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Make your time on LinkedIn Enjoyable & Profitable

Make your time on LinkedIn Enjoyable & Profitable

by | Last updated Apr 22, 2024 | Strategy for LinkedIn™️ use

“I enjoy Facebook, but don’t know how to use LinkedIn, it is all so serious.” I hear this a lot and it makes me sigh. Sure, LinkedIn is a business platform. If you don’t bore yourself to death when running your business, there is no need to act boring on LinkedIn.

Anyone can organically generate leads and grow their business through LinkedIn. On a free account, without any ad spend. Yet the best strategy is useless if you don’t stick to it. Find out how LinkedIn can be enjoyable (so that you stick to it) and profitable whilst you’re at it.

LinkedIn is a great tool to incorporate into your marketing strategy. I mean, it’s got everything. The narrative of your career shows that YOU are brilliant, experienced and skilled at what you do.

Your contact details, often underutilised or only filled out half-heartedly. I’ll be the first to admit that LinkedIn doesn’t make it intuitive to use this the smart way.

Your network. Every client, supplier or collaborator you need for your business is there. How much easier do you want things to get?

And then we have content and conversations. You can post to share your expertise and add value in comments. Before you know it people start tagging you for your knowhow.

Passive LinkedIn Use

Most people will google you when someone mentions you or before they have a meeting with you. Your LinkedIn profile ranks high in Google. If you do nothing else, make sure you’re profile is set out to convert visitors to prospects. If you do nothing else, that is passive LinkedIn use.

In order for your profile to convert visitors to prospective clients, it needs to be clear what you do and whom for. Back this up by proof that you are fabulous at what you do. First impressions are made in seconds. The top of your profile must be clear and resonate with those you want to work with.

  • The big bad banner image that spans across to the top of your profile is the first attention grabber. Make sure it relates to what you do and send a clear message together with your headline.
  • Your headline is a short pitch (220 characters including spaces). Tell people exactly what you do and whom for. Make sure to use keywords for the search engines and some personality for the human reader. The first 40 characters or so are visible every time you comment on LinkedIn. So put clarity before creativity (my own headline is the exception to prove the rule).
  • Name pronunciation. LinkedIn allows you (mobile only) to record the pronunciation of your name. This is invaluable for people who are about to call you, they can make sure they get it right. Mind you, LinkedIn gives us 10 seconds meaning you can actually record a 25-30 word pitch.

Active LinkedIn Use.

Different strategies work for different business models.

  • Using paid advertising campaigns.
  • Spray and pray.
  • Building relationships & sharing expertise.

Paid advertising is something I know nothing about. When you want to go that way, I suggest you hop onto YouTube. AJ Wilcox is the queen of LinkedIn advertising. If you have a paid LinkedIn account you might also want to look for AJs courses on LinkedIn Learning.

Spray and pray is an ongoing numbers game. It is based on cold calling. You connect with people and pretty much hit them with a sales pitch as soon as they accept. You do this for a while and then work out your numbers. Say that out of 100 invitations 70 people accept and that out of those seventy 2 people buy. You then know that you have a 2% conversion from the invites sent. If you need to sell 10 a month to hit your revenue goals, you need to send 500 invites a month. This is tricky now that LinkedIn has limited the invitations to 100 per week.

Building relationships & sharing expertise.

Using LinkedIn to sustainably grow your business means sharing your expertise. Through your own posts and through comments on other posts. Before you get your knickers in a knot about having to be all serious and business-like…

When you meet with a client what do you wear? Suit and tie, a jacket or a hoody? That’s what you wear in your profile picture and videos. How do you communicate with your clients? Do you speak quite formal? Casual? Do you joke? Are you to the point or chatty? There is no right or wrong here. Consider how YOU show up in your business and show up the same on LinkedIn.

One way to share your expertise is by posting on LinkedIn. Different formats are

  • Record a short video (remember to add captions)
  • Create a multi-page PDF which then displays as a carousel
  • Write a text post (max 3000 characters) with or without an image.

Stick to the format you’re comfortable with. When you mix it up you’ll reach more people as some prefer video, others prefer text or an images + text carousel. Even the algothingymebob likes a bit of a mix more than one type of content only. Make sure you reply to every comment on your post. Ask a question to keep the conversation going and slip in some of your expertise.

Commenting on content by others is even more effective. I mean, when you post, you have to hope for the best that someone will see it. When you comment, the person who posted receives a notification. Always add to the post with your comment, don’t try to outshine the bride.

Who to comment on? People who serve the same clients as you, but with a different service. As a book editor, you can engage with illustrators and publishers as you all have authors as clients. This is an easy way to become visible to your target audience.

Create a list of 15 people that you can engage with. People who regularly post on LinkedIn, often get more than 3 comments and who either share your expertise or serve the same clients. Check their recent activity and bookmark this page or save the link in a spreadsheet. Now all you have to do is check 3 of them each day, this means you engage with all of them at least once a week.

Decide on 2-3 types of content that you actually enjoy creating and work out how often you’d like to post. Weekly, monthly, daily, it doesn’t matter. Do what is fun for you and commit to it. LinkedIn may feel like social media, it is part of your marketing strategy and as such needs to be scheduled in your calendar.

When it feels like a chore instead of fun review your strategy!

 

Petra Fisher

Petra Fisher

Business Coach | LinkedIn Trainer | Your External Brain

Petra Fisher is a global business coach who focuses on organic content marketing and sustainable lead generation for established coaches and purpose-driven entrepreneurs. Petra Fisher contributed to print publications for marketers and expats and was featured on radio, TV and podcasts globally. Client satisfaction is expressed through 160+ LinkedIn recommendations.
How one comment killed my first business

How one comment killed my first business

by | Last updated Apr 22, 2024 | Strategy for LinkedIn™️ use

My first business was going quite well. I was 7 years old and made a dozen or so sales, totalling ƒ1,67 (yes, this was well before the € days).  Sweets cost 5 or 10 cents, so even splitting this profit with my business partner would allow us to indulge. Then HE killed business with just one comment. 

“Why would I buy seashells from you, when I can just pick them up at the beach?” 

Growing up we’d go camping for 3 weeks at the same campground each year. I had a friend there and we decided to sell seashells (not at the seashore ?). We walked around the campground asking people sitting in front of their tent if they wanted to buy shells (door to door was our business strategy). Prices ranged between 1 and 5 cents. 

Until THAT man (he might have been early twenties, but we were 7) spoke those nasty words. Nasty, as his tone was a mixture of ridicule and anger. 

We were so shocked – and a bit scared – that we closed down business immediately. Had I known then what I know now, business could have been booming all summer. 

Why do people buy something they can easily pick up themselves? 

Convenience. You’ve done the hard work for them. As we had gone to the beach, collected shells and delivered them to their tent. People work with me on their LinkedIn Business Strategy because I can get them in hours where I got after years of research, trial & error and finetuning. 

Likeability factor. People relate to you, like your style, personality (back then cute pigtails) and want to support you and your business. That one guy got annoyed (not everybody is your ideal client) for others two little girls with a bunch of pretty shells might have totally brightened their day and that is what they paid for, not just the shells. When using LinkedIn to reach your goals in business, strategy involves more than content and engagement. Tone of voice, values and personality are equally important.

Awareness. We could also have done a small craft project and then sell shells as kits. People buy when you create awareness of their needs. I mean, if you are just sitting in front of your tent, instead of lying on the beach or having lunch at a café, you might well need a little craft project that keeps you entertained and becomes a great keepsake of the holiday, right? 

When you post on LinkedIn, do you just show pretty shells that people can easily pick up themselves?

Or do you touch their pain-point (I’m bored) and bring a solution (craft activity). 

Sharing your knowledge on LinkedIn is a great way to gain visibility and trust. For visibility and trust to convert into clients, it helps to speak to them directly. I can write how-to posts about revamping your LinkedIn Profile, Growing your LinkedIn Network or creating a LinkedIn Business Strategy… 

But when I write about: “Using LinkedIn to attract clients, without it taking up your day” people who are not into prospecting and people who feel using LinkedIn is a time sucker will pay attention. 

?????????? Share YOUR first business story in the comments. I’ll reply by translating it into a LinkedIn or business tip.

Another major stuff-up and how I fixed it!

Another major stuff-up and how I fixed it!

by | Last updated Oct 12, 2024 | Business Coaching, Strategy for LinkedIn™️ use

TL;DR; (too long; didn’t read;) key points of this video.

  1. Pay attention to holidays, especially when your audience in global.
  2. Fix any stuff up, as long as it doesn’t damage your credibility.
  3. Only have ONE call to action, don’t confuse your audience.
  4. I (Petra) AM quite brilliant at some things! ?
  5. You want to check out the “give this a miss” part of the sales page (you do, honestly).

 

[VIDEO TRANSCRIPT]

Hey there, me again. So the plan was to update you on the launch this week. Oh my gosh, bad hair day. Yep, the plan was to update you on the launch this week. The membership launch that started out as an epic fail – as far as launches go. And some days ago, I did a whole video – transcript and all that – to explain why – as a launch – it was such a fail. 

I don’t think it was a fail in other respects. Like I did that workshop, that free online workshop. And even though I didn’t make any membership sales at the end. What I did do, was I created loyal fans. I created ambassadors, so over time some of these people most likely become paying clients or they will refer other people to me. So that’s that bit. 

The other thing is, because I started so late with the launch. Normally – my style at least – is to post a bit more often and then still give really useful helpful LinkedIn tips and then sort of as an aside, have a bit of a PS.  Like: hey, by the way, you might want to buy this or whatnot.

It means that all my posts my videos, my newsletters, still have LinkedIn tips – still have valuable content – with a little bit of a sales message and then towards the end, this where you really go like, you know, 48 hours left 24 hours left 2 hours left to really get those people that were on the fence the whole time to buy the membership. 

Because I hardly did any content leading up to it. It feels quite awkward to now suddenly jump into this quick quick quick buy now kind of thing. I’m still going to do it, because you know, nothing lost. 

So what’s happening at the moment? I’ve done two emails that I thought still quite interesting but also had a bit of sales pitch in there. Each one only had three unsubscribes. So that’s not too bad. That’s actually going quite well. 

BUT… but, but, but, I just realised the biggest stuff up ever in this launch.

And I mean I lived in the United States twice in my life. After High School, I lived in Denver Colorado for six months. I came back here, got a degree and then I lived in Washington DC for another 6 months. After that, I spent 10 years in Australia, which is not relevant for this bit. But since I came back to the Netherlands, I have mainly surrounded myself with expats. 

So I’ve somehow been living in this global community, online, offline, everywhere and what did I forget? The last day of this membership launch, the day that it’s like BUY NOW or things go up in price and all that kind of stuff. It is Thanksgiving in the US.

How stupid can you be?

But you know what? I’m just going to change it. Yep. So few people would have seen things that say, oh you got to buy before Thursday night 26th of November at 8 p.m. My time. And then it may or may not say what kind that is in other parts of the world. And I’m just going to change it.

On the one hand, with launches and things, there’s always this thing. If you say this day, this time, that’s it. We’re going to cut it off. Then don’t sell it for that same price after that. And that is fair enough, you know, you want to be reliable you want to be trustworthy.

But because I’ve still got two days, I will go on my website, reset the timer, change the wording so that I still stick to it, that if you hit my website And it says that the membership is only available at this rate, until this day this time, and this has passed and you don’t go and buy, yep. It’ll be a hundred euros more. So that is a thing. I really need to fix it today. And that was my quick news [mumble] launch.

Oh something else, don’t know if you’ve really looked into – so here’s a business tip coming up – Don’t know how much you really looked into marketing and maybe email marketing or sales pages all that in your business.

The biggest thing they’re always telling us… Have ONE, only one, call to action. Don’t give people different things to click on, because either they get confused and click nothing or they might click the wrong thing. So only promote one thing at a time. 

So what did I do today? I sent out an extra email a Facebook post and a LinkedIn post to let people know about LinkedIn Tea. My free weekly LinkedIn training that is happening today and I wanted a few more bums on seats so yeah to completely confuse people whilst I’m in a launch, trying to sell a paid membership, [unintelligent sounds] brilliant membership really, more about that later. 

So while I’m doing this, suddenly I spend the day promoting a free thing in the middle of it. Yeah. Marketing maybe not my strongest point. 

☑ LinkedIn Training.

☑ Business Coaching.

☑ Having fun.

YEAH, THAT’S ME!

—

?????? What was your best ‘save’ when you stuffed up? ??????

One quick LinkedIn lead generation action, two new high-ticket clients

One quick LinkedIn lead generation action, two new high-ticket clients

by | Last updated Apr 22, 2024 | Business Coaching, Strategy for LinkedIn™️ use

TL;DR; key points in this lead generation video

  1. When you are visible for your expertise people start mentioning you to others.
  2. Make connecting on LinkedIn personal.
  3. Share some of your expertise in a valuable manner with your connections.
  4. Impress people (in a positive manner) and they will keep the talk about you going.
  5. Overnight success takes consistent action, something I support established coaches and other values-based entrepreneurs with.
  6. Hot off the press:  this small action resulted in not TWO but FIVE high-ticket new clients. BAM.

 

[VIDEO TRANSCRIPT]

Hey, hey, hello. Today I want to talk to you about a tiny little action I took. The actual lead generation action took me less than to less than two minutes and that gave me 2 one-on-one clients, my high ticket service which, ehm, you know, generating enough income for me for the next six weeks.

Yeah, all that from one action that took less than two minutes.

I’ll tell you what this action was, but let’s look a little bit at the context. I don’t know if you’ve heard this thing… a lot of people whether they’re big in business or showbiz or something else. They sometimes complain that the world doesn’t take them seriously.

That people think they just woke up one day with this big success. Whereas overnight success generally has been in the making 10-20 years.

That also happened a bit with what I did here, because that one little action that I took came from trial and error over a period of years. Seeing what worked. Finding my own way in how I work and tweaking it, testing, trying out… things like that.

One of the things I always talk about is how I don’t do acquisition in the sense of cold calling, cos that’s scary. Instead, the way I act and interact on LinkedIn gets people to notice me, to remember me, to get a bit of a feel for my expertise and my personality and that leads to clients.

This is something that – again – I have developed over years. So it’s easier for me now to teach other people – to teach you – how to do these things. Because I don’t need as many years it took me to figure it out and perfect it, to them explain it to you.

What was this little action, you may wonder? Just a voice message! As a voice message on LinkedIn can only be 60 seconds, I had to look at the profile to decide what to say. So that’s why I said it took me two minutes.

What happened? I got a connection request and I got this from someone that I absolutely didn’t know. No idea, we didn’t even have joined connections, nothing there, but they did send me a personal invite. That’s always good thing. They told me that my name had been mentioned in some Facebook group. A Facebook group that I am not a member of.

So that was the first good thing. That is what happens when you become very visible for your expertise. People start talking behind your back in a good way. Anyway, so I accepted the invite, sent a nice message back, then – when I went on the person’s profile – I saw something that completely confused the shit outta me. Where I didn’t know if they were looking for clients as a consultant or looking for an employer. And whether their main focus was this industry or that and there were two specific parts that totally sent different messages.

I recorded a voice message, obviously with something nice to say, something I really liked about the profile and then said look, you know, there’s just one thing that really confuses me. So I hope you don’t mind and I told them what confused me. This led to some messaging back and forth. We hopped on a quick call about my work and what I offer and all that.

They were interested. I talked about my program. It’s called: Serious Shit. Which is my seven-week signature program. But at that stage they were more interested in profile only, which is about half that program. Yeah, but then the big thing was they still weren’t even sure themselves whether to go for employee or consultant.

That was their biggest struggle at the moment, and I had picked up on that from their profile and put the finger on it in that one-minute message. I gave it a few days and then I said, look if that’s your struggle, why don’t we hop on another call and talk about that. We did, I took notes and took a picture of the notes. Sent it to her and said look, this is how I see it.

Now what happened this person did end up hiring me for the profile, but they rang their brother in a different country. And talked about that one-minute voice message. They said: look you got to reach out to this lady. (that’s me) Because if she can give this much value in just a 60-second voice message. Imagine what it’d be like to work with her.

So the brother also booked a call with me. He knew exactly where he was going, what he wanted, what he was doing and booked the big fat Serious Shit program. Anyways, I’ve got another call lined up today with his best friend. [SPOILER ALERT: the friend just booked the 7-week Serious Shit program, so my small LinkedIn action gained me THREE high-ticket new clients. BAM] And I mean we’re talking people, we’re talking people in a company that everybody knows – that’s not LinkedIn.

Yeah, and you know and at a level where, where they know what they’re doing. And that is the kind of client I like best. It’s not so much like. Oh look at this high-up corporate client. No, it’s like getting a new client who’s at a stage where they know what they stand for, where they know what they want, when they know what their values are, and THEN working with them to word that on their LinkedIn.

That is so amazing. Well, I think so anyway.

If you like that idea of, you know, sending a quick voice message after you connect with someone. Then I encourage you to just play with it for a while. Do it for one week. Tell yourself for one week, every new connection request you get, you visit their profile you find something that relates to your area of expertise so that you can give a tip or even if you don’t want to give a tip, but just a nice little voice message. Just do it for one week. Building genuine relationships is a great start to organic lead generation.

 

Business Lessons from my Epic Fail Launch

Business Lessons from my Epic Fail Launch

by | Last updated Oct 12, 2024 | Business Coaching, Strategy for LinkedIn™️ use

TL;DR; The 5 main business lessons I learned from the epic fail launch last week:

  1. Free workshops have a low show-up rate, promote in time to get at least 100 sign-ups.
  2. Less is more. If you want to sell, you need to leave people wanting more.
  3. Fail fast, a start-up principle is also applied by The Coca-Cola Company. Learn and move on.
  4. When a launch fails, it doesn’t mean there is no market for the product.
  5. Those who attended the workshop loved it, they’ll become ambassadors for my work.

 

[VIDEO TRANSCRIPT]

Have you ever made what felt like a major stuff up and then it turns out that it’s not a bad thing at all? So I got this feeling at the moment, because I just did 3 things that I would always prevent others from doing. Three major stuff-ups. Which is not the best thing to do when you’re doing a launch.

When you’re launching your new membership program and you want all these people to sign up. I’ll tell you what these three things are that I completely stuffed up. But I want to tell you a little bit first why I’m not upset about it. So there’s this thing.

I’m reading this book at the moment by David Butler the vice president of Innovation and Entrepreneurship at The Coca-Cola Company. And there’s two things in there that really, really struck a note with me.

He says to design to grow you need two things which are Scale and Agility. A lot of times in business you don’t see these two. You see a lot of start-ups having agility and big companies having scale. And somehow they seem to be mutually exclusive. While the whole book is going to talk us through how they’re not and how you combine them for your success.

One of the principles there – and this is why I’m not upset at all about this quite epic fail of a launch that I did last week – when you’re about a hundred or so pages into the book, it starts to talk about the fail… fast fail or fail fast. Yeah fail fast and how generally this is something that you see a lot in the entrepreneurial world, in start-ups.

You know when they have all these fancy quotes on the walls and all that. And really it means – you know – you just dive in there you get going. If you fail you’re going to fail. You’re going to learn your lesson, but if you do it fast, at least you haven’t wasted an awful lot of time and effort and other stuff, you know just to fail.

And the book is going to explain to us how even once companies are bigger and have less agility and more scale. How you can still apply the principle to fail fast and how The Coca-Cola Company has been doing this all the time.

So that sort of makes me feel good, because I failed fast and hard.

What are the three things that I completely stuffed up launching this new membership site? Mind you, the membership is already up and running. I’ve been sneaking people in through the backdoor to have, you know, these so-called founding members to play around with it for a while. After six weeks I asked them for feedback and based on their feedback and a sense that I got, I made changes and tweaked and so there’s a really, really good thing there now and you know, I’ll keep at it. It’s not a problem.

So the three things: one is… and this is just a classic kind of launch thing. When you launch with an online workshop or webinar something like that. There’s some statistics of this many sign-ups, you’re lucky if you get a – I think it’s like 30% – show-up and then of these people you do really well if you have a five percent conversion.

I’ve done it in the past and had, I don’t know maybe a hundred and ten signups. It had like a 40% show-up which is quite high. And yeah, had a decent conversion rate. This time I started promoting the workshop way too late.

I only had 38 sign-ups for the workshop. Now given that generally 30% shows up that would have been 13 people and the conversion rates for that is like yeah, that’s pretty sad.

So that was my first big stuff up. And that’s okay. That’s a business owner stuff up you know, I’d only done a few launches before.

The real mega stuff up is in what I put in the workshop.

Before I was an entrepreneur, I worked in an organisation where I was in charge of workshops. Not so much Learning and Development in the company. Although I did do that as well. But my main thing was helping the colleagues with great expert knowledge to translate that into a workshop to deliver to the clients of the organisation.

And without fail, I’d ask them, you know, because they had all the subject knowledge and I just have – well not just. I am the expert on changing that into an interesting engaging workshop.

I’d ask people to just type out for me. Give me in a word doc, the information they wanted to get across in the workshop. And nine times out of ten. If not ten out of ten. I would hand it straight back. I wouldn’t even read it. I could with my eyes closed say OK I want you to reduce this to one-third of what you’ve just given me before I’m even going to talk about this.

Because if you want to convey this much information in a two-hour workshop. You’re better off just printing it and hand it over to them to be able to read. A workshop has to be interactive, has to be engaging, has to be conducive to learning and all that kind of stuff. You can’t stick that much in. I have been telling people this for the past 20 years.

So, what did I do? I put way too much in there!

Way too much. Flipping thing went for two hours. Sure enough, there was still you know, 10 people or so 9, 10 people at the end. And they loved it and they enjoyed it. And well, they should have enjoyed it, because it was the LinkedIn Party Time workshop.

So we had fun games. We had the wheel of names spinning, piñata whacking and all sorts of things. So they got a lot of value out of it, but obviously no need to join the membership. So that was mistake two.

1. I didn’t put enough time in promoting the workshop beforehand.
2. I put way too much content in there.

And ehm, I had a third one which I completely forgot. I knew I was going to talk to you about three things. But anyways, like I said, yeah, I’m not too worried about it.

The principle of fail fast is that you learn from your mistakes. You move on from them and you carry on. So that workshop, yeah. I didn’t post a replay the next day because I had to edit out some anecdotes, some casual ch,t some other bits…

That spinning of the wheel which is great fun when you’re there, when you’re all excited. Whoa is my name going to come up? But which is, you know, it’s a time waster in the replay.

I managed to bring the replay back to an hour and 10 minutes instead of two hours and posted that now. And you know, the deadline is five days away.

The deadline before the price goes up.

Because when I was sneaking people in through the back door, I gave them access to the membership for a €100 less than the actual price. And so the launch was last Thursday. I was going to give people a week where you can still get in at these founding member rates. So I’m just going to carry on this week. You know email people.

Probably come back in a little videos and report to you daily how many people unsubscribe from my list. Either for getting too many mails, no longer interested or – worst case scenario – mark on the spam. But you know, we’ll see what happens.

Anyways, the reason I’m sharing this with you.

Is that a lot of time with entrepreneurs. We only see the successful things. I could have waited and if I managed to sell a decent amount of memberships by Thursday I could be raving about that, you know really humble bragging. When you pretending to talk about something else, but really saying: look I’ve got this when you sign ups.

I think as solo entrepreneurs we all have these moments. When we’re either not prepared enough or stuff up, or try something new too quickly. And that’s another thing.

In the past, if I did something and it didn’t work. I thought: okay that didn’t work and I moved on to something else. Whereas now I keep at it because I know what I’ve got.

The membership is good. I can see it through people that are in there. What they say, how they feel. So it’s not that my product, or my service, is no good. It’s just that. I missed steps in letting the world know about it. So I’m just gonna keep it that. And I’m going to share with you what’s going on.

Because if nothing else it might, you know, help you bit feel more confident in your business. And if that is the only thing I achieve with this video, then that is actually mission accomplished.

So this week there’ll probably be a daily video from me. So look out for those and good luck with you and your business.

 

 

Petra Fisher

Petra Fisher

Business Coach | LinkedIn Trainer | Your External Brain

Petra Fisher is a global business coach who focuses on organic content marketing and sustainable lead generation for established coaches and purpose-driven entrepreneurs. Petra Fisher contributed to print publications for marketers and expats and was featured on radio, TV and podcasts globally. Client satisfaction is expressed through 160+ LinkedIn recommendations.

Consistency on LinkedIn (it’s ok to slack off).

Consistency on LinkedIn (it’s ok to slack off).

by | Last updated Apr 22, 2024 | Strategy for LinkedIn™️ use

My first attempt at tackling LinkedIn with a plan was my “plan” to post each day. I heard you needed consistency on LinkedIn. Consistency is key and all that. Fast forward 9 years and you know what? Sure when I do post consistently on LinkedIn, I am more on people’s radar than when I don’t, but it is not as important as it seems.

When I don’t show up for 2-3 weeks… Because I am on holiday (yup, I take time off when on holidays) or because I got me a new 700-page novel and forget about the world around me… it is not the end of the world. It is not like when I don’t stick to the plan to show up consistently on LinkedIn all my hard work comes undone.

It is a bit like muscle memory. Fifteen years ago I was a total gym junkie. These days, I carry extra weight, have arthritis and whatever other excuses not to exercise beyond walking. But then I saw some step aerobics and started to get the itch. I dusted off my step, found a class on YouTube and you know what? I may not quite have the level of fitness to keep up, but the moves all still come to me without thinking. As that is half the battle won with step aerobics, it is easier for me than I thought to keep going and before you know it I had seriously increased my fitness level.

Being active on LinkedIn works the same way. Once you have a plan in place, a plan that works for you (there is a reason I do step aerobics and not Zumba) it takes a few weeks, for most people 3-6 weeks of following the plan. Some days you may have to make yourself show up. After a while though, showing up consistently on LinkedIn will become an effortless, natural and enjoyable part of your routine.

If you slacken off, sure you will drop a tad off people’s radar. Fortunately, as soon as you get the itch, get back on track, it is dead-easy to get front of people’s mind for your expertise again.

PS These days my plan does involve a bit more than regularly posting and hope for the best. Seems silly to keep it all to myself, so I’ve turned my strategy into a totally customisable blueprint for the people I work with.

 

? What is your plan when it comes to getting noticed, mentioned & remembered on LinkedIn? ?

Posting on LinkedIn: Throwing content in a black hole?

Posting on LinkedIn: Throwing content in a black hole?

by | Last updated Apr 22, 2024 | Strategy for LinkedIn™️ use

“When I post things that I believe are worthwhile for my target audience nothing happens. Feels like throwing things into a black hole.” This is one of the responses to my survey asking people how they feel about LinkedIn. Feels like throwing things into a black hole doesn’t sound motivating to continue your efforts, does it? I understand though, I’ve been there.

The first few years that I was active on LinkedIn I didn’t have a plan. Even more so, I didn’t know there was more to it than sharing all my wildly valuable knowledge with the world! At least I got that bit right, that LinkedIn is all about adding value to your network and beyond.

I got some likes, even the odd comment. Not much else. No new connection requests, no real conversation in the comments. Definitely no new clients.

To a point though, posting on LinkedIn is throwing it into a black hole and hoping for the best. A client of mine once went to a party at her old company. She texted me excitedly the next day. People came up to her starting conversations with her LinkedIn posts as a starting point. She had no idea these past colleagues were reading her posts, as they never liked or commented.

This situation is not unique. This is happening to all of us all the time. If you want to get even more eyeballs on your content, you will need engagement. When I read an interesting article in the paper, I am glad the paper drops on my mat each morning. I don’t bother to write to the editor to show my appreciation.

Online it is a lot easier to engage with the author (you) of interesting content though. It takes one click to like and less than 30 seconds to type and send a comment. This is where it becomes interesting. When someone comments on your post a few wheels are set in motion:

  1. People you are not connected with are shown your content on their timeline as (mutual connection) commented.
  2. You can share more expertise. Always respond to comments on your posts. At the bare minimum, say thank you. Ideally, though you use the opportunity to share another small nugget of your expertise. I can’t say it enough: “Always Add Value”.
  3. If your posts are focused on your main area of expertise and just 2-3 related (sub) topics, people will soon start to associate you with your expertise and mention you when a question is posted elsewhere.

Key to be noticed, mentioned & remembered on LinkedIn is engagement. A lot depends on the structure of your post. There are different formats and most of them work. It all depends on what you want to achieve as to which format works best for you.

? How do you feel about spending time on LinkedIn? ?

 

Your LinkedIn Evolution

Your LinkedIn Evolution

by | Last updated Apr 22, 2024 | Strategy for LinkedIn™️ use

Building sites and LinkedIn, what they got in common? A lot! I love living so close to the NDSM wharf district as it is a fun, creative and constantly evolving area. Just like Your LinkedIn Presence, right? Not sure how they match? Read on!

 

CONTINUALLY EVOLVING

Before they started building here, they laid the foundation, just like you laid your LinkedIn foundation. Your LinkedIn foundation was laid when you opened an account, filled in the blanks and connected to some people.

As you can see this building is nowhere near finished. Most LinkedIn profiles I see have jobs listed, but no descriptions. Or piss-poor descriptions. Boring blah blah about past responsibilities. LinkedIn profiles like unfinished buildings. Ideally, things continually grow, develop and evolve.

 

BRING YOUR PAST IN LINE WITH NOW

Write about the skills, experience, knowledge you gained that is relevant NOW. Build a trustworthy progression throughout your career that makes clients believe YOU are the right person to hire. Once upon a time, I worked in a shelter for women who suffered domestic violence. Instead of writing about my tasks and responsibilities, I highlight what contributed to my current training ability. Working with a group with a diverse social, economic and cultural background. 

ENGAGED NETWORK

Once the builders are done with this building, people will move in. Some will only nod at their neighbours in passing. Others will strike up a conversation. Get to know each other, turn this building into a community. This happens equally on LinkedIn. Some people will ignore their network, others will engage occasionally, perhaps clicking the default birthday “Congrats” message. Others take networking to the next level. Engaging, interacting, connecting … building a true network.

>>> How do you treat your LinkedIn connections? <<<

Show your expertise through authentic engagement on LinkedIn

Show your expertise through authentic engagement on LinkedIn

by | Last updated Apr 22, 2024 | Strategy for LinkedIn™️ use

People often ask if they should consider a paid LinkedIn account. I counter their questions by asking: “are you using your free account to the max?” In this post you’ll learn about detailed and specific ways to search and engage on LinkedIn. Even if you don’t connect (yet) you can still engage on LinkedIn with interesting people.

1) START WITH A BOOLEAN EXPRESSION

If you are looking for an export manager, you don’t want all the results for export and all the results for manager. To search for this specific phrase you use “ “ around the words that need to stay together “export manager”. Only want export managers in the FMCG industry? Then you search for:

“export manager” AND (FMCG OR “fast moving consumer goods”)

Sounds complicated? Have a quick Google on “Boolean Expressions” to find out it is not all that tricky. The AND means your results need to include both the thing before and after the AND. The OR means as long as one or the other thing is found. By using ( ) we made it one thing after the AND. These things are called operators by geeks, mathematicians and other clever people.

2) USE THE FILTERS LINKEDIN OFFERS

You might want to narrow your search down to a certain location, industry or company. Scroll through the search results and open any LinkedIn profile that looks interesting.

3) CONNECT WITH THOSE YOU FEEL COMFORTABLE INVITING

Say something like: “Having relocated to The Netherlands, I researched my area of expertise: export manager. I came across your profile. I noticed (insert something from their profile) and wondered if you’d like to connect”.

Each person who accepts your invite needs a follow-up message. Thank them for accepting your request. Include one question related to your work, ask what they see as typical in that respect in the local/country working environment.

The ones that respond are the ones you contact again. Ask them if they are open to having a 20 min chat on the phone to talk to you about their role and company as you are trying to understand how your expertise may/may not fit in the Dutch … industry.

This not only gives you a targeted network it also lets people get to KNOW you.

4) MOVE ON TO ENGAGING WITH CONTENT

In the search field on LinkedIn, type words relevant to your expertise/industry. Then filter the results to ‘content’ instead of the default ‘people’. Again using Boolean expressions to make your search as relevant as possible.

Scroll through the results and anything you find truly interesting … comment on it. Comment in a manner that is a compliment to the original post AND shows some of your expertise at the same time. Do tag/mention the author of the post @theirname so they get notified. Especially if the author is not the person posting the article.

5) DO THIS DAILY AND SOON YOUR NETWORK WILL START TO NOTICE YOU

Since you made sure your network is full of relevant industry people, they will think of you when they hear of an opening. This strategy also applies when you are looking for clients instead of a new job.

6) RULE OF THUMB FOR POSTING, COMMENTING & SHARING ON LINKEDIN

Notice I didn’t mention like? Likes are pointless in establishing your position as an expert on. A like makes people guess why you liked it and deprives you of the opportunity to share a tidbit of your expertise. Stay on brand (your area of expertise) 80% of the time like or comment to be nice to someone no more than 10% and also stay within 10% max of engaging off topic.

7) IT DOESN’T HAVE TO TAKE UP HALF YOUR DAY

With a bit of focus, you only need 10 min a day. Clients who applied this strategy for as little as 10 min 3 times a week reported results after two weeks.

>>> What is your strategy for reaching the right people on LinkedIn? <<<

 

 

Tag your new LinkedIn connection, even if they stand in front of you.

Tag your new LinkedIn connection, even if they stand in front of you.

by | Last updated Apr 22, 2024 | Strategy for LinkedIn™️ use

Tags as such no longer exist on LinkedIn. Only in Sales Navigator and I am not paying for that, are you? In this post you’ll learn a quick workaround to ‘tag’ new connections. This way, if they reach out to you next month or in 3 years time, you can quickly refresh your memory about where you met. Even what you talked about if you wish.

DO YOU THINK I REMEMBER EVERY PERSON THAT I MEET?

I wish! One week I attended a networking event and someone asked me: “Have you got your phone?” I ehmed a bit. They asked: “Or don’t you want to connect?”

Got out my phone, opened LinkedIn. I typed in the person’s name, took a few extra steps and typed: “Great meeting you at such-and-such event.” Person said there was no need for it, we were standing right there together.

I’D LOVE TO REMEMBER EVERY LINKEDIN CONNECTION

Truth is, unlike Mike on “Suits” I don’t have a photographic memory.

I spent 5 days at a conference, chatted to over 100 people, even if only for a few minutes. Then I spoke at a meeting where two networking groups joined forces. Followed by the networking event I mentioned. Hate to disappoint you, but I do not remember every one of you brilliant people.

Especially when you look nothing like your profile picture!

Got myself a new client who introduced himself by saying: “I am so-and-so’s dad”. I thought so-and-so was at the combined event. Looked her up, turns out we met at the conference. Thank goodness for messages and personalised invites.
The person who asked me to connect on the spot? They accepted my invite A WEEK LATER. Ghee wiz I would not have known them from a bar of soap had I not had the personal note with the invite.

>>> How do you remember where and when you met?<<<

 

 

 

LET’S TALK ABOUT AUTHENTICITY AND LINKEDIN

LET’S TALK ABOUT AUTHENTICITY AND LINKEDIN

by | Last updated Apr 22, 2024 | Strategy for LinkedIn™️ use

Last week I delivered training at an organisation whose values align with mine. They hired me for my knowledge AND because they knew we’d be a good cultural fit.

How did they know that?

Because what you see is what you get. I am no different on #LinkedIn then I am in real life. I am casual, direct, funny (some might disagree) and compassionate.

This is what I teach. It is ok for people to run a mile when they read your profile.

These people are not a good match to work with.

Use your LinkedIn Presence as a natural filter to attract the clients, employers, employees, partners that are a match made in heaving (on LinkedIn really).

I can work with people who drink coffee, even if I don’t. You don’t have to like my kind of music. We must share our values though.

If your values mean certain language is perceived disrespectful, that is totally cool. It doesn’t mean I have to change who I am. It doesn’t mean you have to accept my manner of speaking. It just means we are not meant to work together. Thanks to the PM I received today, I got all inspired to write this post.

Stand Out to Fit In

Fancy you score your all time dream job, only to find out you are miserable every day because you don’t fit in the company culture. Or you attract a client who wants to hire you for BIG money, but you don’t feel any joy being around that person (putting it mildly here).

By adding just enough personality to your LinkedIn Presence you will only attract people that are a brilliant fit.

Find the boundaries and decide on which side to stay

By all means, don’t go over your boundaries. I work for myself and mainly from home so I am writing this late at night in my PJs. You may not be in a role where you can do that. What you can do, is present yourself on LinkedIn as your authentic self within the limits of what is acceptable in the workplace you want to be part of.

>>> Lets chat about this, please share your thoughts in the comments<<<