Few things in this world are absolute.
As Benjamin Franklin once said, “In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” But in the 21st century, there are a few more things that society has grown more sure of — such as the utility of the Internet.
[source: Peter Roesler, Jacksonville Bizjournals] The time has come for all small business owners to accept the potential that social media, specifically LinkedIn, has for networking with other business owners and potential customers. LinkedIn has many features and distinctive characteristics that make it essential for business owners who wish to utilize social media to further their business goals.
In many ways, the growth of LinkedIn over the past decade is reason enough for small business owners to take notice of the platform. Here are a few recent statistics from October 2013:
Since its start in 2003, LinkedIn has grown to more than 256 million users in more than 200 countries, with 87 million users here in the United States. Nearly 40 percent of users check their account daily, and there are more than 200 conversations occurring every minute in the groups alone.
LinkedIn bills itself as the largest professional network and the platform works hard to live up to the promise. In addition to the standard array of social media features (posting, sharing, friends, creating groups, etc.), LinkedIn also has many special tools that make it useful to business marketing and forming connections.
For example, LinkedIn owns SlideShare, which lets users embed YouTube videos, create a Webinar, share presentations/documents and upload PDFs, sales/marketing presentations, conference talks, or portfolios directly onto a LinkedIn profile and Websites. SlideShare is extremely popular and none of the other major social media networks have this business-friendly capability. Companies can even add an Apply with LinkedIn plugin to their site that lets people apply for jobs using their LinkedIn profile. There are also a wide variety of third-party apps business owners can use to make better manage their LinkedIn profiles and company pages.
LinkedIn can be used for traditional social media marketing strategies, such as increasing brand awareness, reaching new potential customers, and getting out product information. For some businesses, LinkedIn is the best place to advertise products and services. Service companies that cater mostly to businesses (professional cleaners, building painters, etc.) will find it easier to find potential clients on LinkedIn than Facebook. Business owners are on Facebook, but so are millions of other people. A marketing message that had equal reach on Facebook and LinkedIn would bring in more business owners on LinkedIn due to the difference in concentration levels.
Even if your key demographic isn’t on LinkedIn, there is almost certainly a professional on the platform that is connected to an organization’s intended target. To illustrate, clothing designers or consumer medical equipment may be primarily marketing to a demographic that isn’t heavily represented on LinkedIn (e.g. teenagers, young mothers, senior citizens). But on LinkedIn, there are clothing store owners, fashion writers and bloggers and health care professionals, who are all in good positions to influence target audiences.
This ability to connect with other business owners is the reason that all businesses should use LinkedIn. All businesses need to connect with other business owners and professionals at some point or another. Being on the platform where professionals gather specifically to make connections makes sense. The tools of the platform help professionals judge the qualifications of the people they meet. Using the skills and recommendations, it’s easier to vet how qualified a professional is. This fact is businesses need to start LinkedIn marketing now. It takes time to build up the endorsements, recommendations and fan base necessary to establish one’s credibility on LinkedIn.
There are many ways to use LinkedIn for a business even if they aren’t directly marketing to the LinkedIn audience. Business owners can use the platform to research their competition by researching the company or its employees. As was mentioned before, HR officials can use the platform for job scoping and background checks of job applicants.
LinkedIn is also a good tool for finding specific people. Being able to see the connections between LinkedIn users makes it possible to track down people even with scant information (e.g. finding a man named Michael who worked at Company X as a programmer and graduated from College Y is much easier on LinkedIn than Facebook or Twitter). Users can even use polls to search for content ideas for blog posts or marketing campaigns. Every business could use some, if not all, of these strategies to further their goals.
Social media marketing takes time and businesses can rarely afford the resources to be on every platform. Even so, business owners need to make the effort to use LinkedIn. The network has grown too large and important to ignore. The specific demographic of LinkedIn users, business professionals, creates unique opportunities for marketing and networking that businesses would be foolish to ignore. Learning how to make the most of LinkedIn will help business owners maximize their internet marketing efforts.