Marketing on LinkedIn: A Small Business Owner’s Guide

Updated: May 5, 2023

Here's a secret: marketing on LinkedIn is a must-have in this constantly evolving digital world.

Social media platforms are powerful marketing tools – if you know how to use them.

We’ve given you The Ultimate Guide to Facebook and Instagram Advertising for Small Businesses and How to Use Pinterest for Online Marketing.

Now we want to show you how to master marketing on LinkedIn.

Why LinkedIn?

Well, to start, the social media platform has 645+ million users, with professionals from just about every industry joining at a rate of 2+ every second. More than 30 million companies are already on LinkedIn right now.

And that means if you’re not, you’re already falling behind.

1: Create a Personal Profile and Company Page

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Before you can start marketing on LinkedIn, you need to create an online presence there.

Your first step is creating a personal LinkedIn profile. Even though you’re looking to market your business, this is a very important step. After all, people ultimately do business with people, not with companies.

Aim to get your personal profile as close to 100% complete as possible. You can always work on optimizing it over time. Encourage your co-workers and employees to do the same.

Once you get your profile sorted out, it’s time to create your company page.

Look at your company page as a personal profile for your business. The same way people will get to know you through your profile, they’re looking to learn about your company here.

2: Identify Your Audience

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This is a hard-and-fast rule, regardless of whether you’re marketing on LinkedIn or elsewhere. If you’re not targeting the right people, you won’t be able to generate any leads or build brand awareness!

3: Smash That SEO

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It can be exhausting (and ineffective) chasing after your target market all the time. This is why you want to work on your SEO, which helps your target market find you.

Make sure your personal profile and company page have relevant keywords. Link to your company page from your website and (business) social media profiles, and ask your employees to do the same.

And, of course, share content relevant to your industry. Make sure it’s as engaging as possible, especially when creating content.

Bonus Tip: Sharing Links on LinkedIn

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

LinkedIn’s algorithm doesn’t want users disappearing via outbound links. The average user is already only spending 17 minutes/month on LinkedIn, so the algorithm favors posts that don’t link away from the platform.

And people are so used to seeing hundreds of links on social media that they tend to keep scrolling.

So how do you share links on LinkedIn without being ignored?

By standing out.

Remove the link preview before posting and replace it with a paragraph or two providing context and adding value to the post. Use a photo, or even a video, to create a visual impact – which is 6x more effective than text alone.

Engage with your audience and give them an incentive to follow the link – which you’ll place in the first comment rather than the post itself.

4: Generate Followers

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The more people following your company page on LinkedIn, the bigger your audience.

An easy start is becoming a follower yourself – and, once again, encourage employees to do the same. SEO will do a lot of work here, but you can help it along by using something like the Follow Company Plugin on your website and asking your followers on other social media platforms to join you on LinkedIn too.

And don’t be a stranger – follow industry leaders and engaged clientele, and tag a few individuals in your posts as relevant.

Speaking of tags, don’t be afraid of using hashtags in your LinkedIn posts.

Do so sparingly, and pay attention to what LinkedIn is suggesting: sometimes, they’re totally unrelated, but often you can find relevant tags with thousands, or even millions of followers.

5: Sponsored Content and Ad Campaigns

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Sponsored Content on LinkedIn is the platform’s version of native advertising, which helps attract new followers by sharing your content with a wider audience.

It’s a good idea to use posts that have a high engagement level, which you can test using a few different tools: LinkedIn Company Page Analytics, LinkedIn Campaign Manager, and Conversion Tracking. Pair these up with Direct Sponsored Content for a winning combination.