Small business owners often struggle to find the best marketing strategy that fits their budget. Here is a look at some of the greatest tips for getting the most bang from your marketing budgeting.
Whether you’re a B2B, B2C or expert firm, you’ll walk away with enough secrets to successful marketing to add new leads and find loyal customers.
How Do You Successfully Market a Small Business?
Small and medium enterprises in the United States spend marketing dollars directly based on a business owner’s decisions. Smaller businesses might find it wiser to focus on local clients first. According to Statista, companies spend around $173.3 million per year on local advertising. They split the rest between TV, radio, digital and events.
Successful marketing strategy execution often starts with an overarching goal. Small business owners find a top-of-mind awareness (TOMA) strategy works well to build brand awareness and develop a loyal customer base. Over time, you’ll gain referrals from your current clients.
What are some of the top secrets to successful marketing campaigns? Here are our top suggestions for small business owners.
1. Learn From Your Customers
Get to know your audience and what their needs are. The better you understand your buyers, the easier it will be to meet their needs. You can survey them, pay attention to buying trends and ask what you can do to improve their experience.
With your TOMA marketing strategy, you’ll want to take actions such as:
Call those who buy from you repeatedly and ask why they chose your brand in the first place.
Inquire about how you can help them refer more friends and family. For example, can you offer any materials that would be of help? Reward them when they do refer new customers.
Survey your customers after a successful campaign. Find out why they chose to buy and if they have other needs. When you understand their pain points, developing the relationship you need to keep your brand at the top of their thoughts becomes much easier.
Pay close attention to any negative comments or complaints. How can you fix the issue for that customer and prevent it on future orders?
2. Use New Technology to Manage Clients
You don’t have to track every little detail of your clients’ needs. Instead, invest in technology that handles customer relationship management. Regular emails from you can keep you at the forefront of their thoughts.
Send a birthday greeting to let them know you enjoy their business.
Offer discounts when sales slow down to clear out old merchandise and make way for new.
The happier your clients are, the more you can use their reviews and testimonials in your marketing campaigns.
3. Promote Yourself
Put yourself in the shoes of the average person visiting your site for the first time. If you’re a newer business, they’ve likely not heard of you and don’t know if they should buy. However, they’ll feel more comfortable trying out your product if you stand behind your work.
People often have to hear of you several times before remembering the brand name and messaging. How can you promote yourself consistently and frequently for your TOMA approach?
Create a social media persona matching your brand personality.
Post frequently and predictably at the same time of day and on the same weekdays.
Enlist the help of others to get your name out there. Ask customers to share your social media posts or forward your newsletter.
Pay for ads to get in front of the same people repeatedly.
Feature glowing feedback from customers and highlight how much you believe in what you offer. Do you feel your product or service is the best in the industry? Thinking about your unique value proposition and using it in your marketing can help gain new clients’ trust.
4. Send Welcome Emails
You likely already know email marketing can be highly effective at attracting and keeping customers. However, did you know that welcome emails have a 91.43% open rate and offer an opportunity to highlight your brand personality?
How can you enhance your brand awareness via emails?
Stick with brand guidelines, using your logo and brand color palette for instant recognition.
Make calls to action (CTAs) look the same as the ones on your website so people know to look for a particular pop of color.
Create great subject lines that tell users exactly what they’ll get when they open the email.
You can also track how well an email performs by seeing how many opens you get and who clicks through to your offer.
5. Use SMS
Short message service (SMS) is an excellent way to add personal touches to messages you send. You might use it for customer service issues and to problem solve. There are also many ways to connect with your clients through small positive messages.
Circulate an offer, discount code or just share news.
Add links to orders or short surveys.
Send a happy thought just to let customers know you are thinking of them and care about more than just making a sale.
Thank them for an order or update them on the status of one.
Many businesses have found great success with this marketing strategy. 98% of people will open your message, which is why thousands have used texting to drive customer retention.
6. Set Clear Employee Expectations
As your company’s leader, you must train your employees in the customer service model you want to exude. Make sure everyone understands your expectations and their role in the buyer’s journey.
Write out what your company policies and philosophies are.
Encourage employees to tell others why it’s a great place to work.
Feature your top staff members. Put a face to the workers for better brand awareness.
At the same time, you don’t want to create an atmosphere where people say, “That’s not in my job description.” Set the example by jumping in and helping when someone feels overwhelmed or has a tight deadline. If your employees see you taking the lead and helping others, they’ll be more likely to embrace the same spirit with their work.
7. Watch Trends
Pay attention to what kids are into and how other businesses in your industry market to their customer bases.
When apps like TikTok first arrived on the scene, mainly preteens used it to repeat dances and popular songs. Today, companies worldwide use them to reach new customers via fun marketing videos.
Stay on top of what your competitors are doing.
Study their social media presence. What kinds of posts do they schedule? How often do they post? Do they use paid ads?
Why do people know their name? Do they do a lot of radio interviews? Perhaps they sponsor local groups and have a strong presence in your community.
Study their name versus yours. Is their business moniker more memorable or more applicable to the industry?
Take a step back and rethink your brand image. Don’t be afraid to rebrand if necessary or to tweak colors and messaging until you hit what keeps your brand at the forefront.
Why Should You Change Up Your Marketing?
Embracing new trends and paying attention to what works for the competition are the secrets to successful marketing. You may not have time to woo people one-on-one, but you can automate relationship management and invest in social media marketing.
If you fail to step up and try new things, you risk growing stale and your customers getting bored with your brand. You only have time and effort to spend. If something doesn’t work, replace it with a new idea.
If you choose to focus on a top-of-mind awareness strategy as outlined above, run everything through the filter of how it will impact brand recognition and keep your audience engaged.
Which one of these list items would you like to implement today to find your successful marketing strategy?
Eleanor Hecks is the founder and managing editor of Designerly Magazine. She’s also a web design consultant with a focus on customer experience and user interface. She lives in Philadelphia with her husband and dogs, Bear and Lucy. Connect with her about marketing, design and/or tea on LinkedIn!
If you find yourself feeling stretched, stressed and overwhelmed from so much to learn when it comes to marketing and growing your business, I wanted to encourage you that …
You’re not alone.
I’ve been a business owner for over 25 years now and I still have seasons when I get that feeling too. And hundreds of other successful people do too. In fact, I recently spoke to a CEO who signed up for my complimentary discovery coaching call. This guy is a seasoned entrepreneur. He has grown his business to 14 locations and he’s even authored 6 best selling books, so you might be surprised to know why he reached out to me. I asked him … “what is the #1 outcome goal you would like me to help you achieve?”
His reply: “I’m feeling so overwhelmed with all of our new initiatives. I need a coach to help me make the best decisions in how I will manage it all.”
Yes, it just goes to show you that even “successful” people aren’t immune to feeling overwhelmed either. So, if you too have been feeling the weight of overwhelm, my encouragement for you today is this:
#1. Accept it’s perfectly normal to feel overwhelmed in your business. #2. Know that you’re not alone. #3. Don’t try to battle through it alone. Reach out for help and support.
Whether you find a peer group of entrepreneurs for support or you looks for a professional coach, having a consistent person to hold you accountable can help you break out of your cycle of struggle faster. And …
#4. Identify what your 80:20 is in your business and then focus on it.
Simplify your to-do list down to what critical few things you do that make the biggest difference to your success. Often times, doing this step requires the help of having a coach and/or accountability group to challenge you. It’s a lot like watching the reality show on hoarders. If you have a hoarding problem it’s because it’s incredibly difficult for you to let go of things. You never see a hoarder be able to clear out their home all by themselves. As a business owner, we too can fall into a similar challenge of not being able to let go of certain tasks you feel has to get done by you … or even done at all. So, if you feel alone trying to manage the overwhelm in your business ….
What is keeping you from engaging a peer group, coach or friend to give you the help and support you need?
Share your comment below. I’d really love to know. I’m in your corner, Yoon ~
Are you trying to boost sales but feel like you’ve lost your Midas touch in your business? You look back on those years when sales came so much easier to you and wonder why you might be suffering a sales slump now?
The good news is you’re not alone. Many entrepreneurs and even the seasoned self employed have felt the same way. What I found is the right thoughts can pull you out of your sales slump. It’s often the missing surge you need to boost your sales and turn your business around.
Figuring out what’s killing your sales can be as simple as answering these 5 questions. I’ve included short action exercises after each question. You can download the PDF version of this here.
Let’s dive right into the 5 key questions to help you discover how to use your thoughts to boost sales.
#1. Are you more competitive or comparative?
If comparison constantly keeps creeping into your mind, I can tell you first hand it’s killing your sales and it’s killing your fun. Here’s my comparison confession:
I started out in the direct sales industry in 1990 where I honed my sales skills for six years. The company was run franchise style. They supported hundreds of locations throughout the country. I was one of them.
As many companies do, they mailed sales reports every week that ranked how each of the independent business owners were doing in weekly sales volume. I enjoyed many aspects of sales and sales management; however, seeing these weekly reports was not one of them.
Instead of adding fun, healthy competition as it was meant to be, I somehow turned it into an intense emotional roller coaster — and I don’t like roller coasters. It was not until years later that I finally realized the problem wasn’t that my sales rankings went up and down.
The torture was I let my self worth go up and down.
Looking back I was letting my sales numbers define me. My subconscious thoughts kept telling me that my sales results was a reflection of my IQ level. The weeks when I was at the top of the sales leader board I felt so smart, but I let myself get puffed up thinking too highly of myself.
Other weeks when my sales sank to the bottom of the national ranking reports I was crushed at the realization of how dumb and untalented I must be. This went on week in and week out.
You would think after six years I would have recognized the root cause of my insanity. But, in those years I never paused long enough to even think about what I was thinking about. So, I just tolerated the torture. I hope you choose to stop torturing yourself.
ACTION QUESTIONS:
> Are you pausing long enough to think about your thoughts? ________________________________________ > How often do you find yourself comparing your results with others? ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________ > What advice do you need to give yourself about this? ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
#2. Are you serving yourself or serving others?
I doubt anyone would immediately answer this question saying, “Yes, I live to serve myself”. But, let me differentiate the two another way:
Serving myself is wanting to make an impression to let people know how great I am.
Serving others is wanting to make an impact to let people know how great they are.
Serving myself is trying to get others to buy largely, to help you meet your goals.
Serving others is trying to help others meet their goals through what you have to offer.
We can all start out with a heart to truly serve others, but sometimes life’s worries can subtly shift our focus off of others onto ourselves. If you want to boost your sales, I invite you to take the daily challenge to give yourself a ‘Check up from the Neck up’ with this one question:
ACTION QUESTION:
> Are you more focused on making a great impression or making a great impact? ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
#3. Are you driven more by fear or desire?
Studies on marketing have shown an interesting fact about consumer behavior. People respond more from fear of loss marketing than they do from desire to gain marketing.
In my business coaching practice I have seen that same fear of loss driver kill more sales than a lack of sales skills among the solopreneurs and entrepreneurs I coach. Here are a few common behaviors that reflect fear driven decisions:
You slash prices leaving little or no profit margins from fear of losing the business to someone else.
Instead of pruning back the C and D clients you tolerate 80% of your headaches from the 10% of your clients that represent at best, only 20% of your revenue.
You need more clients, but you stop advertising for fear you might lose money if it doesn’t work right away.
You send people price quotes, but you don’t ask for the order for fear that you might sound too salesy.
When you’re driven more by fear you also end up trying way too hard and it shows. Whether you are presenting a proposal to a prospect one one one or your are delivering a sales presentation to a large audience, people can smell fear.
Fear revolves around you and not around them. Fear can make you forget to listen, forget to smile and even forget to breathe.
ACTION QUESTIONS:
> What is the worst thing you are afraid might happen in your business right now? ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________ > If that “worst thing” did happen what difference would it make in your life … in 10 days? ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________ > How about in 10 weeks? _________________________________________________ > How about in 10 months? _______________________________________________ > How about in 10 years? _________________________________________________
#4. Are you proactive or reactive?
When you go through a streak of no sales or your whole year has been a sales slump it is easy to be reactive and slip into worry mode. Worry can keep you stuck in a cycle of struggle if you let it become a daily habit.
“Worrying is like a rocking chair. It gives you something to do, but never gets you anywhere.” (Erma Bombeck)
Worry and fear go hand in hand. Worrying is reminding yourself of all the negative outcomes you fear might happen and playing that tape in your head day in and day out. I looked up what is the opposite of worry in the thesaurus. It said “confidence”.
ACTION QUESTIONS:
> What is one area in your business do you want to gain more confidence? ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________ > What is one area in your business (with some training) you could get better results to boost your sales? ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________ > What is one thing you can commit to doing differently to increase your sales? ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
#5. Are you getting bitter or getting better?
Challenges are inevitable. But, if all you do is continue to rotate your mind and dwell on your frustrations you’ll only grow more bitter.
Success in anything, whether at school, sports or sales, there are only three areas we can focus on getting better at. We can intentionally improve:
our thoughts
our delivery (execution)
our strategy (technique)
Are you committed to getting better in your business every day? The right strategy can boost sales. How is your sales and marketing strategy working for you?
ACTION QUESTIONS:
> What is one marketing or sales strategy you want to intentionally improve in your business this month? ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________ > What is a new sales-marketing technique/strategy you want to learn? ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
SHARE YOUR COMMENTS: What thoughts are boosting or killing your sales?
There’s nothing wrong with aiming high – but striving for perfection could be hindering your success, If you can relate to any of these 5 signs, you need to get out of your own way, and stop being a perfectionist:
Sign #1 – Success is black and white
A lot of perfectionists can be characterized by their black or white approach to success and failure. Instead of appreciating a spectrum of success, with some business ideas achieving moderate, or even mixed results, perfectionists will view everything they do as either a complete success, or a total failure. This can be severely hindering to a business, as it encourages an attitude of ‘all-or-nothing’ – with entrepreneurs unable to see the good in their ideas, and unable to achieve satisfaction in anything they do.
Tip to get out of your own way:
Remind yourself that even bad ideas can offer value; and a failure is one step closer to success.
Sign #2 – You won’t take risks
This tendency to view all failures as completely catastrophic encourages an attitude of risk-adverseness – a desire to avoid any and all risk. An element of risk is part-and-parcel of being an entrepreneur (‘nothing ventured, nothing gained’), and being a perfectionist can reduce the growth of your business, and your willingness to adopt new ideas.
I knew a small business owner, a friend of mine, that was offered a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity – to pitch their products to one of the market-leading giants of their industry. My friend was relatively successful, with a small but established customer base; and the perceived risk of scaling up their business was too much for them. They declined the offer, and missed out on the chance to sell their products internationally. Why? Because they didn’t want to risk failing – no matter how small the risk, or how big the reward.
Tip to get out of your own way:
Try and identify a spectrum of risk; ranging from small, harmless risks, to huge, life-altering ones. Make a conscious effort to take a small risk on a regular basis.
Sign #3 – You take criticism personally
Criticism is crucial to the development of a business, and the advice of our peers can provide some of the best insights into successful business development. Perfectionists have a tendency to take this criticism very personally – and they’re unable to separate business criticism from personal criticism. This happens because perfectionists invest themselves into their ideas, and take professional criticism as an attack upon their abilities. This can prevent businesses from making vital changes, and can severely limit growth.
Tip to get out of your own way:
Critique your own ideas, and try to identify an aspect of your business that could do with improving.
Sign #4 – You never reach your goals
Perfectionists are renowned for setting unreachable goals; and even rationalizing away their success when they do reach them. Perfection is rarely attainable, especially for real-world businesses and people. There are always limits and problems that arise from government legislation, employees and sheer logistics – and striving for the perfect business will prevent an entrepreneur from ever reaching their goal. Even successful entrepreneurs might never be satisfied – because they believe that their business could always be improved.
Tip to get out of your own way:
Analyze your ambitions – are they realistic? Could they ever be achieved? Set goals that are aspirational, but still founded in reality.
Sign #5 – You think unhappiness is the price of success
The end-result? Unhappiness. Most perfectionists believe unhappiness to be part-and-parcel of achieving success, and live unfulfilling lives because they think it’s vital to achieving their goals. In reality though, happiness should be a goal in its own right – and success at the expense of your own happiness isn’t really success at all.
Tip to get out of your own way:
Make happiness an ambition, and don’t strive for success at the expense of your own happiness.
QUESTION: What tips do you use to get out of your own way? How do you prevent yourself from being overly-perfectionist? Let me know in the comments!
Don’t let FEAR keep your business stuck in a FOG ….
As a special public service in response to #Covid-19 I’m offering a FREE 6-week digital marketing coaching clinic series on Tuesdays 12-1pm EST March 24-April 28th on Zoom.
This is exclusively for small business owners, so just comment below “Business Owner Public Service” and we will send you the link to join.
When I launched my first three businesses I did so with a sizable budget to fund my startup costs. But, when I started my consulting business back in 2007 I found myself in a very different situation. For the first time in my life I had no income coming in.
My husband was in the midst of a long season of unemployment after I had already sold my previous businesses. We had three hungry mouths to feed at home, so I was determined to launch my new business leaner than ever before — like as close to zero startup costs as possible.
That’s when I decided to figure out the LinkedIn thing.
LinkedIn is an incredible free tool to market your business. Once I invested the time to figure out how to get better at using it, I was able to track 6 figures of annual new business all came from LinkedIn.
So, if you want to start monetizing LinkedIn here are 9 tips to help you start generating leads for your business:
Lead Gen Tip #1. Have the Right LinkedIn Success Mindset.
Thousands of business owners are killing it with LinkedIn, but new clients aren’t going to come flooding in if all you’re doing is logging into LinkedIn to accept connection requests and post a few comments here and there.
LinkedIn will work for you if you put forth the right consistent effort. I love this famous quote:
“Your diamonds are not in far distant mountains or in yonder seas. They are in your own backyard, if you but dig for them.” ~ Russell Conwell
If you’re not sure whether your target market is on LinkedIn watch this video where I share 5 reason why you should be marketing your business on LinkedIn.
Lead Gen Tip #2. Craft a Stellar LinkedIn Profile for Instant FIND-ability and GET-ability.
Keep in mind the user experience on LinkedIn. People will land on your profile in 2 ways. Direct search and an indirect search. Direct search is easy low hanging fruit because they are typically ‘buy intent’ – ‘hire intent’ searches. Potential clients search LinkedIn for the type of person they are looking to hire. This is why you want your profile to be SEO optimized for the right keyword phrases. Your LinkedIn profile should also have a professional looking photo of you. Most people skip profiles where there is no picture or only a logo.
Indirect search can happen in many ways. For instance, let’s say you post an update on your personal LinkedIn profile and you share a few tips about a frequently asked question you get. Let’s say you currently have 1,200 1st degree connections and 45 of those connections liked or commented on your post. Not only does your post get seen by your 1st degree connections, it also gets eyeballs from the connections of the people who commented on your post. So if your 45 comments each had an average of 1,200 connections then your one post can also reach 54,000 2nd degree connections. You’re bound to get some of those people who saw your content click on your profile to find out what exactly you do. They will skim your profile for all of 3 seconds. If they don’t immediately get what you do, they WILL MOVE ON to find someone else.
So, you don’t want to miss out on this EASY passive lead generation opportunity simply because they don’t get what you do. That’s why it’s so important that your LinkedIn profile captures an immediate GET-ability (and wow factor).
Naturally, you want to have the updates you post on LinkedIn reach more people. So, be sure you develop the habit of sending targeted connection requests to grow your 1st degree connections.
Lead Gen Tip #3: Create Customized Connection Requests
When searching for connections on LinkedIn, you are given numerous filters to choose from. This allows you to get really strategic with your search.
You are able to drill down to where someone lives, where they went to school, what their interests are, and so on. With this information, you can take it and personalize your connection requests.
Lets say, For Example, you search for CEO’s and filter by 2nd degree connections located in Philadelphia. Instead of sending a pre-baked template to someone, study their profile and find a way to insert a question about their city in your request.
You can also ask about things like the weather, their sports teams, and much more.
By creating customized connection requests, you break the ice and open up an easy dialogue with the other person.
Lead Gen Tip #4: Don’t Spam Connections. Talk to Them.
When it comes to messaging your connections on LinkedIn there are two common pitfalls occur. Pitfall #1. You send out tons of requests to connect, but then fail to talk to them after they accept. Pitfall #2. You blast straight into a sales conversion. From its inception LinkedIn was not built to be a marketplace to bombard members with advertisements and solicitations. LinkedIn was designed to foster relationships.
If you use LinkedIn to blast straight into solicitation messages to cold connections, you’re just going to burn through those connections.
Instead, just follow the natural sequence of relationship building when having 1-1 conversations on LinkedIn. For instance:
Customized invitation
Welcome / build rapport message
Engage message
Give value message
Value follow up message
Invitation to call, coffee, interview, etc
If you have a well written profile and tagline often times you can go from step 2 straight to step 6, but it’s good to have a 6 step sequence like this to continue the conversation for people who aren’t ready to be a client of yours.
If the idea of messaging people individually feels too daunting, I use a tool called Auto Text Expander to speed my responses to FAQ’s when I’m on desktop.
When I’m messaging people from my mobile I just use the keyboard shortcuts on my iPhone which functions the same way as Auto Text Expander. I can reply 10x faster when all I have to do it type in 2 or 3 letters I set up.
Lead Gen Tip #5: Use Trigger Events to Engage and Re-Engage
Not all of your prospects will be ready to talk about your services immediately. However, they may be ready in 6 or even 12 months from now.
Your goal is to remain in their minds, meaning you’ll need to continue engaging them.
Fortunately, this can be done easily with trigger events. These are situations that will provide a comfortable way for you to re-engage with someone if they’ve shown no interest in your solutions so far.
These situations include:
they engaged on one of your posts (liked, commented, or shared)
they viewed your profile
they’ve published an article on LinkedIn
they’ve posted a status update on LinkedIn
they had a job change
they were promoted
they engaged on one of your posts (liked, commented, or shared)
they or their company were mentioned in the news
they’ve published an article on LinkedIn
they’ve posted a status update on LinkedIn
By re-engaging in this manner, you are more likely to stay on their radar and be top of mind when the time comes that they need the solution you offer.
When you’re posting an update, whether it’s a simple text update, a picture, a video or audio LinkedIn allows users to follow various hashtags. This way, they can get content on a topic in their feed, even if they don’t follow specific influencers for it.
Additionally, when you post an update, LinkedIn will auto-suggest hashtags, which can give you some inspiration for what to include.
You can also do a quick search a topic in LinkedIn and you’ll be able to see the number of followers on that hashtag.
Here’s an excerpt from SEO expert Neil Patel where he shares the importance of posting videos on LinkedIn to grow your business.
Advantages of Video
Native videos are videos that are uploaded directly to LinkedIn or created on the platform itself, as opposed to embedding videos from other sites, such as Youtube, Vimeo and more.
There are numerous advantages to using native video. According to Neil Patel, “A staggering 84% of buyers reported that they had been convinced to buy after watching a brand’s video.
And that same study found that 97% of businesses believe that their video has helped increase user understanding of their product or service.
That means the right type of video will help you sell and engage more.”
How to Upload Native Videos
To upload a Native Video, go to your feed, and you’ll see a button with a camera icon next to “start a post.
From here, You can directly upload a video between three seconds and ten minutes in length. This will appear directly to your update feed, allowing your audience to start watching your content immediately.
The dimensions of a native video can be from 256×144 to 4096×2304, and the orientation can be Horizontal or vertical, though vertical videos will be cropped into a square in the feed. Native video’s will also loop automatically.
Using Analytics
Another advantage of Native Videos is that, Once you post a video, you are able to see detailed analytics. This includes things such as the number of views, likes, and comments your videos are receiving.
Additionally, you can also see audience insights, including top companies, titles, and locations of your viewers.
You can find these insights in the dashboard section of your LinkedIn profile. This works on both mobile and desktop.
Click the drop-down that says “Me” and scroll down until you see “Posts and Activity.”, which brings you to a feed of every post you’ve ever uploaded to LinkedIn.
At the bottom of each post, you’ll see a breakdown of it’s likes, comments, shares, and views.
With this information, you can begin to understand if you’re reaching the people and companies that matter to your brand.
Lead Gen Tip #8: Get to the Point Quickly in Your Videos
On Social media, attention spans are short, so there’s no time for you to waste. This means that you need to hook your viewers by getting to your point quickly at the beginning of your video.
LinkedIn themselves recommend capturing attention with a hook in the first 0 to 3 seconds.
From there, seconds 3 to 15 should be used to identify the problem or opportunity, and should address one of the biggest pain points of your potential customers, in order to really draw them in and entice them to watch the rest of your video.
After you have successfully hooked your viewers and drawn them in, seconds 15 to 50 should be used to describe the solution. Explain what you’re offering and why it’ll help your viewers.
Lead Gen Tip #9: Use Closed Captions for your videos
When a video comes up on your feed, it begins playing automatically. However, it is also muted by default.
It’s estimated that up to 85 percent of social media videos are played with no sound.
This makes adding closed captions/subtitles to your videos essential.
Even if your video isn’t heavy on speech, doing so will make them more accessible. LinkedIn even has a closed captioning feature, making it easy to implement.
To add captions:
Click the video icon near “start a post” and select the video you’d like to upload.
When the preview shows up, click the edit icon on the top right to see the video settings and then click select file to attach the associated SubRip Subtitle file.”
Lead Gen Tip #10: Make Use of LinkedIn Showcase Pages
Let’s ask Darren Travers, who shares, “Showcase pages are add-ons to your LinkedIn company page for highlighting a specific business unit, initiative, product, service, or for targeting unique demographics. They are standalone pages, meaning people can follow them without following your main page.
If you have multiple target audiences or brand personas, you need Showcase pages. With them, you can avoid over complicating your main page and creating confusion for your audience by spreading out your offers and messages across multiple pages.
To create one, simply click ‘Admin tools’ on the right of your company homepage and select ‘Create Showcase Page’ to get started.”
Lead Gen Tip #11: Make Use of Sponsored vs Targeted Updates
If you have a LinkedIn page for your company, then you are able to take advantage of two powerful features. Targeted Updates and Sponsored Updates.
With Targeted Updates, you can target your content to a specific audience. This is useful for many reasons, such as if you want to show specific content to your investors, and other content to your consumers. However, the segment you are targeting must have at least 300 followers for you to use this feature.
Sponsored Updates: Sponsored updates are paid posts that allow you to reach a broader network. If you would like some content to get even more visibility, or if you want to get your content in front of people who aren’t following your Company Page (or your employees) you can pay to sponsor it.
To use targeted updates:
Click on start a post from your Company Page
Click on “Anyone” and you’ll be taken to “Who can see Your Post?”
Click on Targeted Audience and you’ll be able to customize what audience you want the post
While Targeted Updates can be used to build an organic following, Sponsored Updates allow you to pay to get your posts in front of a larger audience to further build your following.
These will appear in the your audience’s feed and look like a normal post, the only difference being a “sponsored” label next to your company name.
You are also able to target specific audiences just like you can with Targeted Updates.
To use Sponsored Updates:
Post an update to your company page and click the “Sponsor Update” button.
Within the Campaign Manager, name your new campaign.
Target your campaign by choosing Location, Company, Skills, etc.
Choose Your payment option. You can select either Cost-Per-Click (CPC) or Cost per 1000 impressions (CPM).
Conclusion
So, there you have it. I just shared 11 tips to help you start generating more leads on LinkedIn. If you’re starting at zero, don’t be overwhelmed by trying to implement all 11 by tomorrow! Bookmark this page to review it each day and decide to implement one at a time until you add all 11.
If you’d like to nail down your LinkedIn profile faster check out our free and paid LinkedIn Profile Makeover services for you here:
QUESTION: What’s one thing that’s been working well for you on LinkedIn? Share With us in the Comments below!
