Tag Archives: linkedin

3 Ways to Build Traction for Your Brand on LinkedIn

Posted on November 5, 2012 by | 1 Comment

LinkedIn is one of my favorite networks for building brand engagement these days, owing in large part to the changes the company has made in how brands can interact, and in the analytics they now provide.

The biggest change came a while ago, when LinkedIn enabled brands to issue updates to their followers, and to interact with them on the brand pages. With that change, LinkedIn followed the lead of Twitter and Facebook, and created (in effect) a new social network for brands, but with a twist.  The LinkedIn demographic skews heavily professional, creating an entirely different messaging opportunity for brands to target and interact with influencers.

Over the last year or so, LinkedIn has become an important outlet for PR Newswire.   It’s a direct line to the thousands of people who are following the company, and enables communication to many more who aren’t.   Here are some things I’ve learned about developing an effective brand presence on LinkedIn:

  • Social media best practices apply.  Just as is the case with Twitter, Facebook and Google+, best practices about sharing and messaging apply on LinkedIn.   The people managing brand presences need to be curating content from third parties, interacting with people who comment on the brand page and ensuring that the owned content the brand shares is relevant and useful to their followers.
  • Take the lead from related professional groups.  One of the most useful aspects of LinkedIn are the myriad Groups that about on the network.   People have setup discussion groups on a vast array of topics, some of which are certain to relate to your brand or marketplace.  Find those groups and follow them.  Pay attention to which groups seem to generate more conversation between members, and then drill into those conversations.  What are they about? What are the issues underlying the questions people ask?  Are there questions that recur over and over again? Use this information to guide the choices you make when curating content. You’ll end up sharing more of the kind of information people value, and will increase the utility of your brand presence to your audience.
  • Don’t forget the personal aspect.  Visibility on LinkedIn linked to the presences individuals build.  Put another way, if your employees are active on LinkedIn, their activity can help you brand gain additional visibility, when they share the content the brand curates with their own networks.  Encourage employees to share content actively and interact with peers on LinkedIn.  This is a great way to build visibility for the brand – and the information you want your audience to see – beyond the confines of brand followers.

 

The PR Newswire presence on LinkedIn follows these rules, and we’ve seen some robust gains in followers, and (more importantly) in follower engagement since really committing to our LinkedIn presence.   What’s worked for you and your brand on LinkedIn?

Author Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media.

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LinkedIn Unveils New Follow Company Features

Posted on February 27, 2012 by | Leave a comment

LinkedIn has embedded more opportunities for users to follow companies.

LinkedIn, the original (and still, many feel, consummate) professional social network, has slowly been making the site more conducive to communications from brands.  Long a recruiting and hiring powerhouse, LinkedIn has evolved into a powerful information hub.

However, brand voices have been muted until mid 2011, when LinkedIn enabled a raft of new tools for brands, including improved brand pages, and the ability for brands to issue updates to their followers.    This week, they’re going a step further, with a new set of options to “follow” companies on LinkedIn.

In addition to the “Follow” button appearing on company pages, LinkedIn is rolling out a new Follow button companies can embed on their web sites, and embedding the follow functionality throughout LinkedIn, including from company mentions in member profiles.

While the secret to brand success on LinkedIn, in my experience, still revolves around employee interaction and engagement on the network, the improved ‘follow’ functionality makes it easier for people to take the next step – if they’re so inclined – to follow a company that piques their interest.

As always, brands won’t be successful on LinkedIn in acquiring – or keeping – followers unless their interactions are genuine, useful and interesting.  But for savvy brands, LinkedIn’s new follower functions will result in potent user engagement among focused and relevant groups.

Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media, and is the author of the free ebook Unlocking Social Media for PR.

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LinkedIn Enables Brand-Follower Interactions

Posted on October 10, 2011 by | 11 Comments

Administrators of Company Pages on LinkedIn can now issue updates and interact with followers. Updates appear within followers' Headlines.

There’s no question in my mind that LinkedIn is a valuable social network for professionals.   However, until last week, LinkedIn focused solely on the interactions and behaviors of individuals.   Brand presences were relegated to company pages, which were largely static and out of the LinkedIn communications flow.

That all changed last week when LinkedIn enabled a new feature allowing the admins of company pages to post 500-word updates,  distribute links and interact with their followers.    Best of all, followers of brands will see the updates in their personal Headlines.

While this is one more thing to add to the social media management list of things to do, in this case, I don’t mind.  LinkedIn is unusual in the degree to which it enables (and encourages) users to self-select, define their interests and find (and interact with) like-minded people.    This is probably why LinkedIn is consistently a top referrer of readers to this blog.

LinkedIn has built some analytics into the new updates, offering perspective on the size of your brand’s audience and the degree to which the audience engaged with the updates the brand issues via LinkedIn.   LinkIn defines the numbers as follows:

  • Impressions:  The number of times this status update has been viewed organically on LinkedIn
  • Engagement: The percentage of time members engaged (clicked, liked, commented or shared) with this status update organically.

Normally, I have very little interest in vague numbers like “impressions,” but in the case of LinkedIn’s impressions data, page administrators can learn something about their audiences – namely, whether or not they are actively engaging with LinkedIn.  Ultimately,  one can use this information to determine if time spent on LinkedIn and on issuing updates is, indeed, well spent.

The engagement number is obviously more interesting, because it indicates how many people actually did something with the update you issued.  The simple acts of a reader clicking on “more” to read the full update, or (even better) sharing it with their networks are considered “engagement” under LinkedIn’s calculus, and I think that’s appropriate, and accurate.

I do think it’s important to note that brands really do have a responsibility on LinkedIn (just as they do on Facebook or Twitter) to offer useful, credible and interesting information – and to mind dosages quickly.   Too many updates of the wrong sort feel spammy and will get a brand un-followed in the wink of an eye.   As with any network, listening, paying attention and getting a feel for what your audience is interested in are cornerstones o brand success.

It’s too early to ascertain what (if any) beneficial effects PR Newswire will derive from this change.  Once we have a month of data under our belt and I have some refreshed analytics, I’ll post an update. Until then, kudos to the team at LinkedIn.  I like this change and think it will be useful for brands … and our followers.

Author Sarah Skerik is PR Newswire’s vice president of social media, and is the author of the free ebook Unlocking Social Media for PR.

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