If you’ve been paying attention to modern marketing practices for your small business, you’ve realized the push toward social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Twitter. All these platforms and more have taken steps to become small business friendly, and as the most popular social media platforms, they seem to get most of the hype. This can make it easy to ignore the value of LinkedIn for small businesses.
Many professionals use LinkedIn to network, to showcase their professional skills, and to look for other professional opportunities as individuals. But as a small business, LinkedIn might be easy to neglect. LinkedIn, however, is exactly the platform you should be utilizing the most. It was built by professionals for professionals and is optimized to help your small business grow.
Here are 3 reasons you should be using LinkedIn in your small business marketing strategy and 2 tips to get you started:
Go Where Your Customers Are
LinkedIn has more than 177 million users in the US alone, which means it’s highly likely at least part of your audience is on LinkedIn. But if you’re hesitant about spending more time marketing on yet another social media platform, consider choosing your platforms based on the demographics of your target audience.
How engaged are your ideal target customers with LinkedIn? Here are some statistics to help you determine if your prospects are using LinkedIn:
Get Found on Google
Are you showing up in the top results when you search Google for your business? LinkedIn has high authority in Google Search so if you have a LinkedIn Company Page, you’re more likely to get that top spot.
You want to make sure your LinkedIn page for your small business can instantly establish credibility for visitors coming in from search results. This is why engaging content and frequent postings on LinkedIn are important and why you should make it an integral part of your marketing strategy.
See how to optimize your LinkedIn profile for 2020!
Be Relevant Instead of Fleeting
In contrast to the fleeting ideas and thoughts most users share on Twitter or Instagram, LinkedIn gives you a platform to share your work life, your goals, your values, your services and products, and more as a company.
LinkedIn discussions are built on professionalism, growth, and authority rather than the latest scandal, trend, or breaking news story. This allows you to create more thoughtful and time savvy content, presenting your business as a trustworthy thought leader on a platform where users are searching for just that.
Keeping Your Followers Engaged
So, how often should you be posting? If you want to establish your small business on LinkedIn and consistently gain new followers, you need to post frequently - every other day is preferential, at least once a week is necessary.
Building up more content will help you gauge what your prospects and customers are responding to. In turn, you can achieve business growth by offering the services and products that best meet your community’s needs.
Share Your Voice, Not Just Your Brand
As a small business on a social platform, it’s important to share your point of view. What do you know? What does your small business represent? You can develop this into compelling content that adds intellectual value and builds trust for your community rather than just selling a brand.
Pick topics relevant to your industry that you are an expert on and share this information with your followers.
Another tactic is to look for the things in your profession that are pain points for your customers. Post the ways your business has discovered to resolve these issues and offer your viewers advice. Not only will you be helping them eliminate a conflict, but you’ll establish your expertise and further build trust for your brand.