don’t want or need anything from your network right now. Become part of the community and build your own community. It will benefit you and your existing employer right now and into the future.