Linkedin Marketing For Beginners (With 11 Practical Tips)
LinkedIn has become an indispensable channel for many companies, freelancers, freelancers, and countless other professionals. Not only do they build their brand awareness, but they also constantly get new leads, jobs, and sales from it. You want that too! But how do you start with LinkedIn marketing?
In this article, we take you through all facets of LinkedIn. This way you can start making LinkedIn marketing work for your company today. For those who are already active users, it is a nice check whether you are getting the most out of your own profile and company page.
So, don’t let unnecessary turnover lie in this promising channel and take your LinkedIn marketing to the next level!
Table of Content
What is LinkedIn Marketing?
LinkedIn marketing is in fact nothing more than using LinkedIn as a channel for acquiring (among other things) more connections, leads, brand awareness, and website visitors. This is done by sharing content and insights, to show the knowledge within a particular industry.
By using LinkedIn to market your business, you gain access to a rich array of data, connections, and targeting options.
Later on, we will go into more detail on how you can get the most out of it. First, let’s see why LinkedIn marketing is actually so interesting.
Why using LinkedIn is important to your business
To start with the most important reason: marketing works best where your target audience is. For that reason, LinkedIn is simply impossible to miss as an important channel.
With 706 million users worldwide (of which more than 8 million in the Netherlands) it is now one of the largest social networks in the world.
The great thing about LinkedIn is that it really is a business, professional community. People are often active there when they are in a “corporate mood”. This is in contrast to people who are active on Facebook or Instagram, usually at times when they are looking for relaxation and distraction.
LinkedIn marketing is therefore an excellent opportunity to reach a professional target group, often when they are open to business. Certainly, for B2B companies and freelancers with a business service, there is no doubt that using LinkedIn is important to get a job, but that does not mean that others should simply ignore this valuable channel.
They can also use this platform to expand the network and brand awareness, to bring in more leads, and thus increase sales. Certainly with sufficient attention to the details that often do not receive the attention they deserve.
Frequently asked questions about the company page
You can use LinkedIn as a person, but also as a company. For this, you use a company page (similar to the dichotomy in this area at Facebook).
As a person, you can make connections. A company page mainly focuses on obtaining as many followers as possible. In this way, you bind your own loyal audience to you, who are interested in the knowledge and content that you share.
⬆️ How do you get more followers on your company page?
More followers on your company page is an important part of getting more value from LinkedIn. After all, this is how (more and more) people see your messages and message. Earlier we published this article full of tips for more followers on LinkedIn.
🔍 How can I see my followers on the LinkedIn company page?
In the app, you will immediately see the number of followers under the logo on your company page. On the desktop, it is a bit better hidden. Click on “statistics” (under the company name and logo) and choose “followers”.
🏗️ How do I create a LinkedIn company page?
Creating a business page is easy. Click on “work” at the top right of LinkedIn and choose “create company page”. You will then automatically be taken through the process. Below you can read how to get the most out of that company page!
Invite LinkedIn company page followers
The most important way to get new followers for your company page on LinkedIn is to actively invite them. As an administrator of a company page, you will have the option to invite your connections to follow the page.
To do this, go to the company page. You will see the option to invite your network to the right of your screen. You have a limited number of credits available for this (which is supplemented every month). Does someone accept your invitation? Then you will get the used credit back. This way, Linkedin prevents you from bothering too many uninterested people with an invitation (which is seen as spam).
LinkedIn marketing best practices
Well, enough talk about reasons to embrace the LinkedIn company page. Time to look into the practice. How do you make LinkedIn marketing work for you and use it for the growth of your business, your reach, brand awareness, and above all: your turnover?
When you use it the right way, LinkedIn is a channel that not only helps you drive more traffic to your website and bring in leads. It is a place to show yourself as a thought leader and expert in your industry.
The tips and handles below are not only suitable for a company page. Even if you mainly use LinkedIn in a personal capacity, you will undoubtedly find valuable input to get (even) more out of this channel!
1. User-friendly URL
You have probably seen that the standard URL of a LinkedIn profile contains quite a few numbers. By adjusting that you make the URL more user-friendly and easier to share.
For your personal page, click on “Edit public profile and URL” in the top right-hand corner. On your company page, go to “Administrator Tools” (top right) and choose “Edit Public URL”.
2. Add links to your site and blog
Sounds like a no-brainer, but you’d be amazed how many people pass up this opportunity.
When editing your page, you can not only specify a corresponding website but also add a button that makes it even easier for visitors to your business page to click through to your website.
3. SEO for Social
The search engine optimization that you apply to your website and blog can also be used for your social media accounts.
This way you can also include terms that are important for your business in the description on your company page.
You can also use the Instagram SEO tips that we shared earlier for inspiration.
4. Follow your feed
The LinkedIn feed – the rundown of what your network has posted and shared – is where the magic happens. An important way to get the most out of LinkedIn marketing is therefore to keep an eye on what is going on in your industry. What keeps your connections busy? Perhaps you can be an active part of the discussions yourself?
By responding to matters where you have something to add, you not only show your knowledge but you also immediately come into the picture with new people.
5. Account-based LinkedIn marketing
The great strength of LinkedIn marketing lies – just like with other social media channels – in the large amount of information that LinkedIn has about its users.
After all, those users have entered this in their accounts themselves. You can make good use of that.
Account-based marketing is the future of LinkedIn. It is not without reason that we invited someone from LinkedIn to come and talk about it in our podcast. You can listen to that episode – full of practical and concrete tips – here.
6. Make yourself recognizable
Make sure people recognize your profile immediately when they visit it. The modified URL we talked about already helps with this. Don’t forget to change the background photo of your company page.
After all, LinkedIn marketing is also about visibility and branding. For that, people must be able to recognize your brand.
7. Keep an eye on who views your profile
You will have noticed that LinkedIn notifies you when someone has viewed your profile. This is a valuable way to discover when potential customers and connections are showing interest in you by visiting your page.
Maybe it is a reason to send an email, call or send a connection request?
8. Join or start a group
Just like on Facebook, there are also groups on LinkedIn about the most diverse topics. Their people talk about the most recent developments in their field or the problems they encounter when carrying out that work.
Not only is that an important way to keep up to date with what’s going on, but it is also a source of potential customers if you have something to offer that solves the problems in that group.
Just make sure that you do not promote your product too actively because that is usually not appreciated. It is best to make a valuable contribution to the conversations and discussions taking place and, where relevant, let them know that you can help someone with a specific problem.
9. Use mentions and hashtags
By tagging a person (using @) in your LinkedIn post, the chances are high that they will respond to your post. As a result, you will not only come into the picture of your own followers but also the network of that person.
You can use this, for example, when you share a particularly good collaboration, write about an inspiring conversation you had or share an article written by someone else that you found particularly interesting.
Another way to come into the picture with people outside your own network is to use hashtags. Although they are not as big as on Instagram, they are followed by a lot of people. You can set up three hashtags that you follow yourself with your business page, for a relevant feed. But the most important thing is that from now on you add some good hashtags to your posts so that you yourself will appear in the feeds of others.
10. Experiment with organic and paid LinkedIn marketing
The vast majority of the tips above were aimed at getting more out of your LinkedIn marketing in an organic way. However, paid marketing on LinkedIn also has a lot to offer, mainly because of the large amount of knowledge that we have already discussed.
LinkedIn Ads give you many options to target your ideal audience. One of the ways to do this is through account-based marketing, which we talked about in point 5.
But the best way to discover what works is to experiment, analyze and improve. Just like in all forms of online marketing, there is a different approach for each industry and product.
11. Analyze and double down
Speaking of analyzing… Probably the best LinkedIn marketing tip is to keep a close eye on what works for your business.
Is that actively participating in different groups that affect your industry? Spend most of your time on that.
Does it work for you to regularly share interesting articles or whitepapers and thus show yourself as a thought guide? Go for it!
Do you notice that people mainly respond to inspiring interviews with other people in your industry? You get the idea …
Most importantly, as in all online marketing, spend time on what turns out to be working for you. There is only one way to find out and that is to do it.
Conclusion: how do you get more out of LinkedIn marketing?
Hopefully, you have been inspired to get more out of your LinkedIn marketing. Don’t forget that – especially if you go for the organic and free approach – it is a matter of the long term. So don’t get discouraged too quickly if it doesn’t immediately deliver what you hoped for. In addition, it helps not to run too fast: many people start out enthusiastically, put in many hours and energy, and then lose the motivation for their LinkedIn marketing.
That is of course a shame. Then it is better to start with a slightly smaller investment and gradually build up when you see that something is working.
Of course, it also helps to be able to brainstorm with like-minded people. In our community, you can exchange ideas, ask questions and let others inspire and motivate you to persevere.
Read Also: 7 Facebook Marketing Tips for Small Business
