5 Reasons Not to Sleep on LinkedIn Marketing
If you are skeptical of LinkedIn Marketing, this blog is for you. In the last few years alone, LinkedIn has—without a doubt— become one of the most influential and important marketing tools for business owners and professionals.
LinkedIn has over 1 billion users across 200 countries, 200 million of which are in the United States alone, and 65 million of which are decision-makers. Chances are you at least have a LinkedIn profile but are not a part of the small percentage of users who are using it for marketing.
Here are 5 legitimate reasons why we consider LinkedIn to be a great marketing tool for business owners.
Posting on Your Personal vs. Company LinkedIn Page
Before we dive in, we need to answer the most common LinkedIn marketing question we are asked at Correnti Marketing, “Should I post on my company or personal page?” Our team almost always recommends posting to your personal LinkedIn page, especially if you are the face of the brand. Personal pages are more favored by the LinkedIn algorithm and they tend to have larger, more engaged audiences than company pages.
However, you may consider posting to a company page if you do not have many followers or if you are not the face of your brand. We have clients who are strategically shying away from the spotlight to grow their firms and create more longevity beyond their name and face, so we focus our attention on their company page.
If you are in doubt about which route to take, you can always post on both your personal and company pages, with more of a focus on your personal page.
The following reasons for why I consider LinkedIn to be an important marketing tool primarily pertain to posting to a personal LinkedIn page but can be applied to both.
Reason 1: LinkedIn Marketing Creates Brand Awareness
Brand awareness is the degree people are familiar with your company, what you do, and who you serve. When you regularly post on LinkedIn, you’ll naturally build brand awareness with your audience, meaning people will begin to understand what you do. A strong brand presence on LinkedIn not only distinguishes you from your competition but it also helps to foster trust and credibility with your audience.
A great advantage of marketing on LinkedIn is the large and diverse user base. Essentially, anyone from anywhere can follow you and consume your content, which means you could be building brand awareness with a much larger audience than compared to other marketing platforms. At Correnti, we have formed relationships with clients across the globe through our LinkedIn posts.
This increased brand awareness will help to broaden your reach as more people become familiar with your business and your unique services. This heightened visibility can be transformative for attracting potential clients and cultivating brand loyalty over time.
Reason 2: LinkedIn Marketing Builds Your Brand Association
Brand association is the mental connection people make between your company and what you do—meaning people will start to associate your name, face, and company branding with your services. For example, when you see the golden arches, you immediately think of McDonald’s. The same goes for other companies with strong brand associations like Flo from Progressive Insurance.
Think of a brand that makes you feel something, then think of the emotions you want your audience to feel every time they see your face or logo online. An easy example is when you’re traveling and see a sign for a Starbucks at the next exit. You may suddenly feel like you need a caffeinated pick-me-up and pull off the interstate for a quick treat. When you cultivate your brand on LinkedIn, your audience will start to certain emotional connections to your brand too!
We recommend posting about your expertise with a combination of your company’s branding and photographs of both you and your team. When you regularly post images with your logo or various headshots, it strengthens the association between those visuals and what you do.
Reason 3: A Strong LinkedIn Presence Leads to Better Referrals
Lead generation and increased referrals are perhaps the most valuable perks of LinkedIn marketing. When you post regularly about what you do and who you serve, your audience will be able to send you better, more ideal referrals. You may think that your prospects aren’t on LinkedIn, and while that may be true to an extent, I challenge you to think outside the box and consider that you never know when someone may engage you for services, especially if what you do is clearly defined through your posts.
Consider this scenario: you’re an estate planning attorney and you just set up shop with your own law practice. You attended undergrad with Sarah and you’re connected on LinkedIn, where you regularly post about the importance of estate planning and how you can help. Sarah’s sister just welcomed a new baby into the family and is realizing that she should update her will. Sarah may not need your services, but, her sister does and because she’s seen your posts, Sarah refers her sister to your firm.
That’s a client who, had you not been active on LinkedIn, you may not have ever had. When you are top of mind for your audience, there’s a much higher chance that you’ll see increased referrals and new business.
Reason 4: Posting Regularly Elevates Your Personal Brand
Another benefit of leveraging LinkedIn as a marketing tool is the development of your personal brand. Essentially, you can write the narrative regarding who you are and what you do. As you continue to elevate your personal brand, you can also use LinkedIn as a platform for becoming a thought leader in your industry. You can instantaneously share your thoughts, insights, and expertise through images, infographics, and articles, all from your computer, which can set you apart from your competition and solidify you as an expert in your niche area of business.
For example, at Correnti Marketing, we focus on marketing the service industry, in particular professional services. But we are best known for our niche— legal marketing for law firms and attorneys. I regularly convey this to my LinkedIn audience, who in return, know myself and my firm to be experts in marketing for the legal industry. I regularly receive referrals to our ideal clients because of this.
Reason 5: LinkedIn Clarifies What You Do + Who You Serve
LinkedIn marketing helps clarify who you are, what you do, and how you can help.
When you’re sharing regularly on LinkedIn, your audience will become more confident in their understanding of you and your services and will be more likely to engage with you or refer you to someone in their network. It may be easy to think that your ideal client isn’t in your audience on LinkedIn, but again, you never know if an ideal client may find your page via a hashtag you used, or through someone reposting your content to their audience, or even if someone in your network may experience an event that would make them an ideal client.
For example, if you are a divorce attorney and you’ve built an audience on LinkedIn and you’re regularly showcasing your wins, your tips, and how you’re different, you’ve then clarified who you are to someone in your audience who, in return, can be confident enough to engage you for services during their divorce.
Next Steps
By taking advantage of the marketing tools that LinkedIn offers, you’ll be able to clearly define who you are, what you do, and how you can help through your posts, and you may see an increase in referrals as your audience reach grows.
Need some ideas on where to start with your content creation? Check out this list of 87 unique LinkedIn post ideas to get started on your LinkedIn marketing journey!
We understand that starting on a LinkedIn content marketing journey may be an investment of time and energy that you simply don’t have available right now. Fortunately, my team and I can help! We offer social media management at a fraction of the cost of an in-house social media manager. We can help you optimize your LinkedIn profile and will get to know you + your brand to create and publish custom social content on a consistent schedule that is on brand for your firm.
We also offer Branding, Website + SEO, Content Marketing, and Photography services for firms of all sizes, giving you yet another tool for standing out from your competition. When you work with our team at Correnti Marketing, we’ll help you define your ideal client profile, craft messaging to attract them, and establish a consistent, clear presence for your firm online to increase your inbound prospects + referrals.
Contact us today to learn more about how we can help you stand out on LinkedIn.
