by Alfie Lambert
For small and medium-sized businesses, LinkedIn can be a gold mine. The world's largest professional network is full of useful data, great content and incredible people. Whether you're looking for your next job, looking for new customers, or just wanting to improve your brand image, LinkedIn has the tools to help you get there.
If you're a regular LinkedIn user, you know the importance of having a polished profile that includes updated information, SEO-related headings and descriptions, and an updated profile picture. However, few companies do the same for their business profiles.
This is myopic. Let's get back to some of the reasons LinkedIn is so useful: hiring, prospecting, branding. A well-presented business profile is important for each of them. It's not good for your brand if potential customers and employees end up on a neglected, hastily thrown together company profile.
Fortunately, you can see great improvements with little effort. The real key is to think about your company page in the same way you think about a landing page. Every inch of space is important, and you want to be well presented and informative while remaining concise.
You don't have much time to get your point across, at least not at first. Think about how someone got to your page and how and why they stick with it. Your initial landing doesn't have to turn them off – this is where the first presentation is important – and then it's all about getting a copy and perceived value.
With that said, let's go to a better company page in three steps. By following these tips, you should have an All-Star Company Profile that will help your business stand out from the crowd.
The cover photo is the most overlooked area of company profiles on LinkedIn. Often times, companies don't bother to create one at all, which makes their site look lazy and unprofessional. And for many company pages that have images in them, they're “tired”, poorly sized, or just plain boring. This is criminal. You shouldn't be wasting top notch digital real estate like this one.
You don't have to be a designer to create a good picture. Use a free graphic creation tool like Adobe Spark or Canva (the former has preset sizes for most social media platforms), add your brand colors, fonts, and logo … and voila! If you really want to maximize storage space, consider adding additional text that you update regularly: product announcements, offers, updates. It's a huge chunk of free space (almost a third of the screen above the crease) – so use it!
If you're looking for inspiration, go to Google and search for "Great LinkedIn Company Page Cover Photos". Follow one of the many links. Remember, your image doesn't have to be worth an art gallery, it just needs to be clean and branded.
It's so easy to clog this space with a dry explanation of the company's history. Do not do that. You can find a potted history of your business in the "About Me" section of your website. You don't need them here. It won't keep anyone busy, at least not initially. Your company history can be useful to customers and prospects alike, but it's not the messaging you want to start with. Save this type of information for later when it is already connected.
My tip here is to speak directly to your target audience, get in touch with them, and possibly add a call to action if that's your goal ("Contact us for all of your X needs;") "Come on You and join the best corporate culture X Industry ”).
The original wording in your description is the most important. Initially, visitors will only see the first two lines of your description. Now that you've caught their attention with your cover photo, you'll need to get them covered with your first copy. Make them want to read more by giving them something to get upset about. If you have trouble finding those first two lines, think about how and why a visitor finds your page, then give them what they want.
It may seem like clichéd advice, but people often forget to put themselves in the shoes of their goals. If you landed on this page, looking for a job or evaluating a potential supplier, what would you read on?
Other items from AllBusiness.com:
LinkedIn Showcase Pages are additional pages that – you guessed it! – should show something. Whether it's a specific product or service, or an upcoming launch, Showcase Pages are a great way to frame an announcement. They also offer the opportunity to align your company with different goals. Instead of being tied to a single company page, you can create multiple showcases to display the depth and diversity of your company.
If LinkedIn is a platform you want to use for growth and prospecting, use these pages for B2B lead generation: create a showcase page that speaks directly to that audience and prepare it for them Conversion before. And here you can be really creative. For example, if you are a recruiter, the page could possibly be a case study for a candidate you have placed. Add some calls to action, maybe something like "Let us help you get there too!" When chasing investors, showcase your product like on a crowdfunding website. Remove anything that is not relevant to a conversion.
Tip: Keep the name of the Showcase page short as LinkedIn will cut off long names!
RELATED: 5 Ways To Use LinkedIn As A Powerful Marketing Tool For Your Business
Contribution by: Alfie Lambert
Alfie Lambert is a growth and branding expert based in London, England. After having worked for many years in the startup scene around London's Silicon Roundabout, his in-depth expertise lies in the areas of social media and automation tools.
Company: LIX
Website: www.lix-it.com
Connect with me on LinkedIn.
