With more than 380 million members worldwide, LinkedIn has become the website where companies engage with their networks, generate leads, and showcase their products or services. But, when was the last time you evaluated your Linkedin business page? Chances are, it’s been a while.

Your LinkedIn business page is where you have the chance to truly instill your brand’s message and share information about your company with the world. This platform allows you to publish stories not only about your brand, but your industry. Doing so invites followers into your world, and opens the door to engaging and compelling conversations. LinkedIn is the ultimate social media channel for knowledge-sharing and networking. If your LinkedIn business page is not optimized, you’re missing out on an ideal resource for building quality connections.  

Many small businesses have taken the steps to create a company page, but haven’t quite gone the extra mile to make sure it’s doing all it can. In order to create the strongest LinkedIn business profile, here are some best practices toward understanding how — and why — optimizing your LinkedIn business page is an essential part of your marketing efforts.

Pepper in Keywords

Consider the words your target audience would use to find your business. For example, if you’re a small restaurant or bar, you might want to include keywords “local craft beers," “vegan and vegetarian restaurant,” or anything different that sets you apart from the competition. Do you have trivia on Tuesday nights? Include that in your profile! Create a list of five or so terms or short phrases you’d use to describe your business and pepper those throughout your profile.

If you’re stuck on keywords, there are a lot of great tools to help you choose the right words. Google’s Keyword Planner provides ideas for competitive terms, analyzes how they might perform, and even creates a new keyword list by multiplying several lists of keywords together.  Best of all, it’s free! Whether you’re a novice or experienced marketer, Keyword Planner can help you create a strong list of relevant keywords to incorporate into your LinkedIn profile.

Why?

Just like when you search for information on Google, LinkedIn profiles are searchable. If you don’t include keywords pertinent to your business, you might be missing out on generating leads for your business, including potential clients, customers, and even future employees. If you’re hidden amongst hundreds of similar business profiles, what’s the point?

Besides making it easier to connect with the right people, optimizing your company overview keeps your page looking more professional, complete, and informational for those viewers that are visiting. You want to provide potential followers with information about who your business is and what you can do for them. Think of this as a short mission statement that quickly gives viewers the information they need to decide if they want to engage with your business or not.

Add a “Follow Us” Button on Your Website

This is a no-brainer — an addition of a Follow Us button can significantly increase traffic to your company page. It’s an easy-to-install icon that makes it simple for your network to follow and engage with your brand.

Adding a Follow Us button makes it easier for people interested in your brand to stay connected. When they follow you, they’ll see your posts, job openings, and stay afloat to any changes or company updates. Easily generate your Follow Us button now!

Why?

Social media users are just that — social! They are always looking for opportunities to follow and interact with businesses. Adding this button makes it simple for them to hop onto your social bandwagon. Just as having a call-to-action in your marketing materials is a common best practice, your LinkedIn business page should utilize the same tried and true methods to keep potential customers interlaced in your web of activity.

Publish Content for your Followers

If you’ve added the Follow Us button, you’ll need to have updated content regularly so that people see the benefit of following you. Part of why LinkedIn is buzzing with active users is a result of individuals and companies posting up-to-date content that generates conversations. You cannot simply create a profile and consider your work done. You need to publish content and updates about your company to keep, and build, your connections. Here are a few ways to make sure your posts are engaging:

1. Ask Questions — When you ask compelling questions, you’ve created the space for discussions on, and about, your post. It gives your audience a reason to comment, share, or tag others — all of which generates more eyes on your page.
2. Share Statistics — Sharing unique figures is a surefire way to get people talking. Find an interesting statistic or results from a consumer survey about your industry and share it on your page to get conversations started!
3. Post Links — Linking to a recent blog post you wrote not only drives traffic to your website, studies show updates with links drive twice as much engagement! If a blog post isn’t relevant to your business, you can link to interesting videos on YouTube or industry-based articles in the news.

Why?

When it comes to social media, engagement is not only key, it’s king. Publishing content will keep your customers interested, keep your page active, and most importantly keep your brand top-of-mind for your followers.

It’s also important to maintain a schedule or some sort of regularity in the content that you’re publishing. Do not let you page go dark — never let months of inactivity plague your profile. Keep posts consistent and frequent in order to keep your followers’ attention.

Monitor Your Page Analytics

The numbers don’t lie. Use your analytics to find out what’s working and what isn’t. There are a myriad built-in tools and analytics that can give you insight into how your posts are doing, where your followers are coming from, if posting at a certain time works better for your audience, and if specific content (videos, news articles, blogs, etc.) perform better than others. Additionally, these tools will help you better understand performance trends across time periods you define.

Why?

Understanding how your page is performing — just like your website or any other social channel — is essential in knowing how people are engaging with your brand. Knowing your numbers will give you valuable insights into what your connections resonate best with so you can further optimize your posts and profile.

If you have a personal LinkedIn profile page, you know that it is the primary representation of yourself and your brand. Your company is no different! Your business page is simply an extension of your company’s image, values, and mission.

What additional tips or techniques have you seen success with? Did we miss anything big? Share your thoughts below!

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