LinkedIn is an excellent marketing tool helping you to build brand awareness and generate leads. We all have a profile page, most companies have a company page and most of us have also joined a few groups. But that is generally as far as it goes (unless you are looking for a job, and that’s not what this post is about).
LinkedIn Groups though, are one of the lesser used brilliant functions of LinkedIn. Ok, so some people overuse it and some don’t know how best to use it, but they are still brilliant.
I get leads and business from LinkedIn Groups and in fact I featured in a Sunday Times article on networking because of my activity in a LinkedIn Group. After my interview, I put the journalist on with one of my mentees at the time, Revive Active. (Read the article here).
What’s so good about LinkedIn Groups?
Well, you can reach a targeted group of people via special interest groups. So if you sell, for example, logistics planning software to FMCG companies, then posting blogs discussing the benefits of logistics planning software for FMCG companies in FMCG logistics related groups will get noticed.
But it’s important not to be salesy or you will get cut from the group. Keep the articles generic and don’t push your own brand. If articles focus on the benefits rather than your brand, then it will be of interest. Subtlety is your friend!
Best day to post
Most LinkedIn Groups produce daily or weekly (depending on which box you ticked when you joined) emails with summaries of recent posts. For best results, post your blog the day before the weekly email – your post is likely to be appear further up the email, or even as the subject heading.
Post in more than one group
You can post in more than one group at a time, but it is better to spread that out over the various groups over different days.
LinkedIn Pulse
Don’t forget to put the blog post in your LinkedIn Pulse – in fact you should post it there first.
It’s not all about you
It’s important to participate in the groups – not just add a post and sit back and wait for comments and business to come your way. LinkedIn is a networking tool, so use Groups to network. Groups help you expand your network and learn.
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