LinkedIn is THE professional network, currently boasting more than810 million users around the world. It’s a powerful platform – and one which is being recognised by an increasing number of companies and employees as integral to business networking.
More people are becoming active users of the professional network, and utilising its reach to promote themselves, their companies, their products and their services. Promoting your business blog on LinkedIn to your connections and wider network makes sense.
Whether you publish a blog connected with your business, or blogging is an important feature of your business, promoting your blog on LinkedIn can:
- provide new opportunities to build your professional presence online
- further enhance your position as an industry expert
- drive more traffic and targeted readers to your blog and website
- help initiate conversations and engagement with other professionals
So how does one go about promoting their business blog on LinkedIn? It can be as simple as set-and-forget – but you’ll want to consider all of your options for optimum engagement.
Link from your professional profile
This goes without saying, but in case you’ve been so busy blogging you’ve missed the obvious (and I don’t judge – I’d neglected to add links to my own profile until I started writing this post!), add a link to your blog from your LinkedIn profile.
You can add up to three website and blog links under the Contact Info section of your profile – and while this area is often minimised, it is a place new connections will check for more information about you.
Link from your company page
If you own a business or manage the social links for your company, ensure you have a company page set up on LinkedIn.
You can link to your business blog from your company page information, and post updates to your company followers in exactly the same way you post updates fro your professional profile.
Post an update
As soon as you publish a post on your business blog, copy the link to that new post and paste in into the Share an update box on LinkedIn’s homepage.
The link will prompt a preview of your new content to be added under the text box. Edit the preview text if need be, add a teaser line in your update field, and post – either to the entire LinkedIn network, or only your connections.
If you have every intention of sharing your business blog content with your LinkedIn network, but find yourself forgetting to actually do it, there’s an application that can automate the process for you (naturally).
LinkedIn’s WordPress App syncs your WP business blog posts with your LinkedIn profile, allowing you to set and forget LinkedIn post shares.
LinkedIn groups are incredibly active, so join a few existing groups related to your business and area of expertise, or establish a new group, and share relevant posts from your business blog with group members.
Engage with your connections
LinkedIn isn’t just a static space to showcase your employment background. It’s a professional network… so get networking!
Take a few moments to glance over your LinkedIn newsfeed and see what your connections are talking about. If they have a question you think one of your business blog posts answers, include a friendly reply with a link to your content.
If they’re sharing information or news stories on a specific area of interest and you’ve written a blog post that could genuinely add some value to the discussion, join the conversation and link to your content.
Yes, LinkedIn is a platform for professionals, but like any other social network, the key to greater engagement and building a following is making genuine connections with people, sharing your content, and adding value.
