From once being a small social networking site occupying a very specific niche in social media, LinkedIn has grown to be a force to be reckoned with in the world of business and LinkedIn advertising has proven to be very successful. Since its creation, marketers have tried to crack LinkedIn for business success; fortunately, their efforts have not been in vain.
However, LinkedIn has not made it clear how B2B marketers can used the site to their advantage. All they tell you is to sign up, be active on the site, and get leads—how you do the last two parts is entirely up to you.
Does LinkedIn Advertising Really Work?
As far as social networks go, LinkedIn shows the most potential for B2B advertising success compared to other social sites like Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and Pinterest. While social media in general is used by B2Bs to generate leads, research by InsideSales shows that social media tends to be overused when you look at the number of leads it generates.
There is, however, a standout: LinkedIn. The site is responsible for over 80 percent of business leads on social media, with all other sites accounting for a mere 19.67 percent.
You can probably get a few falling leads on your own without really trying hard, but if you want to get the most out of your LinkedIn marketing, you need to do some prospective specifically designed for the social network.
Below are some ideas to do just that.
1. Make your Company Page Generate Leads For You
Your business page on LinkedIn has to be designed to generate leads—it has to be intentional. The best way of doing this is to make your page into a pipeline for LinkedIn views to turn into visits to your company’s official website. In other words, you need to go beyond the typical business page on LinkedIn, which displays the company’s basic information and the like about your company. Your LinkedIn company page has to be structured to lead to conversion, which can be a clickthrough to your site’s Recent Updates page or About Us page.
2. Build a Showcase Page
LinkedIn announced its Showcase Pages as a way for businesses to promote separate brands that serve as extensions of the company. These pages also offer a great way to compartmentalize your inbound traffic on LinkedIn. If you can create another individual business unit related to a specific segment of your audience, you can make use of a Showcase page.
Instructions on creating Showcase Pages can be found here
3. Publish Your Own Content
LinkedIn offers a powerful and effective publishing platform (but it’s not available to all parts of the world). If you’ve been granted publishing access, use this platform to communicate your brand’s story. Several LinkedIn users have reported major success with the platform, so there’s no reason for you not to try it out.