A lot of business owners and freelancers rush to have a social media presence, but forget all about LinkedIn. If your customers are other business owners, not having LinkedIn is a missed opportunity. While more eyes might land on your content on Instagram or Facebook, the eyes that land on it on LinkedIn are more likely to belong to a person who makes decisions about where companies spend their money. Here are five quick tips for landing clients on LinkedIn:
- Tailor your profile to your customer. You need to look at it like you’re the person hiring someone to do what you do, and see if you would want more information from this person. Focus less on a laundry list of your skills and accomplishments (while still keeping some on there for credibility) and more on what you can do for the customer. As a business owner, I might be impressed with everything you’ve done, but I don’t get to the point of wanting to hire you until I know what specific problem you’re solving for me.
- Add a lead magnet to your featured content. This can be as simple as a downloadable pdf on one of your many areas of expertise. The goal here is to get subscribers, followers, or contact information. You can also use this space to drive people to your website or YouTube channel, or wherever you have the content that converts people to paying customers.
- Turn on creator mode and add short, relevant, shareable content about five times a week. When possible, use pictures, videos, or articles. You don’t have to create new things for LinkedIn all the time. You should be creating content for multiple platforms and repurposing it regularly. If you are adding repurposed content, it is best to upload videos and copy and paste articles into LinkedIn rather than just post links to the original. LinkedIn will show the content to more people that way.
- Send a personal note when you add connections, and add connections you have no intention of pitching. Actually connect and network with people. Go out of your way to bring them content of value, leave recommendations, and interact with their content before you even think about asking for work or recommendations of your own. Find people to add based on their job titles or companies. Join groups that are relevant to your customers. Treat it like you would treat in-person networking groups.
- When you do decide to pitch people, make sure it’s the right people. Pitch the person in the company who makes the decision on whether to hire someone like you or buy your product. Then, strike the right tone with the pitch itself. You own a business, work for yourself, or are at least a consumer. Read the pitch as if it had come to you and think about whether you would follow up.
Substance and Style 