This post discusses how to leverage LinkedIn’s existing network and grow your own. The article also provides five strategies for building a more extensive professional network on the platform, which includes achieving job promotion or career change goals, cultivating alumni networks that may be helpful in future opportunities you seek, starting advocacy groups with other members of like-minded professions, and using their influence to foster diversity within their field. You have a lot of alternatives when it comes to social media marketing. Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, and LinkedIn are just a few of the social media platforms available. The list goes on and on. LinkedIn is frequently a better option for companies than Facebook, despite its smaller size. It allows you to connect with experts and interact with them more personally.
Here’s a fact I’m sure you didn’t know: LinkedIn generates over 80% of B2B leads obtained via social media. That’s very amazing. Even though LinkedIn receives less traffic, its users are significantly more receptive to learning about items than Facebook users who just want to view images of cats. LinkedIn generated more leads than the company’s blog in one set of statistics.
This does not prove that LinkedIn marketing is more successful than blogging, but it demonstrates its potential. LinkedIn is smaller than some other social media platforms, yet it is still significant. It now has over 300 million users and continues to expand. And, maybe more crucially, those users are purchasers. Businesses that have previously interacted on LinkedIn are 50% more inclined to acquire a product. I’ve been referring to companies as customers if you hadn’t noticed. LinkedIn is primarily a B2B (business to business) networking tool. In other words, it’s for firms that sell to other companies directly. When you think about it, it makes logic. People use LinkedIn for reasons relating to their careers. They’re searching for strategies to further their jobs rather than personal items such as a new computer or toaster. As a result, if you sell your items directly to customers, LinkedIn is probably not for you. If you offer items to companies, though, LinkedIn may help you create a lot more leads. The fundamentals of LinkedIn for business: Almost always, the aim with LinkedIn should be to produce information (and subsequently sales). To do so, begin by creating a network on the site. The broader your network, the more opportunities you’ll have to interact with someone who may become a client.
Tactics for building the most effective network imaginable:
1. Determine who you should attempt to connect with.
If you read about LinkedIn marketing on other websites, you’ll notice two main points of view. To begin, you have the option of rejecting anybody you don’t know or who does not work in your sector in some capacity. The goal is to maintain your network’s “excellent quality” as much as possible. However, unlike other social networks, having a considerable number of members in your network does not punish you. Consequently, even if you have a massive network of “poor quality” connections, your results should not suffer. The second strategy is to expand your network to as many individuals as possible. This implies you accept everyone’s invites to connect and actively seek new individuals to add to your network.
Here’s why I like the second approach—the more prominent, the better:
- Even if someone isn’t now in your sector, it doesn’t rule out the possibility of being in the future.
- Even if someone isn’t in your business, it doesn’t rule out the possibility that their contacts are. You’ll appear higher in their connections’ searches and maybe in their “recommended connections” as well if you’re related to that initial individual.
- The more connections you create, the more likely you are to appear in the “most seen profiles,” resulting in even more requests to connect.
You may adopt this method with only a few basic actions, apart from being more open to engaging with individuals you don’t know well.
- Step 1: Acquire the ability to spot spam profiles: When you reach a certain number of connections, you’ll start receiving more invites to connect. Spammers will be responsible for some of them. They establish accounts, attempt to communicate with a few hundred individuals, and then begin spamming or promoting fraud in different LinkedIn locations. This is where having a network of “poor quality” individuals might affect you. You don’t want to be affiliated in any way with spammers. If someone sees the spam and discovers that you’re linked to the spammer, you risk losing connections and maybe sales. Sometimes, you could be duped, but 95% of false accounts are relatively simple to recognize. Before you accept your new relationship, take a glance at their profile.
Fake profiles, in particular, usually:
- utilize stock pics or don’t have profile pictures (usually of an attractive man or woman)
- contain either a smattering of knowledge or none at all
- Instead of a personal name, use a corporation name (to market your business through LinkedIn, you need to make connections as a person)
- Instead of a profile image, use a logo.
Spammers create hundreds or thousands of these profiles simultaneously, so they all seem the same.
You’ll be able to recognize a phony profile in seconds now that you know what to look for.
There’s nothing you can do except report these invites as spam and move on.
- Step 2 – Begin by reaching out to everyone you know: Most individuals start their LinkedIn accounts by connecting with people they’ve worked with. This may be hundreds of individuals for some, which is fantastic. However, if you’ve primarily worked in small organizations or don’t have much expertise, this number may be as low as 50. If this is the case, you aren’t yet “popular” on LinkedIn, which means people are less likely to connect with you. In practice, going from 300 to 350 connections is a lot simpler than going from 50 to 100. As a result, the larger the group you can start with, the better.
Make connections with people outside of your workplace, such as:
- friends
- family
- associates (other students or people in your profession)
Don’t worry if you don’t know each other very well as long as they know who you are. The only thing you should avoid is sending out many invites to individuals you don’t know since this will result in you being flagged as a spammer.
- Step 3 – Encourage people to connect in as many ways as possible: As I previously said, LinkedIn is often one of, if not the most, efficient lead-generating sources.
It makes sense to concentrate your marketing efforts on LinkedIn. Both on and off LinkedIn, you may expand your network. First, provide a link to your LinkedIn profile in your email signature. If you send many emails, you will get a steady supply of new contacts.
Then, in your LinkedIn profile summary, make it apparent that you’re open to connecting with just about everyone. For example, if you look at my LinkedIn profile, you’ll see the following in summary:
Finally, include your LinkedIn profile on each of your blog’s pages.
2. Content sharing does more than just increase traffic.
One of your primary objectives should be to expand your network, but there are a few others. For starters, you should utilize LinkedIn to cultivate connections with your followers and, when the time comes, convert them into leads or customers. Sharing material on LinkedIn is one thing you should do. When you publish a LinkedIn post, it will be visible to anybody who follows you or is linked to you.
Unlike other social media platforms, which already have far too much material, LinkedIn will notify your followers when you make a new post, so they don’t miss anything. So what should you publish, and when should you post it? First, don’t worry about the exact moment you should post. Although there is an ideal period, it does not have the same impact as other networks.
When it comes to when you should publish, the essential thing is that you do it regularly. I’ve settled on a weekly blogging schedule, but if you have the time, you may try posting more often. Another crucial issue is: what should I post? While you may share personal job status updates, you should focus on topics your target audience is interested in. This is one area where LinkedIn marketing is similar to other social media marketing. You are immediately portraying yourself as an authority in your niche/industry by doing so. It doesn’t matter whether you submit material provided by others or post links to your stuff when it comes to this feature. It does, however, vital if you’re interested in all of the advantages that frequent publishing may provide.
Benefit 1: You keep top-of-mind with them: We recently discussed how publishing information about your topic establishes you as an authority figure. Your contacts will continue to view your industry-related information if you upload it regularly. Every new post serves as a reminder that you take your job seriously and pride yourself on being at the forefront of your field. For example, let’s pretend you’re a nutritionist. Let’s imagine an HR manager (your relationship) wants to engage a nutritional expert to assist their workers in eating healthier. Who do you think they’ll think of first? You, on the other hand, are correct. You’ve been sharing material about how healthy eating leads to happier employees and increased productivity for a long time. In most circumstances, they will not even consider another option. Even if you don’t know this HR manager personally, you could learn from one of their employees or acquaintances. “I know the ideal person for you,” the manager will remark when you pitch the idea to your connection. Once you’ve positioned yourself correctly, staying at the top of someone’s mind is a long-term approach that pays dividends.
Benefit 2: You generate traffic to your material: You instantly drive traffic to it when you publish your content.
In this aspect, it isn’t as effective as email marketing, but it may still generate a few hundred to a few thousand visitors, which isn’t bad.
If you share other people’s stuff, you won’t gain this advantage. Your priority should be to share valuable information with your contacts interested in the issue. In an ideal world, you’d create your content, but share it with your contacts if you find something fantastic that your contacts would like. The primary advantage of blogging should not be increased traffic.
Benefit 3 – You have the option to participate: Keep in mind that one of the primary goals of LinkedIn is to develop connections. Wouldn’t you go to a close friend first if you needed something they sell? When your links convert into consumers, you may attain a fantastic conversion rate by creating deep relationships (as deep as feasible) with the proper individuals. And when you publish anything, the appropriate individuals will come to you. They’re the ones who are most engaged with your material, asking questions and contributing tales in the comments.
Then you may start a discussion with them, which might lead to further interactions through LinkedIn private messaging or perhaps email. Direct contact is always the best method to develop solid connections, so don’t just react to comments on your postings; continue the conversation.
Benefit 4 – Some material may assist you in converting leads into customers: Yes, some contacts will simply say, “I need what you’re selling,” one day. This is fantastic. On the other hand, some leads may be unsure whether they need what you’re offering or how it will benefit them. This is where the substance comes into play. From a marketing standpoint, the bulk of material should be instructional. It educates the audience on various topics, including how your product fits into their lives. Webinars and case studies are two examples of specialized forms of content that might assist in converting skeptics into buyers.
3. The one aspect of networking that LinkedIn users often overlook.
When it comes to networking, it’s not accurate to argue that only LinkedIn members do this. It’s one of the most typical blunders individuals make in real life. Have you ever attended a networking event, given out a slew of business cards (together with everyone else), and then puzzled why nothing came of it? If you have, don’t feel guilty; almost everyone has gone through it at some time. It occurs because individuals do not fully get the concept of networking.
They believe there is just one step:
- Make new contacts in your field.
They are unaware that networking entails two steps:
- First, make new contacts in your field.
- Make friends with the people you meet.
The folks who benefit from networking gatherings aren’t the ones who just hand out business cards and go. They’re the ones who invite new friends to meals or call/email them after the conference is ended. They discover methods to provide value to the unique individuals they’ve met to strengthen the forming bonds, paving the way for future favors and business. That’s how you add someone to your network, and they become someone you can rely on when you need them. Here’s how to accomplish virtual networking: Gaining more “connections” on LinkedIn is getting a lot of attention. This is the same as the first stage in networking. Don’t stop there, however! Now is the time to begin building relationships with as many of your new contacts as possible. It’s a tremendous assistance to show them your articles (content). We’ve previously discussed the advantages of doing so. However, if you simply do that, you will be missing out on a considerable portion of your prospective network. Instead, doing something for the first (also known as “providing value”) is a preferable strategy. The reciprocity principle kicks in when you do, and they’ll want to assist you as well. As long as you’re willing to engage in this trade, it may continue back and forth. At the absolute least, you’ll form a professional connection with someone.
Here are some ideas on how you might provide value to someone with whom you’ve made contact:
- provide intelligent comments on the articles they’ve shared
- share what they’ve posted
- send them direct messages asking if there’s anything you can do to assist them.
It’s difficult to provide exact recommendations since everyone has different tastes. Some users, for example, may ask inquiries on LinkedIn while they are encountering difficulties at work. If you know the answer, do a short video instruction for them instead of simply typing a response. Go the additional mile to assist someone who seems to need it since it grabs people’s attention. You could spend a whole day doing this if you have a huge LinkedIn network (over 500 connections). I highly advise you to go through my guide to being effective on social media so that you can do all of this without wasting too much time.
4. A LinkedIn feature that is underutilized for expanding your network.
Earlier, I mentioned the need for a high-quality connection. It’s someone who has a strong chance of becoming a leader in the future. While having other individuals in your network isn’t a bad thing, you want as many of these high-quality relationships as possible. If only there were a way to gather all of these links in one spot! I wouldn’t ask you a question like that unless I knew the answer. A section of LinkedIn is fantastic for discovering high-quality leads: Groups. Users build groups on topics that are important to them. For example, marketers join LinkedIn marketing groups, and personal trainers join LinkedIn fitness, nutrition, individual training groups, etc. They attend these meetings with the express purpose of learning about new advances, people, and even new goods in their professions. The most straightforward approach to building hundreds of relationships and interacting with them is through groups.
A group chat was discovered to be responsible for 86.3 percent of LinkedIn interactions that finally resulted in a sale. If you follow everything else I’ve said thus far, it’s the most successful way to start creating actual connections. Grow your network and produce leads using groups: One alternative is to start from scratch and form a group. This immediately establishes you as an expert to the rest of the group. In addition, almost every member will be delighted to connect with you. But it takes a lot of effort and time to get there. For the vast majority of individuals, joining established organizations that have already put in the effort to develop a big active group is a superior alternative. Go to the top of the page and type in the subject you’re looking for to locate these groups. You may either use the drop-down menu to the left of the search bar to choose “Groups” or use the “Groups” filter on the results page to search solely for groups.
Unless the founders closely manage the groups, you’ll discover that most of the largest ones are often full of spam. Every day, you’ll notice multiple postings where people just publish their material without engaging with it in any manner.
When a group has tens of thousands of members but no one participates in any postings, it’s doubtful it will have any significant discussions. So you’re seeking groups with at least one or two comments on every other article—the greater the number, the better.
You’ll notice that the most popular groups aren’t always the best to join. So instead, seek more specialized organizations.
“Content marketing for financial institutions” is a group with a laser-like focus. It has higher involvement than the generic “content marketing” groups while having fewer members. Unfortunately, you’ll have to manually go through each group to determine if it’s excellent or not. Permission to join and browse the finest groups is typically required. If you ask to join a group by clicking the button on the group’s page, you’ll generally be accepted within a day if your profile is complete.
If a group turns out to be a flop, you can always leave later. How to act in groups to expand your network: There will be many inactive members in every somewhat big group. The objective should be to engage and connect with the active part of the group. The finest quality leads you will ever discover on the network are those that actively publish, share, and comment on the material. Then you may start establishing your connection with them using all of the other tactics we’ve discussed. So, what’s the most efficient method to go about it? Even if you believe it might help the members, you don’t want to start adding information straight away when you first join a community. If you do, it’s easy to come off as a spammer. Instead, spend the first week or two commenting on other people’s stuff. As a bonus, you may “like” and “share” it, although it won’t help much on its own. Don’t simply say “great post,” but spend some time thinking about what you’re saying. You want the poster to acknowledge and respond to the remark. Try to connect with someone in the group after you’ve had a brief chat via comments. Then, using the strategies we discussed before, seek ways to offer value. You may start posting your stuff after you’ve been in the community for a while. Request that people connect when they interact with it. Aside from that, simply keep commenting as you did in the beginning. It’s important to remember that you may join different organizations. Look for 5-10 activities that you can do daily. You may enter more if you have more time and are thriving.
5. Influencers can connect you with practically anybody.
There are influencers with many followers or connections on every social media platform.
They have in-depth expertise of LinkedIn that no average user can match since they have so many connections and often know many people. There are two ways that this may assist you in expanding your network. The first step is to attempt to contact them or, at the absolute least, start following them on social media.
Find at least 10-20 influential people in your field and connect with or follow them. This will populate your home feed with all of its updates.
Unlike some of the other categories we looked at, fans of these influencers read what they have to say. Not only that, but they interact with it. This is a fantastic way to get your name in front of many people. When you leave a remark on one of the influencers’ posts, a significant number of their followers (perhaps thousands) will see it. But don’t simply say “good post” again. That isn’t going to help you at all. Instead, post a sensible remark and say that you’re attempting to build your network in some manner. For example, a nice comment for the article, as mentioned earlier, would look like this:
That list of characteristics, notably networking, I agree with. I’ve recently begun interacting with as many clever entrepreneurs as possible, and I’ve observed that the larger my network grows, the more chances present themselves. People who see that remark will know you’re willing to connect with them, and each such comment may lead to several new relationships. Will an influencer be able to assist you? The second technique, which centers on influencers, is far more challenging to implement, but it may provide fantastic results. The main goal is to persuade the influencer to help you out by introducing you to a few individuals in your industry. If you told me you wanted to build your network of small company owners, for example, I could easily offer you a list of 10-20 people with whom I’m already linked. After that, you might send them a message stating that I suggested you contact them. You have the opportunity to strengthen your connection with them and wow them by receiving a reference from an influential person. Getting an influencer to do you a favor like that is, of course, the tricky part. And, to be honest, it isn’t simple, and you should expect a lot of rejection. You must find a method to give them some form of value before meeting with them, whether it’s based on anything they’ve placed on LinkedIn, their website, or anywhere else. I’m afraid I won’t be able to help you with this. You must first research their company, identify an issue, then go above and above to address it. This strategy isn’t required to succeed on LinkedIn; all of the others we’ve discussed will suffice. However, it is a viable solution that may help you expand your network with high-quality connections.
Conclusion
LinkedIn is perhaps the most important social networking platform for companies. It has a sizable user base, and members are primarily concerned with bettering their professional life. As a result, LinkedIn is an excellent medium for B2B sales. I’ve outlined five specific tactics that you can utilize to expand your network and establish connections that will lead to sales. Leave a comment below if you have any questions about these tactics or if you have an interesting LinkedIn story you’d like to share.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I expand my network on LinkedIn?
A: You can do this by connecting more people to your network. By doing so, you will see more connections within the system and even send messages on a larger platform.
What is the fastest way to get more connections on LinkedIn?
A: This is difficult to answer because individual connection strengths and weaknesses will vary. One way to get more connections would be to look at the profile of someone who has a lot of links but isn’t in your network and convert them yourself. You can also message strong LinkedIn users asking if they want your email and connect with them individually.
Related Tags
- how to network on LinkedIn with alumni
- free LinkedIn connections
- how to get 500 LinkedIn connections fast
- how to network on LinkedIn for students
- how to convert leads on LinkedIn