Of all the mainstream social media platforms, LinkedIn is perhaps the most underrated as a tool for exposure and lead generation. Most businesses have a LinkedIn profile, but did you know that only 1.8 per cent of users post any content in an average 30-day period? That means at least 98 per cent are completely wasting all the benefits LinkedIn can offer.

Not only is it a great way to recruit (its traditional use), but it can be a fantastic way to boost brand awareness, expand your network and generate leads. That’s because the majority of people carrying out any meaningful level of activity on LinkedIn are senior leaders with real authority to make decisions for their business or organisation.

If you use LinkedIn correctly, you can secure calls and meet-ups with scores of potential clients every year. However, to make LinkedIn really work for you, you need to know how its algorithms work – and how to translate that knowledge into results.

Five crucial things to understand about LinkedIn

1. LinkedIn is designed to keep people scrolling

LinkedIn’s key aim is to keep people on their feeds as long as possible. That means three things:

  • If you create content that stops people scrolling for 10 to 15 seconds and generates engagement, LinkedIn will recognise that it keeps people on its platform and your posts to appear in more people’s feeds
  • If you create content that people scroll straight past and don’t engage with, LinkedIn will recognise that it doesn’t keep people on its platform and your posts will appear in fewer people’s feeds
  • LinkedIn doesn’t like posts with links that take people away from the platform

Fundamentally, it’s really important to make sure your content stops scrollers in their tracks. You can’t break the internet with every post, but anything you publish that bombs will limit the reach of future posts.

2. The hierarchy of LinkedIn content

LinkedIn gives priority to certain types of content – and video is top of the tree. Because it is proven to be more likely to keep people engaged, video content gets an average of 34 per cent more reach that a simple text-only post. The content league table is as follows:

  1. Video – users must watch an average of 40 per cent of your clip for it to be boosted. Portrait-shaped clips work best as they fill users’ mobile screens.
  2. PDF carousels – you can create up to 12 pages with short, sharp messages to prevent reader fatigue
  3. Polls – LinkedIn likes polls because they prompt engagement
  4. Image and text – the most common type of post on LinkedIn and social media in general
  5. Text only – in the multimedia age, this is quite an antiquated way to share information and news
  6. LinkedIn articles – they have low visibility, but can give your profile credibility and position you as a thought leader in your field

3. Structure your posts to fit LinkedIn’s news feed graphics

LinkedIn posts don’t appear in full on your connections’ feeds – only the first couple of lines will be fully visible alongside the ‘read more’ button. That’s why it’s important to structure posts accordingly:

  1. Hook – the first line should be a headline that attracts people’s attention. It needs to be a teaser that draws people in and makes them want to click ‘read more’. The second line should further develop readers’ curiosity.
  2. Substance – the body of your text should contain three separate bite-sized, easily digestible points (not one big, long paragraph). You can use emojis instead of bullet points to make the copy more visually interesting.
  3. Wrap-up – don’t leave your audience thinking ‘so what?’. It’s important to explain why your post is relevant, and/or include a call to action, telling the reader what you want them to do next.

4. LinkedIn favours personal profiles over business profiles

If you can, it’s advantageous to use your personal account to conduct LinkedIn business, with clear allusions to your company all over your profile. LinkedIn gives personal profiles preferential treatment and wider reach. If you can’t realistically do this, team members can give your company profile’s posts a boost by liking, commenting on and sharing your company’s posts with comments.

5. Be careful who you connect with and build good relationships

As with communications of any kind, reaching your target audience is essential. In the case of LinkedIn, that means ensuring you’ve built the right connections. Your content won’t be given endless reach and will primarily end up in the feeds of some of the people you’ve connected with. Make sure as many of those people as possible have an interest in your content – otherwise, it will be put in front of connections who will never engage with your posts. Put simply, if you’re selling steaks, it’s pointless – and, in fact, detrimental – if your connections list is full of vegans.

So, you’ve identified a contact you want to connect with – great. But don’t send an unsolicited connection request – you’re just going to come across as a hard seller, which will wreck your relationship before you’ve even started. First you need to make them notice you and establish a rapport. That gradual process could start with liking one of their posts, building up to commenting and exchanging comments.

When the time’s right to make that connection, add a note to your request bespoke to them. You could focus on a specific post or ask a question relevant to their business. Before you can convert your connection into a potential customer, you have to put the work in and strike up conversations with no agenda, focusing on what your businesses have in common.

Let the connection grow organically as you would when meeting new people in the flesh – through talking, being friendly (but not overbearing) and finding common ground.

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