LinkedIn can be a powerful resource when looking to drive sales, particularly for business-to-business (B2B). Here are 6 ways you can increase your sales with LinkedIn:
1. Build your profile
Having a fully-fleshed out profile is the best way to communicate your strengths and proven abilities. You need to convey all of your relevant skills and accomplishments, which is something a skeleton profile on the world’s largest professional networking website simply cannot do. In order to stand out from the crowd, start by upload a professional profile image.
Build your profile by adding past jobs and experience. If you have received honours and awards, achievements in education, or know multiple languages, be sure to include such information in your profile. Once you have inputted your experience and skills, be sure to enhance your profile by seeking recommendations and endorsements from current and previous supervisors, colleagues, employees, clients, and mentors.
Make sure to craft a compelling headline and concisely outline your profile in the summary. Not only does a completed profile help to showcase your talents and expertise, it communicates thoroughness and competency.
2. Connect with relevant people
Once you have strengthened your profile with your experience and skills, the next important step is to network and connect with relevant individuals. A fleshed-out profile with relevant connections helps to signify trust in the field, and can increase authority. While many individuals will seek out your profile to connect, and LinkedIn has a strong algorithm which suggests valuable connections, you must also be proactive.
Seek a variety of connections, starting with first-degree connections like colleagues, industry associates, and local contacts. Also remember to grow your network by connecting with friends of connections and relevant individuals from your past, such as mentors and former college classmates. Finally, actively develop new connections by targeting potential customers, partners, and suppliers. Opportunities arise and exposure increases with a deep network.
3. Build up your company page following
With your personal profile completed and your network steadily growing, next turn your attention to your company page. Increasing the following of your company page is tremendously important to generating exposure and driving sales. On the company page, post news stories, articles, and exciting discoveries relevant to your business or industry.
Build your company page into a source of relevant, timely, and helpful news and information for your particular field and attract followers who want to stay up-to-date with your business. When your company has a job opening, be sure to create a listing on LinkedIn. Not only are you likely to fill the position as a result of LinkedIn’s large and talented user base, but the opportunity can help to grow your company’s following.
4. Use LinkedIn Ads / sponsored stories
In order to increase exposure, LinkedIn Ads are a great solution. LinkedIn Ads are the second-most effective at generating referrals among all social networking sites, behind only Facebook. Make use of sponsored stories and updates to increase brand awareness, drive targeted traffic to your company page and create a strong call-to-action campaign.
With pay-per-click options tailored to suit your particular budget and proprietary algorithms designed to connect your campaign with a willing audience, smart use of LinkedIn Ads is key to creating sales opportunities.
5. Take advantage of the LinkedIn posting feature (blogging)
The LinkedIn Posting Feature is a key tool in establishing industry authority and generating exposure. In posting quality content at appropriate intervals, you can build the reputation of your company as informed, relevant, and instructive. Posts allow you to use a branded domain link with your name on top, like when shared on Twitter and other social media networks. Simply put, LinkedIn posts are a great way to generate authoritative content and take advantage of traffic.
6. Measure traffic to website/landing page
Finally, you can measure and adjust the results of all of this hard work by using data insight resources like Google Analytics. You can track engagement, evaluate performance, and identify trends, all with an eye on leveraging your LinkedIn profile most successfully. Google Analytics allows you to set goals and track the behaviour of visitors, and provides detailed data and trend reports.
Google Analytics can identify issues with poor visitor engagement and you can tweak strategies to improve these weaknesses. Likewise, you can use this information to identify strengths, such as a job listing or sponsored post that generated an extreme spike in traffic, and attempt to replicate these results with future listings and posts.
