Are you looking to market your business? Look no further than LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a wonderful place for networking and growing your business. LinkedIn can be used to build brand awareness and relationships with customers. Let’s dig into LinkedIn marketing today!

What Is LinkedIn Marketing?

LinkedIn is the most professional of the social media networking websites. It isn’t just for professionals and job seekers. From making connections and establishing partnerships to generating leads and boosting your brand awareness, you can do many things with LinkedIn. That’s why LinkedIn is a great addition to your digital marketing strategy. LinkedIn is different than Facebook or Instagram as it is a professional platform designed to help you establish and reinforce business relationships.

LinkedIn is a professional social network. It’s all about career development, professional connections, industry discussions, and other business-related activities. You can find customers, employees, and partners alike on LinkedIn.

Importance of a LinkedIn Marketing Strategy

Unlike marketing on Facebook, pushing your products or services on LinkedIn is frowned upon. That’s because LinkedIn is considered a social media platform for professionals. This is why it is important to have a marketing strategy specific to LinkedIn for your business. 

LinkedIn is great for creating new leads for your business. LinkedIn accounts for 80% of business-to-business leads, according to B2B marketers. 40% report seeing LinkedIn as their most effective channel for driving high-quality leads. 

How To Set Up Your Account

It’s time to get started. Follow these steps to success:

Step 1: Create A Company Profile

Your first step to LinkedIn greatness is to create a company profile. It’s completely free to start your own page. Select “create a company page”. You will have three choices for the business type: small business, medium to large business, educational institution, or showcase page.

Enter your company’s name. Upload an iconic image that showcases your brand. Keep it professional. 

Step 2: Fill Out Your Profile

Next, create an About Us section that explains your company. Be aware that LinkedIn has a character limit. Keep your description just under the limit. Try to remember to add keywords in this section. 

After that, add your website, industry, and any additional information below the About Us section. Be sure to add your physical location. This helps you stay connected with businesses in your local area. 

Step 3: Create Your Page

After you fill out all your information, check the verification box to confirm that you are allowed to operate the account on behalf of your business. Select “Create page.” You may receive an error message if your company page doesn’t meet the requirements, which includes having an actual company and business email. You may also be denied because you’ve exceeded your page creation limit.

Step 4: Post Content

Once you are up and running, it’s time to post content! We recommend that you post at least once a day on LinkedIn. Spread out posts daily also do well on LinkedIn. You can write an article, share an image, or upload a video. Do you post blogs on your website? Share them in a LinkedIn post to get more readers. We also find sharing inspirational posts like an inspirational quote or image does well on LinkedIn.

It’s important not to just post any old content. You will be up against many articles and competition on LinkedIn. Therefore, it’s important to create content that will stand out from the crowd. 

Step 5: Search For Individuals

All you need is one connection to make a lead! Search for your employees, friends, partners, and family. LinkedIn allows for a ton of customization in searches, so this makes it easy to find people who will be interested in your product or service. Get as many of your employees on LinkedIn as possible. 

Step 6: Join Groups

Another way you can make connections on LinkedIn is by searching for groups in your niche. These groups are a great place to create conversations and see what people are most interested in. For example, if you are a roof installer in the Missouri area, search for groups that have to do with roofing or other construction in the Missouri area. 

If you can’t find any pertinent groups, make your own! To get started, you’ll need to click on the “Create group” button in the “My Groups” tab. Then you’ll be directed to a fairly simple page that asks you to input a title, logo, and description for your new community. Like your company page, make sure that your description is short, accurate, and interesting enough to build interest.

Posting High Quality Content

If you notice, step 3 is to post quality content. Good content should accomplish two different things. First, it should show others how to solve a problem or do their job better. Second, it establishes you as a thought leader in that field. Both of these should naturally attract more leads. 

Good content includes things like post shares, blog shares, presentations, event promotions and portfolio work. Get creative. People’s attention spans on social media last only 2 seconds. Make those 2 seconds worth it!

Analyze Analytics

LinkedIn has its own analytics capabilities that show the impact of your content. These are wonderful, built-in tools for LinkedIn Marketing purposes. It can be a little overwhelming to look at at first, so let’s break it down in an easier way. 

You will want to look at 3 things: company updates, followers, and visitors. The correlation between your company updates and engagement data can clue you in on which types of content is working and what isn’t. The follower section of LinkedIn analytics provides insight into your audience. Here you can see your total number of followers, audience demographics, and trends in your growth. The visitor section of LinkedIn analytics gives you data about your company page, not your content. These data points include page views, unique views, and visitor demographics. 

These last two points help you see if your targeting works properly and if you need to adjust your content. Use these analytics to check how you rank against any of your competitors and optimize content correctly. Identify your target market so you can write better target-specific content in the future.

Final Words

If you are ready to ramp up your LinkedIn marketing, call us today at (314) 537-7974 or message us on our website or any of our social media. We are ready and waiting for you!

The post How To Use The Power Of LinkedIn Marketing appeared first on Razor Sharp Digital.

Are you a small business owner wondering how you can boost your business right now? Look no further than social media. Social media is marketing that you can get out right then, with no wait, and it is very effective. Here are a few small things you can do today that will boost your brand right away. 

Pump Up Your Bio

Refreshing your bios on social media is a great boost your social media presence. This is often the first impression to potential followers. Make your sure bio conveys what you do or what you sell. This space should also let people know why they should follow your account. 

A great visual for your header image and profile picture should show people what you do, as well. Do not forget to use keywords appropriate to your business in your bio, so it will show up in search results. Keywords with your location in them are great, but also add the location you are doing business in your bio. 

It’s also a good idea to add links to your website or use tools that allow you to have more than one click, like a linktree. A linktree allows you to highlight multiple links for people than just sending them directly to your homepage. 

Lastly, try to make your bio engaging. Remember, this is your first impression and your last impression if you don’t do it right.  

Consistency Is Key!

77% of small businesses use social media for sales, marketing, and customer service. We find that posting consistently helps to build trust and a relationship. When your followers know they can expect a blog every Monday, they know they can count on you as a reliable source of information. 

Create a social calendar that you can re-use every month. We like to create them in an Excel spreadsheet. There’s really no right or wrong way to make a calendar, so long as you make sure you stay consistent and create a system that works best for you. 

Some things you should include in your calendar each month are:

• Add in holidays.
• Put any events your business is having, like sales, webinars, or live streams. 
• Mark what days you intend to talk about certain topics or products. 
• List each day with whatever you have slated for that topic. For example, we like to post blogs on Monday, so everybody can have some light reading to get them back into the new week. It is good to at least plan a week or two in advance so you can have your content ready to go. 

Communicate With Your Followers

Whether you’re using Twitter, Instagram, or LinkedIn, communicating with your followers is a great way to boost your brand. If someone makes a comment on your post, like that comment and respond to them meaningfully in a timely fashion. You can start really great, detailed conversations about your product or service this way that will help to market your product or business. 

Additionally, direct messages are a great way to forge a deeper connection and go further than public comments. Direct messages can help you build a genuine relationship with folks, but it could take some time. Send a friendly note thanking folks for connecting with you. Make sure to check your messages often and respond. If you’re getting any spam messages, delete those. 

Leverage User Generated Content

User-generated content is one of the best ways to promote your products or services. People trust other people more than the claims of the brands themselves. With user-generated content, your audience will get honest feedback directly from other customers, which is a form of social proof. This helps to position your brand as trustworthy. 

Always be sure to give your users a platform on which they can brag about their purchases and boost your brand. It should be easy for your customers to share stories with your other followers about why they love your product or services. 

Communicate Your Product Or Service

This sounds like common sense, but it is something brands overlook often. Tell people what services or products you provide. Make sure you are sharing your shop. But also, make sure you have a balance between too much promotion and too little promotion. A great idea is to choose one thing you want to work on promoting each month. If you don’t have a ton of products or services, choose something like some evergreen content you can talk about. 

Let people know you’re selling, and how they can buy from you with Calls-To-Action (CTAs) in your text, such as “click this link to purchase.” 

Get On LinkedIn

LinkedIn is often overlooked for creating a deep connection with prospective customers, but it works! LinkedIn allows you to choose who you connect with, so any niche products or services can really be highlighted here to the crowd you want. Connecting with people you want to network with is the best way to go. 

Use Relevant Hashtags

Hashtag research is something you can quickly do to boost your brand and brand awareness. Use the obvious hashtags for your industry, but add in some more niche tags as well. Bonus points if you include your location!

An example would be a fashion company marketing a new dress with the following hashtags: #dress #clothes #dresses #dressdesign #dressesstlouis #cocktaildress #weddinguestdress #dressesmo #casualdress #fashion #style #outfit #dressesbybri #clothesbybri #stlouisdesigner. 

Change the hashtags based on the content that is being posted. You obviously don’t want to use #weddingguestdress when posting about your most recent company lunch (unless, of course, you are all wearing #weddingguestdresses!) 

Final Thoughts

So, which tip are you using today to boost your brand on social media? These tips are just a tiny handful of examples of things you can do. There are so many more ways to help your business grow with social media. If you are ready to see them, call us at (314) 537-7974.

The post Small Ways To Boost Your Brand On Social Media Right Now appeared first on Razor Sharp Digital.