LinkedIn has become an indispensable platform for business networking and marketing. With over 930 million users worldwide, LinkedIn offers unparalleled opportunities to connect with professionals, promote your business, and generate leads.
In 2023, LinkedIn will continue to be a go-to platform for B2B marketers looking to boost brand awareness, generate leads, and drive sales. Here are some of the best practices for using LinkedIn for marketing this year:
Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile
Your LinkedIn profile serves as your professional online presence and the face of your brand on the platform. An optimized, complete profile establishes credibility and helps you get found by your ideal customers.
Ensure to include a professional headshot, a well-written summary section highlighting your skills and achievements, a detailed work history, and recommendations from colleagues and clients. Also, customize your public profile URL to make it easy to share.
Grow Your Network
Expanding your connections on LinkedIn should be an ongoing effort. A more extensive first-degree network increases your visibility and provides access to secondary connections.
Connect with colleagues, clients, prospects, industry influencers, and like-minded professionals. Personalize connection requests by adding a note referencing shared connections or interests. You can also import contacts from your email list to connect with existing connections quickly.
Follow Companies and Influencers
Following companies and thought leaders in your industry provides relevant content in your LinkedIn feed. This lets you stay on top of industry news, trends, and opportunities.
Remember to follow any companies you currently work for or have worked for. Identify relevant influencers, authors, and experts to follow based on your target audience and niche.
Join Industry-Related Groups
LinkedIn Groups offer a chance to get your message in front of a highly targeted audience. Join Groups in your industry or niche to tap into an engaged community of potential prospects.
Once you’ve joined relevant Groups, participate in discussions when you can provide valuable insights. Avoid self-promotional comments that will be seen as spam. Establishing yourself as a subject matter expert raises your profile within the Group.
Regularly Post Valuable Updates
Posting regular updates provides fresh, engaging content for your connections while positioning you as an industry thought leader. Share insights, trends, tips, case studies, or anything your audience would find valuable.
You can post published articles, images, infographics, videos, Q&As, polls, event listings, job openings, and more. Use relevant hashtags and mention any companies or people featured. When posting images, optimize them for LinkedIn using the right Image size. Post consistently, ideally once a day, without overt self-promotion.
Utilize LinkedIn’s Company Pages
If your business has a Company Page on LinkedIn, leverage it as a marketing channel. Use your Page to promote content, advertise job openings, announce events, highlight wins, and more.
Ensure your Company Page is filled out and utilizes all available sections – Career Page, Products, Services, Showcase Pages, etc. Engage followers by responding to comments and messages promptly. Stay active by posting regular updates.
Run Sponsored Content Campaigns
LinkedIn’s advertising platform enables you to target feeds and pages based on audience demographics, interests, company details, etc. Sponsored content campaigns are ideal for increasing awareness, driving traffic, and generating leads.
You can sponsor existing posts from your Company Page or individual profile. Create native-format ads optimized for mobile as well. Add a call-to-action button to drive clicks to your site, gated content offers, or Shopify store. Measure results and optimize campaigns for maximum impact.
Leverage LinkedIn’s Lead Gen Forms
LinkedIn’s Lead Gen Forms allow you to collect contact information from people who engage with your posts and ads. This helps you generate and nurture quality leads from LinkedIn without leaving the platform.
Turn on Lead Gen Forms for any post natively through your Page or personal profile. You can customize the fields you want prospects to complete, like name, email, company, title, etc. LinkedIn Lead Gen is best combined with targeted Sponsored Content campaigns.
Share Content Via LinkedIn’s Publishing Platform
Publishing long-form posts on LinkedIn allows you to demonstrate thought leadership and gain more exposure. Native posts have greater visibility in LinkedIn’s algorithm than links to off-site content.
Write posts relating to your niche on LinkedIn’s Publisher Platform. Insert images, videos, call-out sections, and other formatting to make content more engaging. Promote your posts organically and via LinkedIn’s Sponsored Content options.
Curate Content With LinkedIn’s Curation Tool
LinkedIn’s curation tool lets you easily share and add commentary to content already published on LinkedIn. This allows you to tap into content from influencers and brands your audience cares about.
Search for relevant posts from authoritative sources. Use LinkedIn’s curation feature to share these posts on your profile or Company Page. Add your perspective in a short commentary. Do this regularly to position yourself alongside trusted industry voices.
Conduct LinkedIn Live Video Broadcasts
Live broadcasting on LinkedIn is a powerful way to engage your audience in real time and build authority. Broadcast industry Q&As, “ask me anything” sessions, workshops, product demos, and more.
Promote your live videos in advance to drive attendance. You can also repurpose recordings as evergreen content by posting them natively or sponsoring them afterward. This expands your reach and shelf-life.
Leverage Your Employees as Thought Leaders
Encourage your employees to be active on LinkedIn, promoting your brand and establishing themselves as industry experts. This boosts your brand’s reach and provides more touchpoints for prospects.
Make sure your team has optimized LinkedIn profiles highlighting their expertise. Empower them to post regular updates – content, commentary, company news, etc. Share and like their posts often to increase visibility. Feature them as guest contributors on your Company Page.
Monitor Company and Keyword Mentions
LinkedIn’s notification settings let you monitor mentions of your brand name, products, services, employees, keywords, etc. This allows you to join relevant conversations and respond to mentions appropriately.
Set up notifications for your company, top employees, core products/services, and keywords like “software for X industry” or “challenges with X process.” Reply strategically to comments and queries to provide value. Search brand and keyword mentions periodically, too.
Integrate With Marketing Automation Tools
Many marketing automation platforms integrate with LinkedIn to help you capture more leads and track engagement. This lets you deliver targeted content and messages based on LinkedIn activity and profile data.
Popular tools like Marketo, Eloqua, HubSpot, and Pardot integrate with LinkedIn. Install the relevant LinkedIn plugins to track LinkedIn visitor behavior on your site. Set up LinkedIn-triggered workflows based on profile views, shares, follows, messaging, etc.
Analyze Your LinkedIn Analytics
Use LinkedIn’s built-in Analytics to uncover visitor demographics, content engagement, lead sources, ad performance, and more valuable data. Accessing insights helps refine your strategy.
Analyze follower growth, Company Page and Sponsored Content metrics, website referrals, Lead Gen Form submissions, employee amplification impact, top-performing updates, and audience data. Compare results week-over-week and iterate based on key learnings.
Make LinkedIn Part of Your Daily Routine
Make it part of your daily habits to capitalize on LinkedIn for marketing fully. Set aside daily time to check notifications, post updates, engage with your network, browse Groups, monitor mentions, and more.
Schedule 15-30 minutes daily to complete LinkedIn tasks. Respond to comments and messages in a timely manner. Consistency and regular engagement will drive more visibility on the algorithm-driven platform.
Final Thoughts
LinkedIn is no longer just an online resume – it has become a versatile platform with marketing potential at every step of the sales funnel. Following these best practices will help you maximize your LinkedIn presence and strategy in 2023.
Focus on creating value, building community, and developing relationships. With nearly three-quarters of a billion users, LinkedIn is too important to ignore as part of your digital marketing strategy this year and beyond.
The key is adopting a comprehensive approach that leverages all LinkedIn has to offer – from profiles and connections to content and ads. Use the tips outlined here to boost awareness, traffic, leads, and sales with LinkedIn marketing in 2023.
