It’s time to rethink how you reach and influence your audience!

LinkedIn can be utilised as the most effective marketing tool for B2B.

LinkedIn was once considered a niche, less-frequented professional social media platform, used primarily by job hunters and employers. But today, it has exponentially transformed into the most effective B2B marketing tool for brands, driving more traffic than all other social networks combined (and yes, those include Facebook and Twitter). How’s that for a Social Media Myth? 

Your business needs to be seen by decision-makers, thought leaders and influencers, and there’s no better place than LinkedIn to so just that. Unlike other platforms, your potential customers are already looking to network with brands offering fruitful professional relationships. They aren’t online to aimlessly scroll away their time. They are primed and ready to be wooed. And here comes the importance of a robust LinkedIn Marketing Strategy.  

I’m going to assume your brand already has a LinkedIn presence. Let’s get into it then. 

Here are 7 essential marketing hacks you absolutely need to master in order to excel on LinkedIn.

Optimize your Company Profile

It’s highly probable that your brand account is not optimized to reap the most benefits out of the platform. It goes without saying that things like Company description, Location information and Website URL should be complete and up to date. 

What’s less common is a highly relevant and quality profile picture and cover photo. While your brand logo can serve as the profile photo, you need to put a little more thought into choosing the right cover photo. 

Your cover photo can either be a reflection of your brand aesthetic and color scheme or a group photo of your employees. It can even be an informative message, either promoting a product or informing visitors that you’re hiring. 

Lastly, your profile page should act as a pipeline to your brand website, serving as a lead generation page. Also, ensure that your company page has keywords that your intended audience is likely to search for. 

Perfect your Content Strategy

With a powerful content strategy, you stand to transition from outbound marketing – drawing viewers through ads – to an inbound marketing strategy, where people find your brand content valuable and engaging. 

Use rich media – photos and videos – to target maximum engagement. According to LinkedIn, posts with images receive 98% more comments than those without. Videos see even more engagement than photos. Make sure your videos have closed captions for sound-off and hearing-impaired viewers.

Posting at the right time makes a world of difference when it comes to your post performance. Brands that post regularly see much more engagement than the ones that stay dormant. 

Time of day is also important, so get comfortable with your Company page analytics, try out different times and analyze the click-through rates to find out the best times of day for you.

LinkedIn ranks all content based on people’s connections, interest relevance and engagement probability. Hence, your posts should ideally be crisp, targeted and have a clear call-to-action. If it clicks with the target audience, you will see your engagement snowball as people share it within their network.

Target the Right Audience

While great content will set you on the path towards a successful inbound marketing strategy, outbound marketing is no less powerful if done right.

LinkedIn’s Advanced Search feature is a powerful tool, even without the paid membership, allowing you to apply a host of filters to identify the exact type of people you need to target.

You can search people by location, industry, current company, past company, school, language and interests. The bigger and better your existing network, the greater your chances of finding warm prospects. 

You can even save your newly-created advanced search, so you can come back to maintain a steady pipeline of sales. 

Using LinkedIn Analytics, you can see your visitor demographics to get a sense of your viewer profile. You can tweak your content accordingly. 

Experiment with Showcase Pages

Showcase pages are basically LinkedIn’s way of enabling businesses to promote individual brands within their umbrella brand. When you want to create a separate space for a brand, business unit or a company initiative, creating a showcase page is the go-to option. 

Showcase pages should target a single customer segment. You get larger header images and places to link back to your company when you create a showcase page. 

Keep in mind that any showcase page should be aimed at conversion, should have a short name to avoid getting truncated in the display sidebar and should have a name that’s relatable and easy to recall. 

Leverage LinkedIn Community Features

Searching for leads can be tough. There’s a way to make it easier though – Groups. Groups on LinkedIn are a goldmine of prospective leads. You stand to gain access to a block of leads by searching for relevant groups, join them and stay active by contributing to them and convert your activity to useful leads.

Look for groups that come up as ‘Highly Relevant’, ‘Very Active’ and are substantial in size to generate the best results. 

You can create your own groups as well. When you discover a need that can be fulfilled by a new group, you can create one yourself, where your target audience can join and interact. Becoming the owner and moderator of a successful group nets you leadership and recognition in the industry.

Another way to connect with your target audience and get noticed as a thought leader is by joining interactions with influencers. Commenting on and sharing their posts will embed you into trendy and latest discussions, where your target audience is sure to take notice.

Harness your Workforce 

As you would be able to surmise, your workforce holds immense potential for your brand’s marketing strategy. A highly-engaged workforce will increase your brand awareness and reach within their personal networks.

In addition to following your Company Page, your employees can engage with your posts - liking, commenting and sharing their enthusiasm and spreading the word. 

Make sure they have their profiles filled and linked to your Company Page. 

Not only engaging with your Company posts, your employees can post original content sharing workplace stories or personal connections to their employer. This will build a strong brand image and awareness for your brand.

Try LinkedIn Ads

LinkedIn offers various ad formats to drive brand awareness, complementing your organic efforts: Sponsored Content, Sponsored InMail, Text Ads and Video Ads. 

Sponsored Content is LinkedIn’s version of native advertising, enabling you to boost your posts with an ad budget.

Sponsored InMail can be used to send personalized messages to your target audience, allowing you to have a one-on-one interaction that’s highly customizable. Sponsored InMail messages have a 52% open rate on average.

Text Ads appear at the top or right side of the user feeds. They are short texts with a small optional image, used to drive leads and promote specific offers.

LinkedIn Video Ads automatically play when users scroll by. They can have closed captions for people who prefer sound-off viewing or for the hearing-impaired.

Key Takeaways

LinkedIn is a social media platform like no other. It provides you ample options to gain credibility, create a mutually beneficial network and generate leads and sales. 

By being highly engaged, joining and contributing in groups, publishing relevant and engaging content, you can build a successful and effective marketing strategy, no matter your budget.