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How To Leverage LinkedIn for Branding & Biz Dev

Your brand is you. Your branding is everything you do to promote yourself.

When LinkedIn launched in 2003, it seriously changed this game and has continued to refine and define the importance of online business networking and branding. In a short time, LinkedIn has given individuals and businesses a professional online community to meet, socialize, interact, and learn from each other.

What started out as a place to post an online resume profile has now morphed into a vibrant, active, innovative content, educational, and networking hub and a place for professionals to share their career stories and meet other professionals.

Tips for using your LinkedIn page
Once you've created a company page, a career page, and a LinkedIn group, regularly use these tools and create content for them. Here are some tips on where to get started and how to build these pages:

1. Get followers.
Publishing and sharing content is pointless if no one sees it. You should constantly seek out new followers on LinkedIn. You can post a widget to your LinkedIn page on your website, add your LinkedIn information to your email signature, and have staff members promote the company page on their personal accounts. You can also put your LinkedIn information on your business cards.

2. Publish and share relevant content.
As with any successful marketing campaign, you need to know who your audience is and what they want to see on LinkedIn. It's important to publish and share content that benefits your followers, not just content that promotes your company.

"Do not be overly self-promotional," said Kyra Mancine, social media specialist at Oldcastle. "Only 20% of your posts should be sales-driven. You want to provide content that is helpful, informational, and interesting. Think about what you like to see in your feed. No one likes to be sold [to] or see commercials all the time."

Overpromotion is a serious pitfall of social media and could cost you followers and reduce engagement.

3. Set up a content calendar.
Publishing regularly is key for any successful social media account. Mancine suggested setting up a content calendar for your posts because it's important to be consistent. An easy way to set up a content calendar is through a social media tool such as Buffer or Hootsuite. 

But don't overdo it, said Eric Fischgrund, founder of FischTank, a marketing and public relations firm. "[Many] companies just start posting away. You'll see engagement spike initially; then people start tuning you out. Only share things that are impactful."