At 575+ million users, LinkedIn is the largest social media network for business professionals. When used correctly, LinkedIn provides access to millions of users. However, these aren’t just regular users. Many are influential, high-level executives. These are the types of users most businesses target in their marketing and advertising campaigns.
Marketing is all about making the right connections and developing meaningful relationships. Unfortunately, many people find this difficult in today’s fast-paced world. It’s not enough to simply send a message and hope for a response. Business leaders must deal with massive amounts of spam every day. Making your message stand out above the rest takes skill and practice. This is why it’s so important to have a LinkedIn advertising strategy in place.
Using LinkedIn Features to Generate Leads
LinkedIn is packed full of features which can allow you to not only promote yourself, but and your business and individual services. LinkedIn adds new features all the time, and with each update they provide more ways to connect with potential clients. However, as updates occur, older features become less effective. This means that what used to work for your business, probably doesn’t work anymore. It’s important to adjust your lead generation strategy to adapt to LinkedIn updates.
Most business owners and marketing managers don’t have the time or knowledge of how to run advanced advertising campaigns. Therefore, it’s usually best to hire an outside digital marketing firm who is not only on top of the latest changes and trends, but has also spent years mastering and providing a successful ROI for their client’s advertising campaigns. Your digital marketing firm can run a variety of advanced LinkedIn features including:
~LinkedIn Groups
~LinkedIn Ads
~InMail and Sponsored InMail
~Video Posts
~Client recommendations
While LinkedIn Groups used to be a place for spam and ads, new updates have made these groups ideal for marketing. Changes include the ability to post videos, tag users, reply to comments, and view content from your groups in your home feed. If you haven’t already, now is the time to join or start a LinkedIn Group.
LinkedIn Ads
Although potentially more expensive than Facebook Ads (depending on your vertical), LinkedIn Ads allow you to target your ads at greater detail to your intended audience. You can target users by industry, title, education, experience, revenue, company size and much more. This improves the effectiveness of your marketing and advertising campaigns. No other online advertising platform can get this granular with professional users. For B2B or B2C marketing, LinkedIn is an important component in any company’s marketing mix.
LinkedIn Ads work best when combined with intelligence from website demographics. This feature allows you to see important details about who is visiting your website. These details can then be used to help target visitors after they’ve left your website. This is also known as Retargeting or Remarketing; allowing advertisers to tailor their message and their marketing efforts towards the right audience.
LinkedIn InMail
LinkedIn’s InMail feature allows users to contact 2nd and 3rd degree connections. This is different than the standard messaging feature, which only allows users to contact 1stdegree connections. InMail is only available to paid LinkedIn users, but is well worth the investment. You can also choose to use Sponsored InMail, a paid service that allows users to send messages to a specific audience.
Video
Video is an extremely effective marketing tool. Fortunately, LinkedIn now allows users to upload videos. This is great news for anyone looking to improve their marketing strategy in 2019. Companies are now able to run video ads that drive growth at every stage of the sales-cycle. Businesses are able to tailor their video campaigns to build brand awareness, drive website traffic, or generate leads. Engage decision makers with video ads in LinkedIn feeds on desktop and mobile devices.
Content is Crucial
LinkedIn is one of the best platforms for content writing. The platform allows users to build name recognition for their company which can enable lead generation. Users should post frequently enough to be noticed by their intended audience. But beware, LinkedIn uses algorithms that determine what posts/content shows up on their updates. Posting too frequently can damage your impression numbers. When posting content, make sure you add a visual to your post to make it stand out.
Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile
In order to connect with the right people, you need to make sure they can find you. A little optimization goes a long way when it comes to your LinkedIn profile. Every section of your profile should explain why your intended audience should work with you. When updating your profile, avoid using “we” and use search-rich keywords in every section.
Targeted Searches
Take advantage of LinkedIn’s targeted search feature when searching for prospective clients. After entering a general keyword, LinkedIn provides a series of filtering options at the top of the search results. This allows you to narrow your search by location, industry, connection type, title keywords, and more. The connection type filter is especially useful. Choosing 2nd degree connections allows you to reach out to users that have mutual connections. These users are more likely to accept your request than users without any connection at all.
Let Users Know Why They Should Connect
Once you’ve found potential clients, it’s time to connect. While you might be tempted to simply send out a lot of connection requests, this isn’t always effective. You need to let your prospective clients know why they should connect with you.
Instead of simply sending a request, send a personalized message explaining the value of connecting. This doesn’t mean you should send a sales pitch, but rather a well-written message about the value you can offer their business. For example, you might want to offer a suggestion for fixing an issue you noticed on their website. You could also send them a link to an article you recently posted about a question they asked on LinkedIn. This type of approach builds trust and proves to your prospective client that you could benefit their business. Once they realize the value of your connection, they are more likely to connect and remember you when they require a service you provide.
Utilize Automation When Possible
As more people realize the benefits, automation is quickly becoming more standard in marketing. On LinkedIn, the right automated marketing program can automatically send connection requests and respond to simple inquiries. While automation can save users time and simplify marketing efforts, it can’t handle everything. This type of approach requires a certain level of human interaction. LinkedIn users that take advantage of automation will still need to provide answers to more detailed questions.
LinkedIn provides access to numerous users. The right LinkedIn advertising and marketing programs can help generate leads. This is crucial to success. If you have questions or need help developing an effective lead generation strategy, I strongly suggest reaching out to a digital marketing agency for help.
