How to use LinkedIn to grow your business

As a business owner, you're probably always on the lookout for new leads, connections, and partnerships to grow your company. But it's difficult to find new avenues for fresh connections, and having limited resources to do so is typically one of the main obstacles to growing a business. 

You can only contact so many people within your own circles, even if you're a top-notch networker. It takes time to network, even more time to generate leads, and on top of all this comes the next step of establishing partnerships. 

Yet in today's society of fast-moving technology, there are platforms for everything. LinkedIn is the business owner's tool for discovery and connection, uniting all of your networking goals and providing avenues for both B2B and B2C marketing.  

The future is online, and LinkedIn is ready for you, streamlined to easily work into your new marketing campaign. From furthering brand awareness to solidifying partnerships, the platform presents you with a wealth of new leads, paving the road to further successes. In this guide, we'll show you four ways to make use of LinkedIn to grow your business.

Here are the 4 Best Ways to Use LinkedIn for Business

1. Create a captivating company page

Creating a company page should be far from robotic. It needs to be full of relatable and usable information. With the right content, anyone who views the page feels like they come away with an informed idea of your business. They have all of the information to make a decision about whether you are a good fit for them or not.

Focus on the "About Us" section

The "About Us" field is your opportunity to share the overall tone of the business and the people that work there. There are multiple ways to make it effective, but whatever you decide, don't forget to optimize the section with keywords.

If your team is small, you can highlight key members. Perhaps you have personal stylists, accountants, or other staff that work one-on-one with customers through your service. Give them a chance to shine here. Then, when a customer contacts you, they have already identified with someone on your team.

Another way to utilize this area is to give your business's backstory. Do you have an inspiring start? Did you have obstacles you overcame along the way? Is your motivation for starting the business uplifting? Highlight these topics.

Add engaging visuals

There are a couple of sections where LinkedIn allows you to utilize visuals. Ensure that your profile photo is one that appears professional and aptly describes your business tone through the image. If you choose to use a background image, make sure that it isn't pixelated and complements your profile photo and your business.

Highlighting certain works and projects is possible through LinkedIn. It allows you to use photos to pull people's attention towards these works or achievements. Make your selection match up with the other visuals on the page and work with the project.

Captivate an audience in the "Overview" section

The "Overview" section should not be a compilation of everything else that the profile already summarizes. Briefly touch on certain achievements, or decide to describe the reason and how you achieved them. Do not deep dive into any company history or repeat your headline. Instead, tell a story and bring people into the life and passion behind the business. As always, don't shy away from keywords.

Create a follow button

Not all LinkedIn profiles automatically come equipped with a Follow button. Go in and add one to make it easy for people to stay up-to-date with your business. Making it harder than a single click deters a large percentage of people from keeping up with you.

2. Optimize your profile to maximize your networking efforts

Optimizing your profile exposure to maximize your networking efforts is key for your brand's success, here are 9 ways to do that.

Customize your LinkedIn URL

Most of your LinkedIn profile is customizable. From background images to achievements, tailoring it to your business is what it is all about. Now, this includes your URL. If you have put the time into developing the profile, get it out there! Make it obvious that that link belongs to your business.

The URL that LinkedIn assigns to a new profile is often a mix of the name and a collection of numbers. There is an option in the editing process to make this unique. It lets you know if anyone else has already used that URL until you tailor one that suits your business.

Make key headlines and descriptors easily viewable

Catching someone's eye and keeping it on the page is the name of the game when it comes to increased conversion rates. This means your headline and description need to make a strong first impression.

Set yourself apart from other businesses that use bland titles and keywords. The most important thing is to make these uniquely yours.

Beyond a description, headlines often act as the first call to action on the page. Being succinct and descriptive helps new connections understand how your business in particular would be able to help them.

Keep your profile updated

A LinkedIn profile should be viewed as a living asset. Once you make it, you shouldn't check it off of the to-do list and walk away. Instead, continue to update it at least once a week with applicable information. Even if you don't post blogs and long-form content, put up pictures, ads, and weekly news reports so that your connections feel like they are a part of the team.

It also helps if a new customer arrives on your page. Seeing recent activity reassures them that you are ready for service and not an afterthought from a startup years ago.

Seek other ways to get updates outside of your own content. Ask satisfied customers to use the link and share a testimonial regarding your work for them. Get permission, if needed, to post pictures or videos of successful projects. 

Use a professional photo

Your photo is another part of the first impression a newcomer has to your page. It is perhaps the most important since it is visual and the eye instantly moves to this before any of the words.

Use a photo that matches the tone and the message from the rest of the page. Most of the time, this needs to be professional, perhaps a logo or a photo that aptly represents you or the business. Since it is a platform of professionals, the logo does need to follow suit or it will fall below the standard.

Link to your profile from your other online assets

Although it is important to have the right keywords scattered throughout the page, as we cover next, one of the best ways to ensure people find your account is to share the link. Attach it to the end of your e-mail taglines. Put it into the bio or description sections on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. 

It might not be as convenient as a quick click, but consider copying it onto your business card as well. (This is where a concise custom URL is a huge asset!) If people are really interested in using your services, LinkedIn is the most professional and descriptive source of information other than possibly your website.

Research keywords

Optimized keywords are the gold of online business marketing. Using the right ones can increase your chance of being discovered by newcomers more than tenfold. There are multiple ways to figure out what the best keyword options are for you.

The first is to look into what your competitors are using. What seems to be working for them and why? Can you put a twist on it to make it your own?

The next is to look directly into the consumer side of things. What do people type in when they look for businesses or services like yours? How do they word it? Who is at the top of the search results and what have they done to get there?

Discover these keywords by using third-party apps and platforms. Since SEO has become such an influential piece of marketing, many useful tools have popped up. Use one of these keyword research tools to begin your search. Still feel like it is incomplete? Consider working with a freelancer to further augment the list.

Once you have developed a list of these keywords, sprinkle them throughout essential areas like your headline, description boxes, your work experience, and any other text-focused region. Continue to analyze your results afterward to change out others that might work better if necessary.

Optimize your business summary

A connection finds your profile and clicks on it. Their interest is piqued by an engaging, professional photo and a catchy headline that convinces them your business could fit what they need. The next thing most people start looking through is the business summary.

Often, this region is one of the most text-heavy parts of the entire profile. You need to make it interesting and keep the sections of text short and scannable. Don't forget that many people could be looking at it on a mobile device with a smaller screen.

Optimize the business summary by using plenty of those researched keywords. Keep it natural, though, since too many keywords can make your summary seem like jargon and unengaging to the average reader.

Personalize it to make it more relatable to your readers and add in your motivation. Why have you started the business? What is the goal? Which direction are you trying to take it in?

Make contact easy

Once a prospective customer or connection can see that you are currently quite active and they know they are interested in your industry, you need to make it easy for them to contact you. 

Don't put all of the time into the profile only to lose leads that don't have enough interest to deep dive just to find out how to get in touch. Instead, make your contact information obvious to your connections. It is also preferable to give them multiple easy-access options. That way they can choose whatever their preference is.

3. Create a LinkedIn marketing strategy

The connections that you make on LinkedIn often carry quite a lot of value. This is because LinkedIn is frequented by authorities in their industries, thought leaders, and high-level executives. But don't expect these leaders to just stumble across your profile. Instead, you need to actively work on your LinkedIn marketing strategy to target these kinds of connections. If you don't know where to start, take a look at our tips below to ramp up those connections.

Have a deep understanding of your target audience

Each product and service that you offer is going to have specific people, or groups, that it appeals to. Marketing your product towards a wider span of people often gets you nowhere but shelling out more money.

Instead, figure out what your target audience needs and why they need it. Then, use your marketing to tailor advertisements directly to the requirements of your target groups.

Define your goals

Even if you know who your target audience is and what they need, you should still have goals for your business. Whether it is financial thresholds you want to meet or more people you would like to appeal to, having attainable goals constantly pushes you to better your business strategy. Ask yourself:

• What is the purpose(s)?

• What does success look like for you?

• What is my motivation?

• What is my business's biggest strength?

• What is its biggest weakness?

• What would be my ultimate achievement?

Knowing the answers to these questions helps you to understand your motivation. They also guide you towards satisfaction since they help you to define what success ultimately looks and feels like for yourself and your business.

Businesses that have a clear goal and motivation come across as stronger and more put-together than others. This is often quite obvious to new customers in the midst of deciding where their brand loyalty will lie.

11 LinkedIn marketing tips to grow your business

LinkedIn is currently the single-most used platform for professionals and business owners. Here, B2C companies find a new lease on networking with a platform that has done much of the heavy lifting for them. Improving brand awareness, generating leads, sharing content, driving traffic to your website, making connections, or establishing business relationships and partnerships is all you can achieve with Linkedin marketing.

Here below we have listed some effective ways to use LinkedIn marketing to grow your business:

1. Invite connections to follow your page. Connections from personal pages and employee pages are all prime candidates to form the initial following on your company's page. Go into your Settings to personalize your new follower message. Make it applicable to as many people as possible and send it out.

2. Link employee profiles to your page. Linking employee profiles to the business page gives it a much further reach than before. Whether you are in a recruitment process or looking to expand your content's reach, working with your employees allows you to access a whole new audience.

3. Collect and give endorsements. Everyone can list skills and talents relating to the services they offer on both company and personal profiles. To validate these, others can endorse them, effectively testifying that they do actually exceed in these specialties. Give endorsements to employees and other members of the community you have interacted with and they will be more likely to endorse you in return. You can also request it from past customers, especially if they don't have the time to write out a full testimonial.

4. Join or create your own LinkedIn group. LinkedIn is all about professional communities and furthering connections within industries and related niches. They started LinkedIn Groups to continue and better this goal. Become an active part of some of these groups to gain community attention. If you are ambitious or have exceptional clout in your niche, take the opportunity to start your own, forming a community centered around your business.

5. Add your Twitter account to your LinkedIn profile. No matter how useful LinkedIn is, it isn't the only form of social media that people use. Often, different types of content are posted on various social media platforms. Link to Twitter and more on your LinkedIn profile so potential customers can follow you across the platforms they use.

6. Create LinkedIn showcase pages. Showcase pages are an extension of your main page. They are connected to the base page and called "Affiliated pages" once they have been established. You can use these to highlight specific initiatives, related brands, offsets of the business, or leading employees. Connecting them makes it much easier for interested followers to find them.

7. Complement LinkedIn marketing efforts with paid advertising. Gather organic leads and conversions is great and is the primary goal of a LinkedIn strategy. However, once you start seeing success, don't be afraid to capitalize on a well-designed page with an effective conversion rate. Attract more people to it with paid advertising efforts. LinkedIn offers multiple methods to begin your efforts, including LinkedIn Sponsored Content, LinkedIn Sponsored Inmail, LinkedIn Text Ads, LinkedIn Dynamic Ads.

8. Write compelling company page updates. Updates posted to your company page should be thoughtful and purposeful. Think about the type of material that got people interested in your business in the first place. Give them useful content, tips, and applicable information regarding changes at the company. Create a community and pull people in by telling a story.

9. Expand your network of influencers. The whole point of LinkedIn is to create relationships with people. As you forge a bond, it moves from knowing "of" each other to trust each other. With this increased engagement, there are no spheres of sharing, both in products and services, that you can experience. It does take time and effort, but it pays off.

10. Follow up on LinkedIn. When a connection is made in real life, take advantage of the opportunity to expand LinkedIn connections. After a business meeting or exchanging cards, choose to follow up with them on LinkedIn.

11. Automate your outreach. Don't make the mistake of loading all the pressure to maintain social accounts on yourself. Use other systems that allow you to automate your outreach. Craft messages that sound personal but can be applied to many different requests or messages. Use apps like Dux-Soup to view prospects, endorse them, and send personalized messages.

4. Position your brand as a thought leader by sharing and publishing content

A thought leader is recognized as an authority in their field of expertise. They are sought out for their opinions. Establishing your business on LinkedIn gives you a heightened level of professionalism than achievable on most other social media outlets, and sharing helpful and highly authoritative articles consistently can just help you achieve this.

In reality, there is a huge content void throughout the platform that businesses should take advantage of. Out of those millions of active monthly users, only 4% share blog posts. 

In a B2B context, 6 out of 10 of these users employ LinkedIn to search out industry insights. If your business is ready to actively provide these insights, you will experience even higher conversion rates.

Taking advantage of your following on LinkedIn is bound to gain you more engagement and business-related interest. Publishing useful content, perhaps as a long-form article, how-to, or listicle, is an excellent way to do this. Here are some best practices for posting LinkedIn content: 

• How-to and list posts, also referred to as listicles, are the most popular

• Headings are a good thing. Aim for 5-9 headings and subheadings, depending on the length of your post

• Title your articles with a length between 40-49 characters to optimize for LinkedIn

• Upload videos directly to LinkedIn and not in any articles

• Post around 20 times per month to reach approximately 60% of your audience

• Add hashtags to increase discoverability

• Use multimedia to make it stand out

Use LinkedIn to power your business

LinkedIn has become an expansive source of additional engagement, connections, and discovery for both B2B and B2C businesses within the last five years. It is a resource that recruits hundreds of thousands of users every year, approximately two per minute. LinkedIn has become the new marketing channel for all businesses.

Building a profile with them brings you to the next step in networking, but that isn't all it does. It helps you to increase your organic traffic to your website. From there, it helps to dramatically raise your conversion numbers, and sets you apart from many similar businesses, bringing you into contact with a vast network of professionals.

A complete profile lends you the feeling of respectability to incoming customers as well. It doesn't stop there since the platform also equips you with data and measurable metrics to better your content output and engagement rates.

What is stopping you from furthering your business? Start simple, taking small steps until you can expand your time or your team. From there, you can watch your business grow.