Whether you’re a local business located in Lafayette, LA or a nationally-recognized brand serving customers across the country, a key aspect of digital marketing is reaching your target audience. Although most social media platforms have distinct levels of targeting, it is crucial to showcase your company on the platforms that make the most sense. For instance, the newly released social-networking app, TikTok, is a monumental platform for connecting with younger audiences and there’s a reason why the minimum cost to advertise is $500 per campaign.
Although it may seem intimidating, one of the smartest platforms for your company as a business owner is LinkedIn. With over 500 million total users, LinkedIn is one of the most powerful platforms for connecting with potential leads, local business owners, and like-minded individuals. With this statistic in mind, does that mean every business should be on LinkedIn? Not quite.
As a Lafayette advertising agency, it makes sense for our firm to maintain relevance on the platform, due to the fact that our services are marketed and geared toward other businesses. Local restaurants, retail shops, and other B2C entities will not have as much influence on LinkedIn as they would on Facebook or Instagram. But the fact remains that LinkedIn is a gold-mine for starting, developing, and maintaining B2B relationships. If you’re already feeling lost, then let’s start at the basics of setting up your own individual LinkedIn profile.
Optimizing Your Profile for LinkedIn
As a business owner, it is in your best interest to optimize your LinkedIn profile in order to connect with professionals in your field. LinkedIn’s process of setting up your account is pretty straightforward. Complete each section of your profile with relevant information– most importantly, your education, experience, and skills. Choose a profile picture that represents your industry and that displays your professionalism (no selfies, photos with your pup, or blurry photos.) When adding past work experience, LinkedIn gives users the ability to feature written recommendations for specific roles. This is a plus if you’re on the search for a new job, or if someone is deciding on whether they should use your company for their desired services, as people can see that you’ve done good work in the past.
One of the newest features from LinkedIn is the Featured section where you can showcase any work samples that you’re most proud of. By using this feature, you can choose the content that you most want users to see, whether it’s an article, document, or photo. This section is also great for posting any certifications or extra education you’ve received in your industry. Once you’ve completed your profile, start searching for friends, co-workers, or acquaintances in your industry and send them an invitation to connect. The more people you strive to connect with, the easier it will be for LinkedIn’s algorithm to match you with people you may know.
Posting Content on LinkedIn as a Company
Once you’ve created a page for yourself and your company, ensure that all relevant fields are complete with correct information as it relates to your business. This can include your About Us page, your company size, and your industry. Then move on to planning out your content.
The content that businesses post on LinkedIn can sometimes vary substantially from the content that is posted on platforms such as Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. Your goal on LinkedIn is to be useful, relevant, and serve as a resource for your customer base to receive valuable, insightful information. LinkedIn is also a great place to showcase your wins and boast about your all-star team!
LinkedIn gives users the ability to post content through multiple formats. For example, if we wanted to share local SEO solutions with our followers, then we could do it by linking a blog, sharing a helpful video resource, or just posting some tips as a normal update. But let it be known that video is huge on LinkedIn. On average, videos earn three times the amount of engagement of text posts. Although we always recommend posting something visual (i.e. photo or video), a text post that is well-constructed with interesting information right off the bat can work wonders.
With LinkedIn, and social media in general, your content should mostly be aimed at stopping the endless scroll that users perform. Put yourself in the users’ shoes. Do you read and watch every post on your newsfeed, whether it’s Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, or even YouTube? If a piece of content is not eye-catching or relevant to the user, then the chances of them interacting or engaging with the post is slim. This is why thumbnails, headlines, and the first few words of your creative are so crucial.
Pro-tip: If you’re wondering when the best time to post on LinkedIn is, aim for Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday mornings to get the most engagement/views.
Advertising on LinkedIn
If you’re already pretty familiar with advertising on Facebook, then you shouldn’t have much difficulty figuring out LinkedIn’s outbound marketing interface. Appearing strikingly similar to Facebook, LinkedIn offers advertisers multiple objectives to use when setting up an ad campaign. Brand awareness, website visits, engagement, and lead generation are just a few of the objectives available. On par with Facebook, you’ll be able to target your audience through a multitude of criteria, including skills, job titles, and interests.
LinkedIn has a few different choices for choosing your ad format. At the most basic level, these formats include:
- Sponsored content: appears directly in users’ feeds in the form of a single image ad, video ad, or carousel ad.
- Message ads: appears in users’ messaging inbox. This format allows you to send messages directly to prospects that may spark immediate action. Think of it as LinkedIn’s platform-specific form of e-mail marketing, only stronger and more likely to garner engagement.
- Dynamic ads: personalizes ads for specific members in your target audience using profile data. These include three formats: follower ads, spotlight ads (website traffic/event registration), or jobs ads.
- Text ads: placed at the top of the page or on the right rail of desktop pages. These are available as PPC or CPM ads.
Once you’ve figured out the logistics of your campaign, including the content and creative, you’ll be able to set your budget, time constraints, and measure the results. Keep in mind that LinkedIn ads cost more than Facebook ads. However, for certain businesses, this may be the better choice. While targeting is an option on both platforms, you know for a fact that people on LinkedIn are on the platform to conduct business or engage with people in their industry.
If you’re still not sure on how to ensure that your company’s LinkedIn profile is up to par with industry standards, then contact us today. We’re ready to create content that shines a light on your business in the best way possible.