LinkedIn Power Tips
The Think Tank
Copyright © 2011 by G. C. Franchising Systems, Inc. All
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Welcome
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My Background
Timing
Please silence cell phones
Check on your social networking knowledge
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Who has a LinkedIn profile already?
Who logs on every day?
Who has 300+ connections?
Who has the Premium acct?
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So, Why LinkedIn vs Facebook,
Twitter or YouTube?
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LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional network
No kids’ pictures, stories about lunch and baseball
It doesn’t require daily involvement in order to be successful
No dollar investment is necessary to use it well
It’s all about networking with strong tools built in to
accelerate contacts
• LinkedIn users are decision makers and often more affluent
• Executives from every Fortune 500 company are on there
• The time investment to keep it up can be much less
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Some Key LinkedIn Statistics
• LinkedIn has 120m members. 50% outside the US
• Members reside in 200+ countries and territories
• They are growing at the rate of a new member every second,
which comes to about 1 million per week
• There were nearly 2b people searches conducted in 2010
• 2/3 of LinkedIn users are male and 6% log on on a given day
• More than 2m companies have Company Pages
• 73 of the Fortune 100 used their hiring solutions as of 3/11
• Many of these stats were pulled from
http://press.linkedin.com/about/
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What Can You Accomplish
With LinkedIn?
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Build a professional network of resources
Get found
Find others
Get a job
Meet prospects
Get business
There are success stories on LinkedIn that feature people who
have done great things with LinkedIn. Find them below
• http://press.linkedin.com/success-stories/
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How Will You Accomplish Your
Objectives With LinkedIn?
• Build a professional network
• Update your professional status and engage w posts from
others in your network
• Get introduced to people you want to meet by looking at the
networks of those you’re connected to
• Recommend and get recommended
• List events
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How Will You Accomplish Your
Objectives With LinkedIn? Cont.
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Look like an expert
Join groups and network within a private group
Answer questions posed by other LinkedIn members
Share presentations you’ve given
Share videos
Share portfolios
Advertise
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LinkedIn – Getting Clearer Now
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Think of LinkedIn as a dynamic professional web page
It has unique aspects not found on the other networks
No need to pay for adornment because the look is fixed
You don’t need to be a technical expert to get a lot out of it
It’s not a social network you need to worry about every day
It’s a nice gateway to other social networks or your website
Easy for people to go from LinkedIn to Email and the Phone
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LinkedIn – Tips For A Strong Start
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Your profile is indexed. Use proper keywords.
Example: Maritime Attorney
Create a good tagline
Go for 100% completion of your profile
Write catchy descriptions for your links
Start getting connections
Ask for 3 Recommendations
As with all social networks tell people you’re on LinkedIn
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LinkedIn – What to do next
• Think about how to help your network: Recommendations,
introductions, sharing updates
• Make it social: Treat your news feed like it’s your In-box
• Join groups
• Use Apps
• Update Apps
• Post 3x weekly
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What to Post on LinkedIn
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Great quotes
Links to helpful articles
Links to videos of you or your staff doing what you do
Information about what you do
Blog posts
Statements about new services you’re offering
Event notices
Links to your newsletter
Tidbits that may help people see how you’re an expert
Status from events you’re attending
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Questions?
• Before we move on now’s the time to ask about anything
we’ve covered
• If you want to go back to something, ask to do so now
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LinkedIn – How To Be An Expert
• Here are steps you can take to be an expert
– Have a complete profile
– Be sure you have a profile that says you’re an expert with some
history to back it up ideally
– Have several recommendations
– Show you’re reading books related to your expertise
– Post presentations you’ve given on the subject
– Join Groups related to your expertise and share good items
– Connect your relevant blog to your profile
– Add Events you’re hosting on the topic
– Use LinkedIn Answers to show you’re an expert
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LinkedIn – Using Answers
• LinkedIn Answers is a great way to get out there and
establish yourself in the greater community
• There are many different categories
• You can also post questions
• If your answer is selected by the poster as the Best Answer
you’ll get recognition for this on your Profile
• You can set up an RSS Feed for certain question categories
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LinkedIn – Using Network Mining
• One of the most important values of LinkedIn is mining
your contacts’ networks for introductions
• Go in to your contacts, then in to an individual’s network
• Who within their network would you like to meet? Ask your
contact for an introduction through LinkedIn, or in the real
world for coffee
• Before meeting with one of your contacts, review their
network and see who you’d like to get to know. Then, ask
for help getting to know those people when you meet.
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LinkedIn – Working the Groups
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Groups are where most engagement on LinkedIn occurs
So, be judicious in choosing your Groups
Get the digests and weigh in
Share your Links in Groups after posting to Status
Your Updates in Groups have a longer shelf life
Look at what Groups influential people in your industry r in
Lastly, think about starting your own Group (Open/Closed?)
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How do I find content to share?
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You want to share what’s trending to get attention
Use LinkedIn Today
Find it under the News heading
Pick the Industries you want to follow and watch your news
flow in to read and share
Use Signal
Also find it under the News heading
Enter in any search term and see a flow of updates
See trending news to share
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Should I get a Premium Account?
• Well, that depends
• Do you need InMail?
• Do you need to know who are some of the strangers
looking at your Profile?
• Do you want expanded views of peoples’ Profiles?
• Oh and you get a fancy icon next to your name
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Should I advertise?
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Do you have a nice place to drive people to?
Do you have budget?
Do you know who to target?
Do you have a copywriter?
Be sure to split test
Give it at least a few weeks
Check the data and work at improving your ad
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The Think Tank
Copyright © 2011 by G. C. Franchising Systems, Inc. All
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Wrap-up: Ways to use LinkedIn
• To network and meet new people to
partner with, refer to/from, or sell to
• To stay in better touch with your
customers and prospects
• To track what’s happening in your
industry and how people feel about it
• To establish yourself as an authority
• To develop new business
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The Think Tank Copyright © 2011 by G. C. Franchising Systems, Inc. All Rights
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Final Tips
• First consider using one or two social networks only
• Ultimately it is a blend of social networks that works well so
once you’re really comfortable with one, add another
• If you have a website, drive people to it
• Look at what competitors are doing online to try to figure
out what their strategy is – and is it a good one?
• Remember! It’s SOCIAL Media. Engage with people.
• Don’t be frustrated that it’s slow to begin with
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The Think Tank
Copyright © 2011 by G. C. Franchising Systems, Inc. All
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How to learn more from LinkedIn
• Visit the Learning Center: http://learn.linkedin.com/
• Check out User Guides for New Users and Small Business
on this same page on LinkedIn
• Read the LinkedIn Blog: http://blog.linkedin.com/
• Visit LinkedIn’s Help Center: https://help.linkedin.com/
• Also via the Learning Center, you can attend a free LinkedIn
101 Class online through the link called Training Resources
– next class is September 28th
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Copyright © 2011 by G. C. Franchising Systems, Inc. All
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Final Questions?
• Before we close, now’s the time to ask any final questions
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Copyright © 2011 by G. C. Franchising Systems, Inc. All
Rights Reserved
Close
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I’m available 1on1 to help you specifically
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Thank YOU!
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The Think Tank
Copyright © 2011 by G. C. Franchising Systems, Inc. All Rights
Reserved