How to Use LinkedIn for Business in 2021
LinkedIn is more than another social media tool to add to your stack. When used for business, it can become the main driver of your opportunities without ever needing to resort to paid advertising, complex sales funnels, or marketing automation.
As B2B business owners, entrepreneurs, or subject matter experts, you know exactly how challenging it can be to "be everywhere" and not get the ROI you're hoping for from various channels.
Successful leaders identify and intentionally invest in the channels they know will generate the highest quality opportunities consistently - all with minimum effort to maximize their margins.
What if I told you that business leaders, like you, are using LinkedIn as one of their best channels for business growth and consistent opportunities?
In this episode of Mondays with Mindi, I show you exactly how to use LinkedIn to generate business opportunities... not just how to get X more followers who don't want to buy from you.
The secret to using LinkedIn to grow your business is NOT in how popular you are, how many likes you get on your posts, or how many hours you whittle away in the news feed hoping to spark engagement.
The objective is how many opportunities you can generate from LinkedIn ongoing. When you know what that number is, you can make an educated guess if LinkedIn is right for you.
Ready to roll up your sleeves to discover what 99% of your competitors don't know about using LinkedIn? Watch the video!
LinkedIn is NOT Another Social Channel
Trying to use LinkedIn like another social media channel is costing you business opportunities, high-quality leads, and business revenue. Plain and simple.
The “be everywhere” approach with just ONE of those being LinkedIn is a complete waste.
Cross-posting doesn’t work here. You’re either HERE and investing your time/resources/energy.
Or, you should just set up a decent LinkedIn profile and go hang out on Instagram or Facebook.
**Yes, sarcasm intended.
Too many people think they can dabble on LinkedIn and get the results of a power user.
That’s not how it works. You cannot just “pay $ to play” on LinkedIn. For your LinkedIn efforts to generate ROI, you need to actually BELIEVE LinkedIn is your most valuable lead-generating asset and ACT as if using LinkedIn effectively will generate business revenue.
What actually happens if you underestimate the power of LinkedIn for your B2B business...
You will waste thousands of $ on paid advertising on other social channels - where your target audience may not even WANT to see anything business-related
Spend a TON of time setting up the wrong type of sales funnel for your business - using what the online experts recommend which is more inbound, less outbound, lots of ads
Amass the wrong types of people in your LinkedIn network - those who “like” your stuff but do not want to buy from you
...but don’t worry, we’ll talk about a better way. When your business is built somewhat on your personal brand AND involves a relationship-based sale, LinkedIn is the best platform to reach those decision-makers.
LinkedIn for Business is a Skill
A number of business leaders AND professionals interested in strengthening their personal brand whom I talk to, are confused with where to invest their time and resources because they’re told they need to “be everywhere” and “just cross-post to LinkedIn through an automation tool” or “just hire a VA to do your social.”
The problem is, trying to be on just ONE platform effectively can be tricky enough.
Learning how algorithms work, figuring out if you need to have paid ads, trying to build an audience, knowing what sparks engagement, the language to use, the hashtags that work.
It’s different on every platform.
So, how do you choose which ONE platform you need to do well?
Where does your target audience mingle online WHILE ALSO being in the mindset to do business?
Think about that for a moment.
We go to Instagram to be entertained or inspired. We go to Facebook to keep up with friends, family, and our favorite groups. We go to YouTube when we have a question.
None of these places is geared towards BUSINESS.
B2C audiences are different and have more platforms to choose from, but if you’re in the B2B space… you’ve got ONE. It’s called LinkedIn.
If you’re avoiding LinkedIn because you’re unsure, you’re overwhelmed, or you’ve tried it before and it didn’t work like you hoped… you’re not alone.
But, you do need to realize using LinkedIn for business is a SKILL you can learn - that could take your business from “doing okay” to a sales pipeline bursting with people who want what you have to sell and actually LIKE you as a person. Go figure.
30 Calls from LinkedIn in 30 Days
A marketing agency consultant came with the problem of having an AWESOME service where he could help his clients easily productize just about any service they were offering.
Problem was that nobody knew him on LinkedIn. He had a boring ol’ LinkedIn profile, and he was not convinced that LinkedIn would actually work for him because he heard it had gotten so spammy.
We dialed in his target audience (discovering that they were VERY active on LinkedIn), fixed up that profile, did a test of sending out some tailored LinkedIn messages to see if his audience wanted to chat.
BOOM! His message immediately resonate, and he had more discovery calls with PERFECT prospects than he could handle in a month. We about killed him with 30+ calls in less than 30 days!
Three years later, he still didn’t need to go outside LinkedIn to fill his sales pipeline. He had as many prospects as he could handle - with no end in sight to the prospect pool.
So what really happened here?
Belief happened first.
Testing happened next.
Results spoke for themselves.
Get Clarity: Your LinkedIn Objectives
When you CHOOSE to go “all in” on LinkedIn, that’s when the magic happens.
It’s not about spending hours a day trying to scrounge up LinkedIn posts to comment on, rather it’s about providing value and showing up consistently over weeks and months.
Using LinkedIn for business means that you are here with a very clear objective in mind.
It’s exactly how we go about building a business. We create offers and services, build a clientele or customer base, and overdeliver on expectations - we do this over and over again - until we get a process that works, with margins we love.
Everything you do on LinkedIn should lead you closer to doing more good business with more good people.
It’s not about spamming. It’s not about clever automation.
It is about using a proven system and processes that actually work on LinkedIn right now.
Now I want to go back to the story I told earlier, what I didn’t tell you about that consultant, he spent an average of fewer than 3 hours per week on LinkedIn. Why? Because we NAILED his processes and systems.
Now, how do you figure out if LinkedIn is the platform for you?
3 Questions to Ask Yourself
If you’re not already convinced, I want to share with you three questions that can help you determine if LinkedIn is the right fit for growing your business or building your personal brand.
#1 - Who is your target audience?
As I mentioned before, if they are professionals, leaders, CEOs, and executives - LinkedIn is most likely the ONE channel where they actually have a profile, are somewhat active, and can be reached.
Trying to target a CEO on Facebook with an ad? Good luck.
Reaching out to that same CEO with a personalized InMail and a great connection invitation? Your chances of getting through are much higher, even if they do have an executive assistant checking their LinkedIn messages for them.
And, that’s the thing, they DO have a gatekeeper paying attention to LinkedIn, but do you think they’d let their VA into their personal Facebook account?
That’s a rhetorical question.
#2 - How relationship-based is your sales process?
We all have heard about the “know, like, and trust” factor in getting people to purchase what we’re offering.
Thing is, how much of YOU will the person need to make a decision on whether or not to buy from you?
If you tend to push people towards a “free discovery call” or default to “let’s hop on for a quick chat” - LinkedIn is a great fit because when you have genuine conversations in LinkedIn DMs, calendar links are quite often exchanged.
If you are accustomed to pushing people towards a landing page or video to learn more about you, and it’s a lower-priced product that they can easily purchase without thinking twice… then LinkedIn might not be the best fit for these customers.
BUT, if you’re like many other entrepreneurs and business owners I know, you likely have a premium offering or upsell where your high-ticket clients want to work with you directly. These clients are the types of people you’d want to reach out to directly on LinkedIn.
If you’re a salesperson trying to get through to decision makers, you probably already are using LinkedIn, but I’ve come across very few who do it well. It’s a tricky balance and tough when you have any type of “sales-related” word in your title. You’ve got to get clever.
Think about your sales process and how you sell. How much of “you” is part of that sale? The more of “you” that’s necessary, the more valuable LinkedIn as a lead generation source will be.
#3 - Are you ready to invest in LinkedIn?
This is a question that you need to answer for yourself because getting into LinkedIn haphazardly will get you absolutely nowhere.
You need to decide if it’s the right channel for you, and then realize it’s going to take some education, some time to learn the ropes, some processes, and some resources (like a good VA) to help you manage some of the moving parts.
I tend to recommend to my students and clients that they do a simple 90-day experiment where they go “all in” on LinkedIn for a short period of time before making a longer-term decision.
Thing is - once you get it all set up and going (usually takes only a few weeks), you can make an educated decision on how much/how little to invest in LinkedIn moving forward.
Worst case, you decide LinkedIn is not for you. Then, you’ve spent 90 days getting your LinkedIn profile looking amazing, creating content you can use in other places, and learning exactly how to do cold outreach in a way that doesn’t feel spammy.
Best case, you figure out a LinkedIn system that actually leads to business revenue, a “social” channel that you can point to next year and say “LinkedIn opportunities made me X dollars for Y investment.” Good return?
Commit. That’s my word of advice.
Make that choice and commit for at least 90 days.
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Before you start actively using LinkedIn for business, make sure to optimize your LinkedIn profile to increase your chances of getting that connection invitation accepted.
I just released a free three-part mini-training How to Reboot Your LinkedIn Profile to Grow Your Online Business to help!
It’s jam-packed with templates and examples and a step-by-step approach to optimizing your headline, the two most important parts of your About section to get more inbound connections and build your list, along with what to do with your Experience sections!
Click HERE to get instant access!
