Tag: online marketing

Marketing Through LinkedIn: Tips and Tricks

custom powerpoint

digital marketing

LinkedIn

Marketing

online marketing

pitch deck

Rick Enrico

SlideGenius

Apr 24, 2017

LinkedIn has become an indispensable tool for professionals and businesses alike. Whether you’re looking to network, promote your brand, or generate leads, marketing through LinkedIn offers unique opportunities to connect with decision-makers and grow your business. Here are some tips and tricks to help you make the most of LinkedIn’s marketing potential.

1. Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile

Your LinkedIn profile is often the first impression you make on potential clients, partners, or employers. Ensuring your profile is professional, complete, and optimized for LinkedIn’s search algorithm is crucial for effective marketing.Why It’s Important:

  • Builds Credibility: A well-optimized profile establishes you as a credible and trustworthy professional or brand.
  • Improves Visibility: Optimizing your profile increases the likelihood of being found by people searching for your expertise or services.

How to Do It:

  • Use a professional profile picture and a custom banner that reflects your brand.
  • Optimize your headline with keywords related to your industry or services, and fill out the summary section with a concise description of what you offer.

2. Leverage LinkedIn Groups

LinkedIn Groups provide an opportunity to engage with professionals in your industry, share knowledge, and demonstrate your expertise. Participating in groups can help you build relationships, share valuable content, and promote your services in a less promotional and more organic way.Why It’s Important:

  • Increases Engagement: Active participation in groups helps you connect with potential clients or partners.
  • Showcases Expertise: Sharing your knowledge and insights positions you as an authority in your field.

How to Do It:

  • Join groups relevant to your industry and participate in discussions by answering questions, sharing articles, or offering advice.
  • Avoid overtly promotional content—focus on adding value to the conversation and building relationships.

3. Use LinkedIn Ads

LinkedIn Ads allow you to reach a highly targeted audience based on job title, industry, company size, and other professional criteria. This makes LinkedIn Ads an effective tool for B2B marketing, lead generation, and brand awareness.Why It’s Important:

  • Targets Decision-Makers: LinkedIn’s ad platform allows you to reach key decision-makers in specific industries or companies.
  • Increases Lead Generation: LinkedIn Ads can drive high-quality leads to your website, product, or services.

How to Do It:

  • Use Sponsored Content to promote blog posts, whitepapers, or webinars to engage your target audience.
  • Create Sponsored InMail campaigns to send personalized messages directly to prospects’ LinkedIn inboxes.

4. Share High-Quality Content

Consistently sharing high-quality, relevant content is one of the most effective ways to engage your LinkedIn audience and establish your brand as a thought leader. Posting insightful articles, industry news, and company updates keeps your network engaged and positions you as a go-to resource.Why It’s Important:

  • Builds Authority: Regularly sharing valuable content helps establish your brand’s authority in your industry.
  • Engages Your Audience: High-quality content encourages likes, comments, and shares, increasing your reach and visibility.

How to Do It:

  • Post industry-relevant articles, how-to guides, and thought leadership pieces regularly.
  • Use LinkedIn’s Publishing Platform to write longer articles or blog posts directly on LinkedIn, showcasing your expertise to a broader audience.

5. Network with Decision-Makers

LinkedIn’s advanced search filters allow you to find and connect with decision-makers at specific companies, industries, or locations. Building relationships with these individuals can open doors to new business opportunities.Why It’s Important:

  • Drives Business Opportunities: Connecting with decision-makers increases your chances of securing partnerships, clients, or job offers.
  • Expands Your Network: The more relevant connections you make, the more opportunities you’ll have to grow your network and business.

How to Do It:

  • Use LinkedIn’s advanced search to filter for professionals by job title, company, or industry.
  • Send personalized connection requests and follow up with a message introducing yourself and explaining how you can help.

6. Post Consistently

Consistency is key when marketing on LinkedIn. Posting regularly keeps you top of mind with your connections and increases the chances that your content will be seen by more people.Why It’s Important:

  • Builds Visibility: Regular posting ensures that your profile and content remain visible in your connections’ feeds.
  • Increases Engagement: The more often you post, the more opportunities you have to engage with your audience and grow your influence.

How to Do It:

  • Aim to post at least once or twice a week, sharing a mix of content such as articles, videos, and company updates.
  • Use LinkedIn’s Analytics to track which posts perform best and adjust your strategy accordingly.

Final Thoughts

LinkedIn is a powerful platform for building professional relationships, promoting your brand, and generating leads. By optimizing your profile, sharing high-quality content, and engaging with your network through groups and ads, you can leverage LinkedIn’s full potential to enhance your marketing strategy. Consistency and authenticity are key—focus on adding value to your network, and the results will follow.

Content Creation / Curation: Find the Sweet Spot [Guest Infographic]

content creation

content curation

content marketing

infographics

online marketing

SlideGenius

Dec 03, 2015

Have you ever met someone who only ever talks about their own interests, qualities and successes without showing any concern whatsoever for your input?It’s not always the most engaging conversation for both parties, and by the end of it you’ll likely think of them as a self-centered and arrogant individual whom you would do anything in your power to avoid.The same idea applies to businesses that use overly self-promotional advertisements, or create content that points all fingers back in their direction.You don’t want to be stuck with absolutely no chance of being seen either.The trick is to find a balance between how much of your content should be curated, and how much should actually be original content.First, let’s get a better understanding of the difference between content creation and content curation.

Content Creation

According to Curata, content creation refers to “… the original creator of the content, either the author, illustrator, researcher or whomever is the original source.”Content creation is necessary for influencers and marketers to position themselves as thought leaders within a particular area of marketing.However, content creation can be extremely time-consuming, and crafting content that stands out requires a lot of research.

Content Curation

Content curation is similar to content aggregation (i.e. collecting a bunch of articles or references on a particular subject), except that this content is handpicked by the author.This is a great way to take existing ideas and either provide an opinion on them or simply provide your audience with a selection of refined resources that you recommend.So how do you find the sweet spot of content curation and creation?Convince and Convert did some great research on how well an article performs based on where your outbound links lead to, and how frequently you should lead to your own work.The following infographic by Venngage visually summarizes just how you can find the content curation and creation sweet spot.content curation infographic

This infographic was made with the Infographic maker Venngage.

Helpful Infographics for Your Online Marketing Plan

infographics

online marketing

visuals

Oct 09, 2014

Anytime you browse through different social media channels, you probably always come across graphics that detail facts you probably never knew before. These images usually have cute and eye-catching drawings or designs. As we mentioned in the past, infographics are a growing trend. They offer an element of fun while conveying key facts and data. A good infographic can condense useful stats and information without overwhelming viewers.To illustrate how effective they really are, we looked around the Internet to find some infographics that can help your online marketing strategy. Here are 5 that we think are particularly well-designed and informative:

How to Sell Without Selling

This infographic by Stride shares details and statistics you’ll need to improve your online marketing strategy. As its title suggests, it offers useful information on how to connect with consumers that are looking to be engaged, rather than to hear sales talk.by Stride via Daily Infographic

20 Captivating Marketing Statistics

Here’s another set of enlightening data for entrepreneurs. These statistics were gathered by WebDAM.WebDAM via BufferApp

A Well-Balanced Blog 

In this infographic, LinkedIn breaks down the different components you need for a successful blog.LinkedIn Marketing Solutions via HubSpot

Email Cheatsheet

Email marketing is one of the best ways to engage with your target audience. As Marketo points out in this infographic, a majority of consumers prefer receiving marketing communications through their inbox. Don’t waste a good opportunity by keeping in mind some useful tips they offer.Marketo via BufferApp

It’s All About the Images 

We all know how powerful visuals can be. In fact, an image can make a huge difference in how your content is perceived and received by consumers. In this infographic, MDG Advertising offers great advice on how you can get the most mileage from your image-based content.MDG Advertising via JeffBullas.com

The Ridiculously Exhaustive Social Media Design Blueprint 

And since images are important to online marketing, Tent Social created a cheat sheet to tell you the perfect dimensions to use when sharing pictures in different social media platform:Tent Social via BufferApp

Email Marketing Tips: The Art of Pitching through the Inbox

email marketing

marketing presentations

marketing tips

online marketing

Sep 15, 2014

It may seem old-fashioned, but email marketing is far from becoming obsolete. While social media channels are helpful for reaching out to prospects, there’s no reason to discount the power of an email. Unlike other methods, email marketing allows you to deliver content directly to a space that’s personally curated by your prospects.As blogger and entrepreneur Jen Fitzgerald points out, “your audience is giving you permission to be in their email inbox – that’s a pretty giant leap in the sales process.”Make sure you won’t let a great opportunity go to waste by following these 10 essential email marketing tips:

1. Give prospects a reason to subscribe to your mailing list

How can you convert a casual blog reader into someone who’s genuinely interested in what you have to say? Promise them access to things they might not find by simply browsing your website or social media profiles. Use your emails as an avenue to promote special deals like discount coupons or downloadable resource materials. You can also provide access to insider information like product updates and industry news.

2. Always come up with a compelling and descriptive subject line

Crafting a clever subject line is crucial to email marketing. According to Copyblogger, making use of “power words” can help create an immediate connection. Clever gimmicks will urge your readers to open your message, but avoid click-baiting techniques. A good subject line is able to describe what the audience will see once they click through the link.

3. Keep content brief and straight to the point

Your subscribers will come across your email while they check their inbox for something else. Most likely, they’re probably corresponding with business contacts and thought to spare a brief moment to check out your content. Because of this, it won’t do you any good if your email is too long. Like you would when writing a speech, keep your emails brief by focusing only on key points.

4. Incorporate great visuals

Email marketing is similar to presentations, except that you have to deliver content directly to a prospect’s inbox. Aside from writing brief and compelling copies, you’ll also need eye-catching visuals. Make use of high-quality images to illustrate your emails.

5. Make it personal

Email marketing allows for a direct line of communication between you and your prospects. Try approaching your readers with a more personal touch. You can make use of software like HubSpot Email to personalize your content and organize your subscribers according to lists.

6. Be mindful of how spam rules work

No one wants to be bothered by a flood of unsolicited emails. To make sure your emails don’t get marked as spam, read up on the CAN-SPAM Act and be mindful of what you send out. You should also avoid typing subject lines in capital letters or using trigger words in excess.

7. Double, triple check before hitting “send”

This might seem obvious, but it bears repeating: always re-read your emails before hitting “send.” Check for spelling or grammatical errors you might have missed while writing your content. Make necessary adjustments. Trim out repetitive sentences or add some more details. If you can, try to get another set of eyes to check your work.

8. Make sure you email is optimized for mobile

A growing majority prefer to read emails using a mobile device. And according to statistics gathered by Return Path, 63% of Americans will quickly disregard a message when it’s not optimized to be viewed on their smartphones. Email marketing tools like MailChimp can help you create messages that read well on a variety of devices.

9. Integrate social media sharing

Reach a wider audience by allowing your subscribers to share your content through various social media channels. Provide share buttons and include links to your own profiles.

10. Track your stats to improve your strategy

If you’re making use of email marketing software like the ones mentioned above, you can get reports and updates on how your campaign is faring. Take note of the different statistics provided to you use it to your advantage.–It’s important to communicate your message to prospects clearly and effectively. Email marketing is just one of the ways you can share compelling content. Other techniques include delivering a presentation using a PowerPoint deck.

References:

“37 Tips for Writing Emails That Get Opened, Read, and Clicked.” Copyblogger. 2013. Accessed September 15, 2014.”CAN-SPAM Act: A Compliance Guide for Business.” Federal Trade Commission. Accessed September 15, 2014.Fitzgerald, Jennifer. “Guest Blog: How to Target Different Personality Types.” The Client Angel. Accessed September 15, 2014.White, Chad. “Click-Baiting: Frowned upon by Facebook and in Email Subject Lines.” Salesforce Marketing Cloud Blog. 2014. Accessed September 15, 2014.Featured Image: Wilson Alfonso via Flickr