Where Facebook is the friends network and Twitter is the quick information network, LinkedIn is the professional social network. It is where people have display profile pictures of themselves in a suit and post about articles that make them appear professionally involved and switched on. Aside from this it is an invaluable tool to network, engage in discussions and plant your professional services right where your audience are the most alert.

 

LinkedIn by the numbers

LinkedIn is the second most used social media website in Australia, rising above the likes of Twitter. Due to its professional user base and purpose, the content and interactions here are of a different nature to that of other social networks.

• LinkedIn is home to over 65 million professionals, around 4 million are Australian
• Over 50% of users have decision making authority within their business
• Over 15 thousand Australian businesses have a LinkedIn page
• When it comes to professional skills, there are 108K members with health care listings, 55K in community and social.

Courtesy of SolomoIT

When should I put my Business on LinkedIn?

The short answer – if your services are of interest to the professional world, and if your content can help them better assimilate the ideas that drive value to your business. Just like other social networks, if the effort you’re putting into providing insightful knowledge does not result in clients appreciating your offering more, there’s not much point.

Hopefully the above statistics give you a fresh perspective to the opportunities available for your business regardless of size or niche. If you don’t have oodles of time (who does?) you can still get some visible results from just an hour a week. (See our Investing in Social Media article)

Company Pages – Best Practice

Tell a brand story, then connect

Even on LinkedIn people will skim over the details. In your company description tell a story of what your business means and how it came to be. Don’t go too overboard and leave some room for people to want to find more information. Once you’ve done this and have added your logo you should be following likeminded ‘influencers’ and popular thought-leaders within your industry. Learn from their delivery, learn from their sympathetic language, and then add your own thoughts!

Scope your content and audience

Don’t be afraid to reuse sections and content that has been previously successful, several topics have seasonal interest and will be all the talk again in the near future. Scoping your audience also means sharing your LinkedIn page link on other social properties, your website, and outgoing emails. Friends, colleagues, other departments, clients, they should all have something interesting to read when they get to your page.

Don’t oversell it

LinkedIn is not the place to constantly tout promotional details or discounts, it is an opportunity to get your professionalism out there on a more personal level. Company updates and information are fine, especially when you’re able to connect it to some interesting advice content or a hot topic, but you need to give back before you receive. Think one directly company related post for every four pieces of strong value creating content for your readers.

In a recent article we gave you a rough posting on a small time budget outline, and how to engage users in social media whilst keeping alignment with your brand. This week, we’re going to put the rules of engagement to the test and give you the facts of what does and doesn’t work in Facebook posts. We will give you something that you can use with a simple engagement plan to have a strong long term presence without worrying that a smaller time capacity will limit your abilities.

Size Matters – Timing is Everything – Be Social

When posting to Facebook it is important to share interesting and engaging content (and don’t forget the golden rule – be social) that you yourself would get involved with. People tend to skim through their Facebook newsfeed even more so than twitter, so making lengthy wordy posts won’t help your cause.

Buddy Media did a study on the top 25 brands on Facebook and returned key guidelines to posting.

Size of Facebook Posts

·         Posts with less than 80 characters are much more engaging than anything longer. Due to the real estate they take up, photos are the most engaging thing to post on Facebook.

·         Using URL shorteners: websites such as bit.ly or hootsuite that can shorten your URLs are very popular but think twice; users are more likely to click through on full htmls. Why? Usually this is because the link will contain a known domain or words that they are looking for so they know what they’re getting themselves into!

Best times to post

·         Posting between 8 PM and 7 AM showed the greatest engagement, however do not take this rule too close to heart, instead find what works best for you. Make it a habit to think back to what you’re trying to achieve; if it’s important for clients to click on your links then business hours might work best. If you want people to read through an article or read an update in their own time then go for 8pm. Some people shy away from scheduling posts as they’re not at their desk, but programs such as Hootsuite allow you to schedule whilst still choosing images and crossing multiple social platforms. People generally understand that staff cannot get back to questions at all hours of the day.

·         2 posts per day is a healthy amount of posts, doing more than this should be saved for special occasions as it may annoy certain viewers. With this in mind, posting up to 4 times per week receives the highest engagement.

·         The most engaged day to post was shown to be a Thursday, so consider making your more important or prominent posts on this day. You don’t have to delve too deeply into Facebook insight statistics to find out what your best days have been, so experiment!

Being Social

·         Engage users with questions, and call to actions. Try not to post a hard sell, Facebook is not the ideal place for this. If you do have promotions of interest to your key group, $ off statuses receive far more interest than % discounts or clearances. For getting other calls to actions, actually asking people to do things works best. Getting people to “Like,” “Post” “Submit,” “Comment,” and “Watch” work the best and coincide with the Facebook language people are used to, then terms such as “Share,” “Become a Fan” or “See” receive less attention.

·         Don’t forget: if you’re posting about current news or events; try to create necessity which can link to your product.

·         Don’t be afraid to comment on other pages’ statuses. Look for pages that may contain interested parties if they are active and also engaged. You don’t want to overdo it or barge in and link to your page, have something to add to a discussion and give your insight. Give people a reason to listen to you not a demand.

·         In essence: post what you would read and respond to, keep it simple, be timely and up to date, build up an identifiable rapport with your audience and remember – Facebook is an extension of your brand with added personality.