Are you getting the most out of LinkedIn? Plenty of entrepreneurs create a LinkedIn profile, only to connect with a handful of colleagues and log in occasionally–but think about it this way: if you’re not engaging in important conversations with other industry experts, making new connections within your field, and creating amazing new relationships, you could probably be getting more out of your LinkedIn.
The truth is, there is so much that entrepreneurs and small business owners can get out of LinkedIn by growing their personal brand and generating real engagement. With over 875 million members from around the world, It can become one of their most potent channels for growth within their industry, and a powerful way to grow their influence as a brand.
Getting engagement on your posts is one of the most essential parts of growing your presence on LinkedIn, but how do you do that? We’ll talk about how to grow your presence on LinkedIn and increase your content engagement, why LinkedIn is a powerful tool for growing your personal brand, and how generating more engagement can open you up to a world of new business opportunities in 2023.
How Entrepreneurs Use LinkedIn To Grow Their Influence
Entrepreneurs use LinkedIn to start great conversations, every day. Those conversations turn into new connections, an opportunity to share and learn, and more visibility for their personal brand and tons of important new relationships with others in their field.
Think about that for a moment. With all that engagement (aka in my word “eyeballs”), these entrepreneurs are reaching people across Linkedin who may not even be followers or connections. For your personal brand, this potential is massive. So how do you exactly grow your influence with content? The key is engaging with fellow industry leaders and focusing on building your own personal brand. Creating engaging content helps you to reach a wider audience, and personal brands help establish yourself as a go-to expert in the field. That’s simple!
We’ll talk about how you can create real engagement with your Linkedin profile and how you can use LinkedIn as a sales page for your personal brand rather than just using it as a static resume, gathering digital dust in the virtual void.
Why Engaging With Fellow Experts on LinkedIn Matters
When you need a service or product, you probably have an idea of what you’re looking for, to begin with, but you’re also influenced just by what you’re aware of. If you’ve never heard of a company or brand, how can you know that they have exactly what you’re looking for? You probably already know that–that’s just marketing in a nutshell.
Here’s why I bring it up: on Linkedin, your engagement translates to visibility. And if you want to make the most of that potential, the best way you can do that is by engaging with other industry experts and leaders in your field–people whose audiences will already be interested in what you have to offer.
If you want your LinkedIn profile to be a huge metaphorical billboard, you need to build up that engagement first. We talked about how Linkedin has over 875 million members, so if you want to tap into that vast potential, this is important. If your LinkedIn profile just exists to hold your employment history, the only people that will see it are likely to be people who are going out of their way to look for it.
Avoidable Engagement Mistakes
Many LinkedIn users have great services and products they’re offering. Still, they fail to reach potential customers, clients, and partners through LinkedIn because they don’t create content for their audience–they create content centered around themselves. You should create content with one question in mind: “what’s in it for my audience?” The answer: engaging content that opens hearts and wallets, guaranteed.
When you don’t put your audience front and center, content becomes copyable and lost in the sea of noise. Because they don’t put time, effort, and attention into their audience and getting to know what their audience expects, they begin creating low-quality content that doesn’t become an integral part of their marketing strategy.
Here are some avoidable mistakes:
- Parroting obvious information: Before you start making posts, think about how useful people might find them. You are an expert in your field. Instead of offering predictable platitudes, or boring basics, talk about what makes what you do interesting.
- Posting Un-engaging Content: Try not to think of what you post on Linkedin as just for yourself. Think about how inviting your content is to engage with. If you want to start an active conversation, be sure to end your piece of content with a “Call-To-Action” or “Call-To-Conversation.” Invite your audience to join you and share their thoughts–encourage engagement, ask questions, and interact with your audience.
- Confusing Information: Be clear about what you do. Even if you’re generating posts that are getting attention, think about the next step in your marketing funnel. Someone might see something you wrote and dig deeper, only to find your profile page and realize they don’t even know exactly what you do. Make it easy for potential partners, clients, and customers to learn exactly what you have to offer!
- Your LinkedIn Profile is not fully optimized: Make sure your Linkedin profile is complete! Posting great content and engaging with and expanding your audience is important, but it’s also crucial that you have a complete profile to get more profile views. According to Linkedin, profiles with a photo can see as many as 21 times more profile views. Focus on making sure your work history is complete, your summary tells the story of who you are in your industry, and your headline is attention-grabbing. You can find more actionable tips here.
The Best Time To Start Growing Your Personal Brand Is Now
Don’t wait around for another year of opportunities on LinkedIn to pass you by. There’s no better time than now to start growing your online presence on Linkedin. There’s an old saying that goes:
“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.”
There’s perhaps no better way to think about growing your Linkedin presence. It may not happen overnight, but if you want to increase your engagement, it’s essential to get started as soon as possible.
You don’t have to do it alone, either. Understanding the basics is excellent–and it’s a great first step–and, if you’re ready, we’d love to help you take the next step. If you’re ready to build up a follow-worthy personal brand that attracts your ideal clients, join us at Insiders Suite Experience™.
TL;DR
With over 875 million users around the world, LinkedIn is a great tool for growing your personal brand and building demand for your business through engaging content.
Here are some key takeaways:
- If you just use your LinkedIn profile as a place to keep your resume, you’re missing out on a wealth of opportunities.
- Engaging with your fellow industry peers and experts is vital to growing your brand on LinkedIn.
- Many users fail to take advantage of LinkedIn’s potential through common pitfalls, like posting content that is not audience-centric, not posting at all, or not having a fully-optimized LinkedIn profile.
- Stop waiting and start engaging! Begin posting on LinkedIn if you aren’t already.
- Building up your personal brand through engagement on LinkedIn is a solid foundation for your online presence and business success, and if you’re ready to take the next step, we’re here to help.
Don’t Forget the Many Ways to Grow LinkedIn Engagement
LinkedIn can be so much more than just a way to store your resume online. The conversations you engage in and the relationships you build through that engagement can lead you to a world of new business opportunities in 2023. Each day is a new opportunity to begin new conversations with other industry experts as well as potential future clients and partners. Remember that engagement, having a complete profile, and sparking great conversations within your field are all important parts of growing your LinkedIn from zero views and zero engagement to hero!
Ready To Take The Next Step?
First impressions matter. And your profile is the first place your target audience can get to know more about you.
If you want to set yourself apart from the crowd, you need to build a Rockstar LinkedIn profile and rank higher in LinkedIn’s search results in order to:
- Be more visible to your target audience,
- Become someone your audience knows and trusts enough to DM (and work with), and
- Showcase your personality, vision, and mission.
đź“Ť Ready to create a scroll-stopping LinkedIn profile that wins you and your business eyeballs, trust, and clients?
Download this 2023 Ultimate LinkedIn Profile Checklist and get started.
