7 Tips for Effective B2B Marketing on LinkedIn

As the #1 social network for lead generation, LinkedIn is a powerful tool that can kick your B2B marketing strategy into high gear. It can be leveraged to position your brand as a thought leader, drive website traffic, build your professional network and attract top talent.

Of its more than 500-million member base, 61 million LinkedIn users are senior-level influencers and 40 million drive decision making for their businesses. In fact, LinkedIn is the first place B2B buyers go to find valuable content—making it the best platform for brands to influence their purchasing decisions.

Still not convinced?

LinkedIn drives more than half of all social traffic to B2B websites. Of all B2B leads that come from social media, 80% – or 4 out of every 5 leads – are produced by LinkedIn. By comparison, all other social networks combined make up less than 20%. On top of that, a recent HubSpot study revealed that LinkedIn generates 3x more conversions than Twitter and Facebook.

Although LinkedIn can be an invaluable resource for B2B marketing, there are several best practices that brands should implement in order to get the most out of this popular social platform:

Optimize Your LinkedIn Page

Your company page is the central hub for your brand’s presence on LinkedIn. It’s where visitors will go to learn more about your business. That’s why it’s important for brands to take the time to create a company page that will engage their audiences.

When optimizing your company’s LinkedIn page, it’s recommended that you follow these steps for best results:

• Draft a compelling overview that clearly describes your business and contains relevant keywords
• Update your profile and banner images (don’t forget to include your logo!)
• Fill out other key fields, such as URL, address, industry and company size
• Add a call-to-action button that directs visitors to your website or prompts another specific action
• Incorporate on-brand visuals, such as images, videos or infographics
• Add job postings to help drive recruitment efforts

It’s also worth noting that, because of the more “serious” nature of the B2B space, many businesses often believe they need to maintain an entirely matter-of-fact, professional front on their LinkedIn pages. However, social networks like LinkedIn present the perfect opportunity to humanize your brand—so, don’t be afraid to let your company’s personality and work culture shine!

Publish Valuable, Engaging Content

In today’s ever-evolving social landscape, it’s not enough to simply be on social media—your brand needs to build an active presence by publishing fresh, valuable and engaging content on a consistent basis. Ideally, you should aim to post 1-2 times per week.

When coming up with content ideas, keep in mind the main purpose should be to help your audience. For instance, your posts could:

• Explore hot industry news
• Address your audience’s common pain points
• Share the highlights of key industry events

LinkedIn, in particular, is the perfect platform for establishing thought leadership. As trends and issues emerge in your industry, use this as an opportunity to offer a unique perspective. Over time, your audience will look to your brand for fresh insights.

Along with posting updates or articles, your brand should be regularly sharing curated content from other influencers in your industry. Just be sure to tag the person or brand in your post! This not only gives your content more exposure—it helps nurture connections with other industry experts and, in turn, builds your own credibility.

Whatever your content mix, aim to post in the early morning, at lunchtime or in the early evening, as this is when you are likely to see the best results on LinkedIn.

Incorporate Visuals

It’s no secret that people are drawn to visually appealing content. So, it makes sense that visual content, particularly images, receives more likes and shares on social media.

In fact, social posts that include images drive 650% higher engagement than their text-only counterparts. On top of that, content with images generate 94% more views and 98% more comments.

And there’s a good reason why—incorporating visual content such as images, charts and infographics into your social posts makes it easier for your audience to digest and retain the information. In fact, information presented in visual form is retained 6x better than information that is read or heard.

Create Videos

Another form of visual content that has taken B2B marketing by storm in recent years is video marketing. In fact, video is projected to account for 78% of all online traffic by 2021, according to a recent Cisco Visual Networking Index study.

On LinkedIn, in particular, there are so many ways to incorporate video into your B2B marketing strategy:

• Telling your brand’s story
• Addressing frequently asked questions
• Sharing customer testimonials
• Showcasing your products and services
• Interviewing an industry leader

And it’s no wonder why it’s an increasingly popular marketing tactic on LinkedIn—59% of senior executives prefer video over text when consuming their content. On top of that, brands that use video marketing drive 27% higher click-through rates, generate 34% more conversions and grow their revenue 49% faster.

Get Your Employees Involved

Your employees are one of your best resources—and it’s no different when it comes to social media marketing, particularly on platforms like LinkedIn. Encourage your employees to connect with your company page. This will give your brand access to their social networks, meaning that your reach will continue to grow with every new connection.

But don’t just stop there.

Invite employees to list their positions within your company on their profiles. This will add a link back to your company page. In addition, team members can create or share relevant content—helping to promote your company and showcase the faces behind your brand.

Leverage LinkedIn Ads

LinkedIn ads are a great way to expand the reach of your content and get it in front of B2B buyers—ultimately drawing attention back to your brand. An effective tool, ads can be used to help achieve business goals, whether that’s generating leads, building brand awareness or even driving event registration.

There are a few options for paid advertising on LinkedIn, depending on your needs:

• Sponsored Content – This allows your brand to amplify its most engaging content by running native ads in the LinkedIn feed that are targeted to your audience.
• Text Ads – Created on a pay-per-click (PPC) advertising platform, these ads consist of a compelling headline, brief description and 50×50 image. They can appear in a number of places, such as the LinkedIn homepage, profile pages or search results.
• Sponsored In-Mail – Similar to email marketing, this option allows your brand to send customized ads straight to your target audience’s LinkedIn inbox. It only delivers messages to active members, which helps to drives higher conversion rates.

LinkedIn ads can even be targeted to your specific audience by selecting options such as job title, function, company, industry and more. In addition, you can set a budget that suits your needs and stop the ads at any time.

Keep Tabs on Your Analytics

At the top of your company page, you will find a nifty little Analytics tab. This powerful tool will allow you to monitor your social metrics in order to continually improve your LinkedIn strategy for optimal results.

There are several types of key metrics that should be on your radar:

• Visitors – This allows you to track how many people are visiting your company page and the number of page views.
• Engagement – This shows how your audience is engaging with your content—from clicks and likes, to comments and shares.
• Follower Demographics – This data provides insight into the demographics of your follower base, which can be used to cater your content to that specific audience.

Keeping an eye on your analytics will allow your brand to see how your content is performing—ultimately providing valuable insight into which types of posts will be most popular and what steps you can take to further improve your LinkedIn strategy.