Promote Your Business on LinkedIn These 6 Ways, By Joan Stewart, The Publicity Hound
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(Editor's Note - I ran across this excellent article written by Joan Stewart, The Publicity Hound, from Port Washington, WI. She is formerly of Maple Heights and worked as managing editor of The Lake County News-Herald. Joan was kind enough to allow COSE MindSpring to share her article with all of you. Enjoy - Phil Stella.)
http://www.linkedin.com. the world’s biggest business networking site, can be a powerful promotional tool to promote your business—IF it’s used correctly.
That’s a very big IF. One of the first rules about social networking is that your primary goal should not be to promote. You first must become part of the community, join the conversation and offer helpful advice. Then, and only then, can you promote—not overtly, but very subtly.
Before you do, you must first start making connections. Some people collect LinkedIn connections like they collect pennies in a big, empty mayonnaise jar. They add them one by one, watching the pile of names grow bigger and bigger. They keep track of how many connections they've made. And they feel pretty darn good when their list grows to 100...300...500 names and beyond. But they do nothing with the connections except when it’s time to look for another job.
Scott Allen, an expert in social media and social networking, teaches business people how to use LinkedIn to promote. Since creating his LinkedIn profile four years ago, he has used LinkedIn to:
- Close a 5-figure consulting deal with a company that found him at that site.
- Find an agent for his first book, "The Virtual Handshake: Opening Doors and Closing Deals."
- Collect feedback from 100 contacts who read the draft of The Virtual Handshake. Of those, about 80 had never met Scott face to face. Yet he established such a strong connection with them on LinkedIn that they took the time to not only read his book but provide valuable comments.
- Generate media opportunities. How many? "I've lost count," he says.
- Find joint venture partners.
- Connect with authors who interview him and quote him in their books.
Scott calls that promoting. Not the in-your-face, obnoxious kind that most of us hate. But the smart, subtle, savvy kind that makes it easy for people to find him if they need the kind of help and information he can offer. He has more than 500 connections and more than 60 recommendations, almost all of them absolutely glowing. He stresses, however, that someone on LinkedIn with only 70 or 80 really strong connections can make them go a lot farther than somebody with 500 names of people who they barely know.
Scott says business people who aren't using LinkedIn to promote are missing a huge opportunity. Here are six ways to use http://www.linkedin.com. to promote your business:
1. In your profile
When you create your profile, you can optimize it for the search engines by repeating the name of your business several times within it, or by simply mentioning something else that you want the search engines to find, like an event you sponsor or a product or service you sell.
2. Refer to yourself as an expert (assuming you are)
Within your profile, you can also refer to yourself as an expert. For example, I refer to myself as “Publicity expert Joan Stewart.” Journalists frequently search for experts at LinkedIn. If a reporter types “publicity expert” into the search box, my profile will pop up.
3. Ask a question
Use the question-and-answer feature on LinkedIn to ask a question. For example, let’s say you’re a PowerPoint expert and you’re hosting a one-day workshop on how to create interesting PowerPoint presentations. You have room for 50 people, and many of them will be flying to Cleveland to participate. About two or three months before the event, you could ask this question on LinkedIn: “What are the biggest things that you struggle with when creating PowerPoint Presentations?”
This helps you do several things. First, people who answer the question will talk about the types of problems that your workshop will help them solve. As the event gets closer, you can email people who answered the question and say something like, “By the way, I just thought you’d like to know that I’m sponsoring a one-day workshop on how to create interesting PowerPoint presentations Nov. 3 in Cleveland…..” And give them the link for the registration page.
4. Answer a question
Log in several times a week and answer questions that pertain to your area of expertise. You can, of course, link back to articles, blog posts or anything else at your website. Just don’t make your answer overtly promotional. It’s much better to give well-thought-out answers that are very helpful. The person asking the question can review all answers and flag one of them as “Best Answer.” One of your goals on LinkedIn is to accumulate as many “Best Answers” as possible. This builds your credibility.
5. Ask your connections to help you “spread the word” about what you want to promote
People hate it when you try to sell them something. But they don’t mind being helpful. Ask your connections to let their connections know about an event you’re sponsoring, a new product launch, or a fund-raising campaign for a good cause. This is a powerful strategy if used correctly.
6. Buy a targeted ad
LinkedIn has recently launched a service called Direct Ads. You can set your budget, schedule the start date and decide how many days you want the ad to appear. It tells you the price per thousand impressions. The starting price is $10 per thousand. You can target it up to two additional categories based on company size, job function, industry, seniority, gender, age and geography.
Connect with me on LinkedIn
If you’d like to invite me to connect with you, you can find me here. When you invite me, please let me know that you read this article. That’s because I don’t accept invitations to connect with just anybody. I prefer that the person to whom I am connecting already has met me or already knows about me.
That’s because on LinkedIn, you can ask your connections to introduce you to one of their connections. And I don’t want to introduce one of my connections to another connection who I do not know.
Use just a few of these tips, and you could boost attendance to your events, create the buzz for new products and services, attract great employees, make valuable connections, and be introduced to decision-makers who you wouldn’t otherwise meet by yourself.
Have fun on www.LinkedIn.com!
Joan Stewart, aka The Publicity Hound, interviewed Scott Allen during two sold-out teleseminars on “How to Use LinkedIn to Promote Anything—Ethically & Powerfully” and sells the MP3 audios and electronic transcripts. Joan also publishes the ezine “The Publicity Hound’s Tips of the Week.” You can subscribe at her blog at PublicityHound.net
