When it comes to LinkedIn, we tend to find that most people fall into one of two camps: they either love it and use it every day, or they may-or-may-not have a basic CV uploaded, perhaps a dodgy looking ‘headshot’, definitely have a blue cover image and that’s about it; it’s left to languish on the world wide web, never to be looked at again.
If you pitch your tent in the latter of those two camps, you may be surprised to hear that it’s no longer somewhere to simply host your CV. LinkedIn has actually become a powerful tool which, when used correctly, is the leading social media platform for B2B lead generation. Time to look at how the LinkedIn algorithm works in 2020 and how you can make it work harder for you.
I’m a Conversation Starter (Twisted Conversation Starter)
Changes to the LinkedIn algorithm in 2020 mean that the platform is now prioritising content which sparks conversation. It’s essentially become your professional Facebook. LinkedIn’s mission is to serve you content from “People you know, talking about things you care about”. With this in mind, don’t be afraid to voice your opinion on industry trends, to share news and content relevant to your profession and comment on content within the hashtags that you follow.
Which leads us nicely onto…
Hashtags are Trending
Yep, hashtags are a thing now on LinkedIn. Just like you would on Instagram or Twitter, you can now follow hashtags which are relevant to your profession or interests to keep on top of breaking industry news. Use hasthtags to see what’s resonating with LinkedIn users in your industry, your neck of the woods… your world in fact.
Similarly, you can also add hashtags to your own posts in order to reach more people. So to give an example of a social media agency hashtagging posts with #SocialMedia, anyone following this hashtag will have a chance of seeing these posts in their feed. And the person that sees your post could well be after the perfect social media consultancy to manage their platforms (24fingers. #JustSaying.), which is where the whole brand awareness and inbound lead generation things comes in.
Content (and Constant) Changes
As well as prioritising ‘conversation starter’ content, LinkedIn now has a much better array of options for the way that you present your content. By this, we mean that you can now choose to go live on video, share a post or publish an article, for example. Similarly, you can also add multiple images to a post, including those on a company page, as well as being able to post from mobile to a company page nowadays. This is excellent if you want to share some photos from a networking event or trade fair on the go.
There’s also the option to tag people in images on LinkedIn now, which will allow you to piggyback onto someone else’s network. If they’re nice people (and we’re sure they are), they may also share the post for you which could make your reach event greater.
Let LinkedIn Do The Hard Work For You
Did you know that your LinkedIn business page will now suggest content for you that it believes is of interest to you? This clever little tool, tucked away at the top of any LinkedIn business pages you’re the admin of, is a great way of finding third-party content that you can then share on your own feeds to spark that all important conversation.
Express Yourself!
Finally, LinkedIn have introduced a range of reactions for posts, which means that you can now react to your network’s posts with a simple ‘like’, a more emphatic ‘love’ or even a round of applause.
So go ahead and embrace the new and improved LinkedIn changes. It has evolved so much in recent years and now lives up to the ‘social’ part of its social media moniker much more than it ever did before, albeit in a professional capacity. It really is new and improved, and more importantly than that, it’s the most powerful platform for lead generation. Time to go forth and convert.
PS If you’d like a little extra helping hand, talk to us about our Brentwood social media training workshops. We have a range of monthly sessions designed to help you get more out of your social media, both in a group setting or one-to-one basis. Email hello@24fingers.co.uk for details and how to book.
