I do all of the following once a year and suggest all my clients do the same! You’ll see what I’m talking about in a second, but having a daily, monthly, and yearly routine for LinkedIn keeps my account fresh and current. Nothing is more of a turn off than a LinkedIn account that looks like it hasn’t been touched in the past five years. Read my list and see if this won’t work for you. The first thing I do is update my head shot. I’m a stickler on having a professional, up to date photo of myself. As my rolls at my business change, I need to change…
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Building a Personal Bond on LinkedIn with Your Audience
Okay, I get it. LinkedIn is all starched shirt stuffy, and no one has any fun. It’s not Facebook, right? This isn’t the place for frivolity, or personality, for that matter. It’s the place where people get—stuff—done. And, all of that is true, but for some types of businesses, freelancers for instance, sharing personal moments on LinkedIn can get you a lot of mileage. What’s your lifestyle like? Mine? I work for myself. I run a small business. I do have flexible hours and a ton of fun at my chosen career. So, why not show that? It doesn’t matter what you have. Someone else wants it too! If you…
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Two Ways to Create Near Viral Content on LinkedIn
LinkedIn marketing done right goes something like this. Get an account, create a killer profile, and get a lot of connections. Reach out to those connections and tell them about your product or service. Next, turn yourself into a though leader by creating tons of meaningful content. This process works, but it won’t happen in just a day. It’s going to take a few months. A year, maybe. But think of what you’ll have when you’ve accomplished the “thought leader” part. You’ll have positioned yourself as a big dog in your market area. This is positioning and branding that will serve you well for the rest of your career. Here’s…
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Why No One’s Viewing Your LinkedIn Profile and What to Do About It!
One of the most important metrics to keep up with on your LinkedIn profile is the number of views you’ve gotten recently. Even with a free account, LinkedIn gives you an indication of whether or not your views are growing as compared with the last reporting time. Although you can’t always make sure your views are growing, you can generally influence them to grow, which is a very important thing to do. If you’re not getting many profile views, there are a few things you can do about it. First off, I’d tweak your headline and possibly your profile summary. You headline and your photo appear when someone’s searching for…
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How to Turn Your LinkedIn Profile into a Lead Gen Machine!
I’m amazed at how many entrepreneurs, salespeople, freelancers, and business people fail to utilize the amazing power of LinkedIn for sales and lead generation. I know what happened, though. At some point in the past, everyone got it into their heads that LinkedIn is a place to find a job, or a virtual Rolodex. Sure, it’s both of those, but it’s actually so much more! LinkedIn is the world’s top business networking platform with over half a billion users. You can connect with virtually any business person, or really anyone who’s a professional of any sort, on the planet through LinkedIn. To actually start leveraging the power of LinkedIn, let’s…
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When to Call Yourself a Consultant on LinkedIn—And When Not!
There’s been a plethora of people calling themselves consultants on LinkedIn, when in point of fact, they’re not consultants—they’re just currently unemployed! Somehow, rightly or wrongly, word got out that being unemployed was a bad thing and that recruiters would look askance at anyone who’s title says that they are indeed unemployed. I’m not s recruiter and I’m not looking for a job. I actually am a consultant. I consult with individuals and businesses who want to learn how to leverage LinkedIn to grow their networks, sales, and their businesses. So, you can see that I have a vested interest in there not being a lot of “false positives” when…
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The Easiest Way to Find New Business on LinkedIn
Want a quick hack that will secure you tons of new business this year, if you apply it consistently? LinkedIn had removed this feature, then, probably due to all the hue and cry, they added it back in. It’s the “Who’s Viewed Your Profile” feature, and it’s my go-to method of getting new business for my consulting business. Think about it for a moment. Who would potentially be more interested in you and what you do than someone who searched for you on LinkedIn and took a look at your profile? That right there is a ready-made source of potential prospects! I’m not going to tell you how to get…
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Three Things to Cut Out of Your LinkedIn Profile Today!
Your LinkedIn profile is your “silent salesperson”, and the profile summary is actually more like a personal sales letter than anything else. I’ve been helping businesses and professionals use LinkedIn successfully for quite some time now, and often when I look at a new client’s profile, I see some of the same elementary mistakes. I’d like to alert you to these so you can fix them and watch your connections, referrals, and sales that you make from LinkedIn soar! Mistake #1: Unprofessional looking photo! Wow! This one’s on probably half the profiles I look at. Would you go to a job interview looking like you’re chilling on the beach with…
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Ideas of Live By for Businesses of All Sizes
As the world of social media makes our lives much more transparent and much more public, it’s very important for businesses to change their approach to finding, selling, and servicing their customers and clients. Gone are the days when you couldn’t sell somebody something, charge them an arm and a leg, and then offer shoddy service on the back end. You’ll hear about it, not just sooner or later, but in real time on Twitter! Reputations can be smashed in a matter of a few days online. This may or may not be a good thing, but it’s a reality for today’s business world. I sell to a lot of…
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Check Out LinkedIn’s New Service for Freelancers
Although I usually work with small to medium-sized businesses, I do occasionally work with professional freelancers. I’ve had clients who are business writers, graphic artists, and digital designers. Freelancing is a great way to work because you have very low overhead and, if you know what you’re doing, you can make a killer income. The only real issue that most freelancers face is finding clients. And, that’s where LinkedIn comes is. Last year, LinkedIn launched a new service called LinkedIn Pro Finder. Basically, this service connected freelancers with people who need their services. If you’ve ever heard of Upwork, this is LinkedIn’s version of the same idea. Potential clients come…