LinkedIn is one of the most powerful weapons in a business owner’s sales arsenal. With over half a billion members, it has a proven track record of helping people promote their businesses and their personal brands. And LinkedIn enables you to expand business opportunities and connections while monitoring your competitors. Most importantly, LinkedIn offers opportunities to establish yourself as a trusted industry expert.
Unfortunately, too many people ignore the network’s power. As a result, their pipeline dries up and access to opportunities is limited. Want to change that? Here are my top nine reasons to be active on LinkedIn.
1) LinkedIn is the Top Social Platform for B2B Marketing
“LinkedIn has now surpassed Facebook as the #1 most important social platform for B2B marketers….41% of B2B marketers put it at the of their list (compared to just 30% who said Facebook was the most important).”
– Jayson DeMers, Forbes
If you’re pouring resources into Facebook and Twitter, but wondering why you’re not getting B2B leads, it’s because you’re not concentrating on the top social platform for B2B marketing. One of the reasons to be active on LinkedIn is that it’s overtaken Facebook as the top social platform for B2B marketers, highlighting its ability to help you ramp up your B2B success.
LinkedIn’s success as a B2B marketing social platform stems from its membership. According to Omnicore, 61 million users are senior level influencers and 40 million users are decision makers. LinkedIn article readers are especially likely to have upper-level positions, a plus for users who regularly post content.
2) Reach Nearly 600 Million People
LinkedIn’s membership has exploded. At the end of 2018, LinkedIn’s global membership hit 590 million. Nearly half of those members are active monthly users and two new people join LinkedIn every second. Don’t ignore the opportunity to reach so many people; you’ll miss out on new customers and countless revenue dollars.
3) Your Chances of Landing a Job Interview Increase by 71%
“Job applicants who included a link to a comprehensive LinkedIn profile on their resumes received a callback rate of 13.5%, which is 71% higher than the 7.9% callback rate of job applicants who didn’t have a LinkedIn profile at all.”
– ResumeGo
If you’re in the market for a job, beefing up your LinkedIn profile is a must. ResumeGo launched a field experiment that explored the impact a LinkedIn profile could have on job application callback rates. The experiment, which concluded in 2019, involved submitting 24,570 fictitious resumes for positions listed on job search websites like Glassdoor, Indeed and ZipRecruiter.
Resumes were divided into groups based whether they had a complete LinkedIn profile. One-third of the resumes included a link to the applicant’s comprehensive LinkedIn profile, while one-third contained a link to a “bare-bones” LinkedIn profile. The remaining 33 percent of resumes didn’t even reference Linkedin.
The results showed that resumes with links to a comprehensive LinkedIn profile fared 71 percent better than those without a reference to LinkedIn.
4) Receive Up to 40 Times More Opportunities
Another one of the top reasons to be active on LinkedIn is because it generates a staggering number of opportunities for active users. Career strategy leader, Nathan Tanner, notes that “All-Star” LinkedIn users are 40 times more likely to receive opportunities through LinkedIn than people who “only have a LinkedIn profile because you’re supposed to have one.” And achieving All-Star status is easier than you might think. Tanner says you qualify for All-Star status by making sure your profile includes seven things:
- A description of your current position
- A profile photo
- Your location and industry
- A minimum of 50 LinkedIn connections
- Your educational background
- A minimum of three skills
- At least two past employment positions
5) Generate New Leads
LinkedIn is a goldmine for lead generation. The platform offers so many ways to connect with key players in your industry and build interest in your brand. Jeff Haden, owner of BlackBird Media, highlights lead gen strategies using Linkedin:
- Follow your clients‘ activities to see if they require your services
- Post an update to your profile that includes a link to an article your clients will find relevant
- Join a group to connect with prospects within your industry
You can also prepare a short, digital commercial about your products and services. Including the text in your profile will help raise awareness about the ways that you deliver satisfaction to your customers.
6) Monitor Key Competitors
Maintaining an edge in your industry is much easier when you have an inside track on your competitors and their latest market activities. LinkedIn lets you follow your competitors, their connections and their plans for expansion. Using LinkedIn, it’s easy to track their product launches, monitor their trade show participation and even see who some of their top customers are.
But LinkedIn also offers insight into your competitors’ industry status. Nicholas Woirhaye, Co-founder of IKO System, notes that following competitors on LinkedIn can give you clues about their performance and strategy. For instance, posts about new hires or executives who are leaving can provide insight into that company’s direction and health.
7) Expand Your List of Industry Contacts
But isn’t LinkedIn big on actual networking? Yes, and no platform is better for connecting with new industry contacts than LinkedIn. The average LinkedIn user has 930 connections and that figure continues to rise. Another one of the important reasons to be active on LinkedIn is to regularly browse profiles of people in your industry and invite them to connect with you.
But don’t think LinkedIn ties you to one specific industry. It can be a big help if you’re switching careers and are looking to build relationships with key players in your new industry. And LinkedIn makes it easy for you to invite others to join your network. You can even personalize your invitation to increase the likelihood that a potential connection will accept.
8) Position Yourself as an Industry Expert
“Whether or not you feel comfortable calling yourself an expert, positioning yourself as an expert is an incredibly effective way of marketing yourself and your business. And if you sell to other businesses then LinkedIn is the place to “be known for what you know“.”
– Greg Cooper, Independent LinkedIn Coach and Consultant
Customers like to buy from industry experts, and LinkedIn offers ways to showcase your expertise and close more sales. Greg Cooper, an Independent LinkedIn Coach and Consultant, outlines five steps to position yourself as an industry expert on LinkedIn:
- Step One: Develop a solid personal brand that features a professional headshot and a headline that summarizes your industry expertise
- Step Two: Establish a network of connections that is broad and relevant to your goals
- Step Three: Create and post original content that showcases your industry experience
- Step Four: Develop a “super network” within your network that includes people who regularly show support for your activity
- Step Five: Get involved with your connections by posting comments, answering questions and sharing information
9) Increase Your Knowledge and Expertise
LinkedIn has plenty of professional development opportunities. For one, as an active LinkedIn user, you have access to the latest industry news and developments. With hundreds of millions of talented professionals posting every day, you can expand your knowledge just by logging on.
But one of most attractive aspects of LinkedIn is its flexibility. You can engage in industry learning on your favorite mobile device. Whether you want to enroll in a LinkedIn course or browse the latest news at home or from your office, you have a valuable source of global industry news at your fingertips.
What’s the Most Important Thing to Remember About LinkedIn?
“A well maintained LinkedIn profile allows you countless benefits to your professional career. Simply having a ‘presence’ on LinkedIn isn’t going to help you achieve your objectives. You’ll need to use LinkedIn’s tools effectively and more frequently.”
– Paul Keijzer, CEO of the Talent Games
The key to a successful LinkedIn presence is to build a solid profile and then remain active. It requires a little time up front and a modest time investment as time goes on. But once you establish your profile and build connections, you’ll see returns. And when you gain traction on LinkedIn, you’ll see that it really is a goldmine for small business owners.