Archive for LinkedIn

Social Proof and LinkedIn:
‘Tis Better to Give, than Receive…

ExcellentAs I’ve shared in previous posts,  the value of social proof — referrals, recommendations, and client testimonials — cannot be underestimated.

Similar to how frequent, quality content enhances your website pages, social proof enhances your professional credibility.  When readers learn from the comments from other people about your business, they become your most persuasive sales people. Comments from others are such strong persuasion triggers, you shouldn’t limit them to just a page, but have them scattered throughout your web pages, blog, and social media profiles, such as LinkedIn.

With over 350 million members, and over 1 million members publishing blog posts on LinkedIn, you’re likely to encounter a few colleagues you know.  So make sure you take the time to recommend and endorse them.  Your recommendation or endorsement on LinkedIn is social proof for a other people; it signals that the person is qualified and recognized as a valued colleague. Read More→

4 Reasons to Publish on a LinkedIn Blog

LIBloggingDo you know about LinkedIn blogs? And are you blogging yet on LinkedIn? I’m not yet, but I will be right after I write this blog post!

Since early 2014, LinkedIn opened its publishing platform to its 300+ million users. Here is your chance to show your expertise in your professional life and without character restrictions! The importance of using a LinkedIn blog is that it will add dimension and help in building a well-documented profile.

According to Business 2 Community, in-depth content works best, don’t hesitate to write very detailed and specific posts about your industry. Contrary to what you are being told for traditional blog posts, the ones being picked up by Pulse (LinkedIn’s app to shed some lights on the best contributions) are pretty wordy with almost no visual. Indeed, you should opt for a newspaper-like kind of formatting. Black text on a white background.

  1. Here’s the real upside, once you publish, all of your contacts will be notified of your posting and again, remind your connections that you are indeed an expert in your field.
  2. Recruiters will notice you as well. Now, that may not seem like a big deal if you already have a job, but, recruiters are looking for more than potential employees. Let’s say, for instance, you are a career coach or a leadership development consultant. You may be writing a post about the benefits of hiring an expert, such as yourself and a recruiter happens to read your blog post, this could lead to consulting work for you within that company that the recruiter works for.There’s not a lot of folks blogging yet on LinkedIn, yet. It’s still a fairly open marketplace for your expertise. Publishing on LinkedIn will give you a real edge, and you should start now while there isn’t much competition.
  3. LinkedIn is not just about your expertise (although we’d like to think that some times), but it’s about others as well. Here is a golden opportunity for you to get new business contacts, build meaningful relationships and so on. If you’re writing on a regular basis and your writing is of value, even 3rd degree connections may possibly invite you to connect. The possibilities can be endless with just one simple blog post.
  4. Just think of all of those comments! Just think of all of those conversations you can start and get involved in. Besides, that is what “social media” is all about. We forget that sometimes. It’s about the conversation, it’s about being social.

Guest Author: Christine Buffaloe is a social media wizard for authors, coaches, speakers and consultants. Her company SerenityVA will help you succeed with social media and LinkedIn, including what you need to know about posting to your LinkedIn blog. You can also connect with her on Facebook, Twitter and of course, LinkedIn.

Social Business Success Starts at the Top

Twitter is not just for kids. Smart business tweeters know that the social network is a great tool in promotion, brand recognition and customer interaction. The same goes for other social media sites – (Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+) the number of them growing by the day. (Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net)

Someone should send the boss a memo.

In a recent survey done by the social media branding firm BRANDfog, respondents said that CEOs and other company leaders who use platforms like Twitter effectively are regarded more highly by customers and their employees. An overwhelming amount (86%) of respondents said that CEO involvement in social media campaigns is “somewhat important” to “mission-critical.” Here are some of the other findings:

  • A whopping 94% said that a company with social media-friendly executives contributed to a better brand image
  • 78% believed that better communication is established when CEOs engage in social media
  • 77% of respondents said they were more likely to do business with a company whose leadership team used social media to carve out company values
  • 71% said that brand recognition and image improved with social media savvy company leadership
  • 64% felt that more transparency was present when company executives communicated through social media platforms

So it seems like a relatively easy concept, right? The big shots — yes, the top executives — need to spend a few minutes every day tweeting, updating statuses and accepting friend requests. But they’re not doing it… quite yet. Read More→

3 Networking Tips with LinkedIn Groups for Business

LinkedIn is today to working professionals what Facebook was to college students when it first launched: a networking tool with a specific audience and purpose in mind. Facebook has since degenerated to an all-inclusive social media outlet for friends and family, but LinkedIn still retains its reputation as an online social networking service for the working world.

As of last month, LinkedIn reported an astounding 131,200,000 members, with 12% of those being entrepreneurs.  While many users leverage LinkedIn during job searches, the users who really derive the most value from the network are:

  • Entrepreneurs
  • Salesmen and women (10% of all users)
  • Academics (9% of all users)
  • Other professionals

In facet, LinkedIn benefits anyone whose livelihood depends on staying current with new technologies and trends, and keeping an open line of communication with a powerful network of successful peers.

LinkedIn Groups

One of the features that keeps these working people connected on LinkedIn is the Groups feature.  The LI membership base is a veritable ocean of users, but with Groups, you can shrink that ocean down to small pools of relevant people with whom you can: Read More→

Feed Your Blog Automatically to LinkedIn & Twitter

Update From Patsi, February 2012: We apologize for not updating this post earlier. I no longer update any social media automatically, but am posting manually (read why here, Say NO to Auto-Feeds: Your Blog & Facebook, Social Sites). This is time-consuming and may require a virtual assistant for some of you. I recommend SerenityVA.com.

How do you get your blog posts to feed into your LinkedIn profile and Twitter automatically? I asked social media expert AnnaLaura Brown to write a guest post. This is the 2nd part of her post Connect Your Blog to Facebook.

For LinkedIn you have a couple of options as well.

Your first option is to add the WordPress blog option to your Linkedin profile.

To do this:

  1. Go to edit profile and scroll down to the bottom. You will see a link that says Applications- Add an Application.

Click on that link and you will see this page of options. There is an option to add your blog link with Typepad or WordPress.

Click on the link and you will be taken to a page where you can add in the RSS feed for your blog.  From now on your new posts will be automatically posted to this section of your LinkedIn profile.

The second option is to add your Twitter stream to LinkedIn and then by default as long as your blog posts are appearing in Twitter they will also appear on LinkedIn.

You do this by going to the same page where you added your blog and clicking on the tweets application.

Twitter Read More→

9 Ways to Use LinkedIn for Smart Professionals

How Business Owners Can Benefit From LinkedIn’s Features, this week’s featured guest post, by Carol Tice, Make a Living Writing blog.

LinkedIn is a highly useful social-media site for business owners looking to connect with prospective customers, suppliers, partners, or other businesses in their town. If you haven’t already built a profile on LinkedIn, I recommend it. Get on, fully flesh out your profile, and start connecting with people you already know.

LinkedIn has a reputation as a social-media channel with a very businesslike “flavor,” and that’s one of the reasons I like it. People aren’t on there to talk about what their dog ate this morning…they’re there to grow their business.

LinkedIn offers many ways for you to make new connections. Each connection you make connects you to all of that person’s connections indirectly.

Once you’re on, you’ll get invitations to connect. There are different schools of thought about how to respond — some people only connect to people they know well, while others accept anyone who asks. I guess I’m somewhere in between: unless they’re really spammy or not remotely someone who would ever be a prospective client or good referrer for my business, I usually approve friend requests to keep my network growing.

Some of the features I like best on LI (in no particular order): Read More→