Is Linkedin purely for endorsing people I’ve never met or will it get me any new leads?

I recently gave a presentation to a group of businesses about using Linkedin effectively for the promotion of your business and the acquisition of new leads, which changed some people’s view from “No way, Linkedin is for endorsing Joe Bloggs for his excellent customer service skills” to “I’ll give that a go”. I’m sure that most of you out there use Linkedin, but are you getting the most from it? Read below for some easy to fix items that will result in more leads.

• In my experience, Linkedin is most effective for B2B businesses. The mantra that needs to be in your mind for B2B marketing, is give before you receive. Whatever the medium that you use for spreading your message, the B2B market needs to believe in you before purchasing a service or product. Have you written a white paper about your industry knowledge? Then share it. Do you follow influencers that have an impact upon your industry? Tell others about them. If a piece of content shows that you’re an expert, get it out there in front of potential clients.

• Join LinkedIn Groups. These groups will keep you up-to-date with the latest news as well as give you the opportunity to join in healthy debate. Join groups that are of interest to you, but as one of my clients recently found out, make sure you join groups where potential customers are. Establishing yourself as a credible “voice” in these groups will help you to stand out from your competition.

• Having a profile is great, but are you updating it with relevant content? If not people won’t be able to find you as easily and those already connected to you will not remember what you do. Don’t bombard people, but gently update your status with courses that you are running/ attending, awards you have recently been shortlisted for/ won. Oh I forgot to mention, we won another one last week!

• LinkedIn as well as all other social media outlets is a platform for communication. So communicate, don’t lecture. If you see an interesting status update, comment on it. It is a great way to show that you are a living, breathing person and not just an automated update bot!

Everyone uses Linkedin differently and that’s the beauty of these platforms. There is no golden ticket to success, its up to you to make it work for you. If all else fails give us a call and we can help.