The previous four instalments have set the stage for you to harness the power of LinkedIn to boost your social selling initiatives.
Part 5, Strategies for Social Selling using LinkedIn, is the culmination of your journey on the L.E.A.D.S series with me. To recap, you:
In short, this instalment brings together the aforementioned posts to provide you with a workable strategy towards social selling success.
Social selling as we have now come to understand is all about getting ‘Timely Referral Leads’. Today, it is reported that about 2/3 of marketers are using social media, namely LinkedIn, to supplement their sales activities.
In this article we tie up everything we’ve learnt together with the overall strategy.
Your Pain
The pain I’ve noticed in even seasoned LinkedIn members is that they’ve got the basics right, but do not have a clear strategy to use Social Selling to generate L.E.A.D.S for their business. Some of the Pains they’ve expressed during my workshops and via e-mail are:
– Who should I connect with on LinkedIn?
– I’ve got a great network, but how do I communicate my connections?
– Should I accept requests from a person I do not know?
– How much time should I invest to reap the benefits of LinkedIn?
– What type of content should I post?
– How can I select Groups/Companies to connect with?
– How can I gather intelligence from the network
The list goes on….
In my experience, most of these questions sprout from the fact that there was no clear online strategy in the first place!
Since I understand some of these pains, let me attempt to prescribe some actions that will help clear them.
My Prescription
Remember the end-game of L.E.A.D.S and your presence on LinkedIn – becoming an influencer in your area of expertise!
A prerequisite to becoming an influencer is building T.R.U.S.T, which you became familiar with when we discussed how social selling and LinkedIn are connected to each other.
To jog your memory, let’s expand the abbreviation…
T – Transparency – Your communication needs to be clear, honest and open
R – Relationship – Commit to building and nurturing relationships with members
U – Unique – Add value by contributing useful, relevant information
S – Simplicity – Keep It Simple, Stupid
T – Timing – Your communication needs to be timely a
Flip back to Part 4 of our series to get a quick, refresher course on T.R.U.S.T and how being S.O.C.I.A.L plays a pivotal role.
Have a look at my prescription to help you implement your Social Selling strategy via LinkedIn. Remember, unless these are adhered to, your strategy, no matter how solid, will not work (think building the tallest, technologically advanced building with a weak foundation!).
- The Foundation – Personal Profile, Company Page and LinkedInGroups
Your personal profile is the foundation of your LinkedIn presence. Ensuring you’ve achievedALL-STAR status is an indicator of fully complete profile. Obtaining endorsements and recommendations from your superiors and clients add a lot of value.
Next comes your organisation’s Company Page. Make sure all the relevant details have been added and your products/services are showcased accurately (with links back to your business website). Do not forget to obtain recommendations from customers for your products/services once you’ve served them.
The third step to building a solid foundation is via Groups. LinkedIn Groups are an amazing platform that set you up to learn from role models and industry experts. Also groups help you take part in ongoing conversations in your area of expertise, thus exposing you to a lot of networking opportunities. Becoming a member of groups that deal with the type of products/services you offer allows you to gather intelligence about your target market, their needs, and also identify prospective clients.
- Making connections
Identify people you’d like to connect with (former and current colleagues, clients, influencers, opinion leaders, role models and stakeholders) and take action. Connections do not need to be limited to LinkedIn members. You may also connect with relevant LinkedIn Groups and companies to get regular updates from them. Groups help you expand your connections beyond the people you already know.
These will help you grow not only your 1st degree connections, but also your 2nd and 3rdlevels.
- Building your network
Make connecting with new people a priority and continue to add useful members to your network. Every new contact you make is a potential customer or business partner. Today my network has grown to encompass over 12+ million 3rd Degree members. That’s over 5% of the total membership on LinkedIn!
- Type of posts and timing
What you contribute towards your networks can make or break your online reputation. Ensuring you post valuable, useful content will set you apart from most others and help you attract new contacts, while helping you towards the road to becoming an influencer on LinkedIn. Posting on LinkedIn is different when it comes to posting via your personal profile, company page or group. Click here to find out how each of these, when done right, can help you build your online reputation.
Would you believe it if I told you that you can get the best out of my prescription by starting from 10 minutes a day on LinkedIn?
My Pills
You’ve got my prescription. Here are the Pills I prescribe to set the stage for you to generate leads via social selling for your business.
Your strategy to harness the power of social selling revolves around you establishing your professional reputation as an influencer (which requires you to build ample trust amidst your network by being social). My love for acronyms will help you identify what goes in to becoming an influencer on LinkedIn. The points are pretty much self-explanatory.
Now it’s time to take ACTION! To ensure you’ve got the right strategy to help you harness the power of LinkedIn for your social selling efforts, I’ve given you a check-list. Compare your present LinkedIn presence with it and take corrective action today!
| Item | Features |
| Personal Profile | Clear profile picture |
| Keyword rich headline | |
| Clear summary of yourself | |
| Work experience | |
| Your skills are showcased | |
| Endorsements and recommendations | |
| Educational experience | |
| Interests & Contact details | |
| Company Page | Main page banner |
| Fully update details | |
| Products/services | |
| Are all employees following your company page? | |
| Are the posts being monitored? | |
| Groups | Follow specific groups relating to your industry to gather intelligence on target market, prospects and other stakeholders |
| Contribute useful, relevant information | |
| Objectives | Have you defined your objectives and target market? |
| Connections | Are you actively seeking out members to connect |
| Employees | |
| Clients | |
| Stakeholders | |
| Influencers | |
| Role-models | |
| Updates / Posts | Personal |
| Company Page | |
| Group(s) |
There you go, I’ve presented to you a check-list that arms you with the actions you need to take to leverage in and taking your social selling game to the next level.
Stop by solomoIT Academy’s company page, follow us and do check out the recommendations we have received. You will see how well my training pills have helped professionals like yourself take advantage of LinkedIn to achieve their goals and objectives.
Do let me know how your journey on LinkedIn has been thus far by dropping a line in the comments section. Also, let’s connect on LinkedIn.
This concludes our L.E.A.D.S instalment in the Pain, Prescription and Pills series. For regular updates on all that’s LinkedIn and the amazing world of social selling, follow solomoIT Academy on LinkedIn and check out our updates.
About Logan Nathan
Digital Sales & Marketing (SoLoMo) Consultant | Social Media Strategist | LinkedIn Trainer ♛ Speaker ► Connect Me!
The CEO of solomoIT, Logan has been an avid & passionate social media user and LinkedIn trainer. As a Social Media Business Consultant he brings to the table over 30 years of experience in MNCs and SMBs, together with running solomoIT (formerly ICTIP) for the past eight years. Connect with Logan here.
About solomoIT Academy
SolomoIT Academy was set up with the goal of making online LinkedIn training videos and social business tools available to everyone from students and corporate executives to organisations as a whole.
