The current context of business is forcing organizations of all sizes to step up their digital marketing game. Online is the only place your potential clients are right now—which makes social selling more important than ever. This is the first in a series of posts to help you implement a social selling strategy and maximize results. You can take these steps in-house or enlist an outsourced marketing agency to amplify your social selling tactics.
What is social selling?
Encompassing both sales and marketing, social selling is leveraging your social networks to find the right leads, build trustworthy relationships, and gain market intelligence that helps you meet your business goals. There are four steps to social selling: build, connect, interact, and measure results. In this post, we’ll talk about how to build your personal brand. A strong personal brand helps to build your network, which benefits your company.
According to MarketLogic research, 90% of B2B buyers purchase products or services from one of the three providers they had in mind when starting the purchasing cycle. By building a strong brand on LinkedIn and connecting with decision-makers, you can be one of the sellers on the shortlist when those decision-makers are ready to buy.
How to create a LinkedIn profile that builds your brand
These best practices can help you build a LinkedIn profile that reflects your personal brand and is optimized to get noticed.
- Your title: Who are you? Introduce yourself in two lines. Remember, LinkedIn is a search engine, so be sure your title includes the keywords you want to be found for.
- Your passion: What do you love about what you do? What gets you up in the morning? Think outside the job. Are you doing great things in the community? Make sure they get noticed. Even in a digital environment, people will pick up on your passion.
- Your career and experience: Tell your story briefly on your profile. Never use the default language of LinkedIn; expressing your personality makes you memorable and relatable. This shouldn’t be a CV, but a place to position yourself. How did you get where you are today? Provide a quick overview of industries and companies you’ve worked in.
- Information about your company: Connect to your company’s LinkedIn page so others can learn more about your company. If your company doesn’t have a LinkedIn page, get one. Be consistent across your personal and business brands, and across all social media where you are active.
- Your image: Profiles with photos are 14 times more likely to be seen than profiles without photos. Use a professional photo—first impressions matter.
- Projects: Share your past work to demonstrate that you can successfully tackle your clients’ challenges. Keep this updated.
- References: Showcase your experience and reliability using endorsements and recommendations from clients and colleagues.
- Share content: Keep your profile dynamic by updating it with content that shows you as a trusted consultant for your customers. Use multiple formats, including videos, blogs, webinars, and presentations.
The more places your prospects can find you online, and the stronger your personal brand, the more successful your digital interactions will be. If your personal or business brand needs improvement, using an outsourced marketing agency can help you create a brand that gets noticed—and helps you make the sale.
Once you’ve built a solid LinkedIn profile, learn how to make connections on LinkedIn.
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