If you open up my notebook and look at my long-term marketing to-do list, you’ll see LinkedIn mentioned a lot. I really want to figure out a way to use LinkedIn to maximize its effectiveness as a B2B marketing channel. In short, I want to master it.
There are 3 things I’m already doing pretty regularly:
- Sharing my blog posts
- Commenting on my network’s updates
- Looking for shared connections so I can get warm introductions to potential clients
All well and good, but I really felt like I was missing out on something big. As it turns out, I was.
Social Media Examiner published a post last month that immediately caught my attention: It’s all about how to effectively use LinkedIn’s publishing feature. This was all new to me, so here’s what I learned about using publishing to master LinkedIn for B2B marketing:
Getting features on a LinkedIn channel can expose you to A LOT of people
Posts are categorized into channels; as a user, you can follow as many channels as you’d like (when you log in, click on Pulse in your news feed to find channels). I am on the Big Ideas & Innovation channel now, which has nearly 7.8 million followers. If you get featured on a channel, that’s a lot of eyeballs you’ll reach.
One small problem: You don’t have much control over this (which makes the next tips REALLY important). Someone at LinkedIn chooses what channel to feature your blog post on. Still, getting featured is pretty sweet.
Publish content that fits a winning formula
The most popular content on LinkedIn (in terms of likes, shares, and comments) includes articles that are:
- Practical and data-driven
- Focused on career development, leadership, management, marketing, and customer service
- Specific to finance, banking and government
- Tied to self-improvement
You can also look for trends based on what’s featured in the channels you follow and by using BuzzSumo, which analyzes the most popular content on a site by keyword.
Optimize the heck out of your blog post
LinkedIn places a premium on headlines and visuals, so focus on writing the best, most compelling, most interesting, and most WOW headlines to get noticed (so you can get featured). Same with visuals – choose one that makes a big impact.
Don’t gloss over a call-to-action (CTA), either. Think about what you want a reader to do – subscribe to your newsletter, download an ebook – and write a strong CTA that lets them know the benefit of taking action.
Choose your publishing time carefully
In general, people use LinkedIn during work days and hours. The worst days to publish are Fridays through Sundays. Monday and Tuesday are better than Wednesday and Thursday. Time of day is practical and common sense: before work, at lunch, and late in the afternoon/early evening.
If you regularly publish blog posts on LinkedIn, what do you do to get noticed? Have you been featured on a channel? What kinds of results did you get?
Want more assistance growing your business online? Join the Web.com Small Business Forum for free access to our library of ebooks, the latest industry news and support from other business owners, entrepreneurs and working professionals. Join a Group to ask questions, share your opinions and grow your network! Visit Web.com to learn about our full range of affordable website design and online marketing services.
Author information
Monika Jansen
Monika Jansen is a freelance copywriter and editor who helps with companies of all shapes on sizes kick their content up to the next level. You can find her online at www.jansencomm.com.
