Latha Karthigaa, a B2B and LinkedIn specialist, recently spoke to The Networking Group’s online meeting about the power of LinkedIn marketing and shared some helpful tips for making the most of the platform.
While her advice focused on solopreneurs, it can also be extended to small businesses too.
Your new website
Latha starts off by explaining that it’s practical to think of your LinkedIn profile as your “new webpage.” Rather than a website, LinkedIn is the first place professionals go if they want to learn about you and your business.
For perspective, LinkedIn has nearly 830 million users, with 9 billion impressions per week, but only around 3 million users actively post. This means that if you post, you could be getting 3000 impressions.
On top of that, 80% of B2B leads come from LinkedIn. In other words, LinkedIn presents a wealth of opportunities for solopreneurs and businesses to promote their brands.
To make the most of LinkedIn, Latha suggests you consider the following:
Your goals
Decide what you ultimately want to use LinkedIn for. Is it to generate leads, or are you looking to promote awareness of your brand? While you can give more weight to one or the other, both will ultimately benefit from a strong profile.
Before working on your profile, it’s important to consider your strategy and your audience. Latha points out that audiences are often dynamic—the demographic you target today may not be the same as the one you target next week. As such, you must be sure to constantly understand your demographic, and any shifts that occur and adjust your strategy as necessary.
Optimising your LinkedIn profile
The basics of a good profile are a professional photo, which will, on average, lead to 14 times more views, having your education and prior experience clearly displayed, and having skills and endorsements.
Skills and endorsements are a shortcut for viewers to immediately understand what you’re capable of and who you are.
Understanding the algorithm
When optimising your profile, you need to understand how the algorithm pushes you into people’s feeds.
The algorithm favours “complete” profiles above all else. This means having all information fields filled in and a minimum number of connections.
Next, it looks at what connections you have in common, going from mutuals to 2nd-degree and 3rd-degree connections. Finally, it looks at what groups you have in common.
Recommendations
Latha ends off with a few recommendations. First off, she emphasises the importance of having two-factor authentication. If your profile gains esteem, it will be a target for hackers. Next, you should always keep your tagline simple and updated.
In terms of posting, it’s best to post videos, which generate the most engagement behind polls (the later have the highest engagement of content on LinkedIn). You should post regularly. Latha suggests once a week or once every two weeks.
The best days to post are Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday however Latha notes that recently her company has been seeing success with Friday afternoon posts performing well over the weekend.
Finally, it’s essential to be active in groups. This allows people to become familiar with you and will see your account showing up in more feeds. Don’t hesitate to connect with valuable contacts. As Latha explains, the days of only connecting with those you know personally are over.
Conclusion
With these helpful tips, you can begin optimising your LinkedIn profile and enjoying the compound effect—the greater your reach, the faster it will grow.
One of Latha’s last points was to explain that webinars, like those regularly hosted by The Networking Group, are an excellent way to build authority. Keep an eye out for upcoming TNG webinars, polish that LinkedIn profile, and get ready to network.
TNG ConnectNZ Online
TNG features members on our online group each fortnight. For further information contact us here.
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