Are you LinkedIn to Social Media?

If you are in professional services and you want to grow your business, you simply must embrace social media – specifically LinkedIn.

For example, a client of ours who only recently opened a LinkedIn account:

Has made more than 1,000 connections;
Is a member of 50 groups (LinkedIn’s maximum);
Gets dozens of comments on every blog post that is placed on LinkedIn;
Has brought in an astounding 664 visitors to his website in the last 30 days, from LinkedIn alone.

Another client who was new to LinkedIn has connected to numerous COIs (Centers of Influence), many of whom asked him to lunch before he had the opportunity to make the first move. A self-professed hermit, LinkedIn has become his networking platform.

These 2 clients are not limiting themselves to their respective professions, yet the vast majority of their connections are nearby potential COIs, who can have a direct impact on the growth of their practices.

You haven’t yet met most of the potential COIs that would be a good fit for your business. Many of them aren’t networking or out in social circles. They are “hiding” in their offices, waiting for you to come and find them. LinkedIn is the first place to look. Consider how many potential COIs reside in your city, your state, your region. I propose that it’s unlikely that even half of them know you exist.

Your competitors are probably getting hundreds of visitors to their websites per month from LinkedIn, and those connections are on their mailing lists as well! What’s the secret to their success? A content-rich blog or some sort of virtual charisma won’t hurt, but what your competitors understand is that LinkedIn is a tool – a relationship-finding tool, a relationship-building tool, a relationship-maintaining tool, and a connect-others-together tool. LinkedIn is a hundred times more effective at locating and connecting you with the people you want in your orbit than any physical networking could be.

But you still need to be out there, connecting personally with those you meet through social media with whom building a relationship would be mutually advantageous.

If networking alone is a kitchen faucet, then social media – and specifically LinkedIn – is Niagara Falls. LinkedIn is online networking on steroids.

If I still haven’t lit the social media fire under you, take this case in point: phoneBlogger.net recently held a small webinar with 25 attendees that was promoted to just a few. If we had invited our entire mailing list of 15,000 people – many of whom were acquired via LinkedIn – there could have been hundreds, maybe even thousands. You can’t get that kind of leverage, influence that many people, and reach the multitude of office hermits that easily and cheaply – except online. That begins by leveraging social media.

We’ve written several articles about using blogging and social media to foster referrals.
Feel free to check them out at phoneBlogger.net/Blog.

We’d love to hear your feedback –
you can comment or ask questions in the “Leave a Reply” section below!