Have you been struggling with how to use LinkedIn as a business owner? Do you want to raise interest in you, your business, your ideas, and get followers, requests to connect, or direct inquiries about opportunities?
LinkedIn is a great network for business professionals to make connections, and create new opportunities. It is also a prime platform for industries that are not necessarily B2B. And you don’t need to be a paying Prime member to take advantage of its tools to connect with potential customers.
The problem that many face when using the network to advance their agenda, is time. In fact, time and knowledge of a platform are two of the largest obstacles for many business owners when using any type of social media.
In this post I will share with you how to use LinkedIn in less than 10 minutes a day, and make a lasting impact.
Here’s how to use LinkedIn to make an impact:
• If you haven’t yet, join at least 5 LinkedIn Groups related to your industry, and where your potential target customers will also be. Search for groups with keywords related to your business. The beauty of LinkedIn Groups is that they can have thousands of members who are interested in the same thing (whether it be real estate, marketing, film & TV, writing, etc.), and sharing a post or message to a group has the potential to reach those thousands.
• Post a slideshow you created for your blog or another social media channel to your profile: share that slideshow with your LinkedIn groups. This creates authority. The more valuable and useful content you publish, the more you will establish yourself as an expert in your field or industry.
The more valuable and useful content you publish, the more you will establish yourself as an expert. Click To TweetTip: If you use Slideshare, you can choose the option to automatically post your slideshow to your profile. The media will show up beneath your summary.
• Comment on LinkedIn Group postings, whether it’s a supportive comment or additional insight on a topic. Anyone else who has liked or commented on the post, in addition to the author, will see your name in their notifications when they log-in to LinkedIn.
• Log-in at least every two days and take a few minutes to scroll through your home feed, and like several posts. Of course, if a post links to an article, take a quick read before you like it. Doing this puts your name in front of the people with whom you want to connect.
• Share content on your profile and to your groups with a summary: meaning don’t just post a link. Ask a question related to the topic, or add a summary of why you are posting the link.
Tip: Using a social media management platform like Hootsuite makes it easy to schedule and share to your LinkedIn groups, company page and personal profile.
• Republish a blog post on LinkedIn’s platform, Pulse. Look for an article that has “green content,” meaning it has value and is not time-sensitive. Republish it on Pulse with a new title, and a new cover photo.
You might find yourself making some edits as you read through it, which is even better as it will make it unique, depending on how much you edit. Remember to add a link with a CTA at the end to encourage readers to subscribe to your blog, or visit your site.
• Take a look at who’s viewed your profile, and if you’ve published posts, who’s viewed and interacted with your posts. Connect with or message those who’ve viewed your profile or posts, and send them a personal message. In your message, note that they read your [content title], and you thought they might be interested in another post [title, link]. Or, you can ask if they have any questions pertaining to the topic you wrote about.
If they didn’t view a post, visit their profile, and find something in common, and connect/message them. The point is to create a dialogue, and make a real connection. Don’t sell yourself. That comes later.
In Summary
Learning how to use LinkedIn for maximum impact, will generate new connections and leads for your business. If you do one or all of these actions each week you will definitely attract attention, get profile views, and generate some valuable business connections.
Over to you. What do you think? Let me know in the comments section below.
Note: Affiliate links have been included in this article.