LinkedIn is one of the most important and popular social media platforms nowadays. Because it is a professional network, it is also a great medium for businesses to promote themselves, share content or even spread their own culture.
However, LinkedIn is not really like your usual social media platform, especially for your business. In order to yield results from it, there are a set of unwritten rules and best practices most business pages follow.
In this article, we talk about a few tips and tricks you should keep in mind if you want your business to gather following on LinkedIn. We tried to step away from general knowledge such as what type of content to share, so we focused more on things people don’t think of at first.
Always remember that in online marketing, the best practice to grow your business is to be consistent in everything you do!
Write a great “About Us” Section
While visual appearance is also important on LinkedIn, remember what the platform is mainly used for. On LinkedIn, people connect and learn more about your business, so keep this in mind when writing your “About Us” section.
A great “About Us” section is around 2000 characters long, telling visitors everything they need to know about your business. Moreover, make sure you use accessible language. Not everyone on LinkedIn uses English as a first language.
To simplify even further, keep in mind these following questions. Your “About us” should answer them:
- Who are you?
- Where are you based?
- What do you have to offer?
- What are your main values?
- How can people contact you or learn more?
Also, remember that LinkedIn is a professional space, so tailor your content to a business-minded audience. This doesn’t mean it has to be boring, just plan accordingly and make sure you leave the memes and silly stuff for other platforms.
Collect and give endorsements
LinkedIn’s most powerful form of social and professional proof are endorsements. Overall, more than a billion endorsements have been given on LinkedIn so far. Try to gather as many recommendations as you can for your business. How can you do this?
Ask your employees
Encourage your employees to connect with your business on LinkedIn. Write your employees a great recommendation from your personal profile too. This way, they will be much more likely to endorse the whole business themselves.
Ask customers
Look for opportunities to create a dialogue with your customers and win an endorsement. Did they leave a comment on one of your posts, or messaged you with an inquiry? That’s a great opportunity to start a conversation!
Ask associates
76 percent of B2B buyers prefer to work with recommendations from their professional network. This is according to official LinkedIn statistics.
For every positive B2B interaction, there’s a great opportunity for a new endorsement. Make sure you reach out to them, connect with them on LinkedIn and offer a recommendation in return. This approach can boost both profiles.
Use the 4-1-1 Rule
Older marketers should be more familiar with this “4-1-1 rule”. This rule states that for every single post or piece of content about yourself, your business or your organization, you should share an update on your industry from another source and 4 pieces of content written by others.
This is a key tactic to keep your business feed centred around what your audience wants to see. In other words, your business profile page should not be only a place to talk about yourself. Remember why people are on social media in the first place: to unwind, to read about cool stuff or pass time.
For every post you write promoting your business or your product, share multiple helpful posts around the web. This is how you also boost your company’s credibility!
Share Company Culture
It’s well known nowadays that people are more likely to apply to a company that promotes and displays its culture on social media. LinkedIn Career Pages, specially built for employer branding, are a great way to showcase your company’s culture.
You can share images, videos or articles about the day-to-day at your organization. Moreover, according to this study, young job seekers value growth opportunities and personal development over anything else. We suggest sharing in-house produces content, educational materials or inspiring videos as well. Try to indirectly promote your company by showcasing how much-added value you bring to your employees.
Another great way of boosting your visibility on social media is to produce videos such as “A day at X company”. People are curious to see how a normal day at your business unfolds, which will make them more open to applying at your job opportunities or trying your products. While building video content might seem a little tricky and time consuming at first, we guarantee that it’s worth it in the long run. People are spending more than 100 minutes a day watching online videos, increasing conversions by up to 80%!
Write some posts without links
As a general rule in online marketing, we recommend using links in most of your posts. So why did we include this tip here?
It’s true that, on average, posts with links see around 45% more engagement than those that don’t, but it really depends on what the post without the link is about. The occasional posts without a link can really stand out then! So how do you do this?
There are two main pieces of content you can share: posts that spark discussions or debates or the inspirational, thought-provoking content. It’s human nature that people respond more often towards a powerful or negative feeling, especially on social media. We advise you to share posts that lead to healthy discussions, without touching upon sensitive matters – they can really hurt your business and divide your customers.
As a rule of thumb, when thinking about sharing a debate-sparking conversation, make sure you ask the opinions of others and go through the possible outcomes of the discussion. If the topic is a good one for your business, it will skyrocket your engagement on LinkedIn!
