LinkedIn remains one of the most effective outreach channels for B2B selling (and we would know, as it’s still a huge part of our own ABM strategy!). When selling on LinkedIn, every little detail matters — who are you reaching out to? What’s your approach? Is the timing right?
Your LinkedIn profile is the biggest piece of the puzzle. People want to know who is speaking to them — and your profile is your business card, but better.
According to our own internal research, well-developed, engaging profiles get 54% more engagement and positive responses from cold outreach on LinkedIn, than new or empty profile pages.
Based on the 100+ LinkedIn campaigns we’ve done over the past year, we’ve combined our insider knowledge to help you optimise your LinkedIn profile to sell.
This is the first advice in any profile building guides, but only because it’s really true! Your photo is the first thing people will look at (second is your name and job title), so you have to make a good impression.
Strive to make a human connection through your photo — choose a picture that shows that you are approachable, fun and friendly. Depending on the impression you want to give, you can choose a type of photo — a professional headshot or a selfie, but we’ve noticed that a friendly smile goes a long way.
LinkedIn photo checklist:
It’s all part of the visual appeal of your profile! The background picture lays directly behind your photo, so use this to your advantage — choose matching colours and patterns.
A nice professionally looking banner with the slogan of your company will go a long way to quickly let your prospect know your area of expertise.
Your headline is the space right under your name — by default LinkedIn’s got it as “[Job title] at [Company]”. Don’t settle for the default — make it unique and relevant to your potential audience.
HubSpot proposes this formula:
[Job title], helping [Companies] do X
Which is a great way to show the kind of partnership you are looking for and summarise your USP in one sentence.
However, try to avoid buzzwords. We’ve seen too many profiles with words like ‘specialised’, ‘leadership’, ‘focused’, ‘strategic’, ‘experienced’, ‘passionate’, ‘expert’, ‘creative’, ‘innovative’ and ‘certified’ in the headlines — so now it’s really hard to say who really is all those things.
Show don’t tell works for self-brand marketing too, so use action words and clear concepts.
Your summary is a place where prospects come to briefly learn about what kind of person you are. And when we say briefly, we mean it — they usually don’t spend more than 5 seconds looking through your bio, so no need to write War and Peace.
Make it short, snappy and scannable. Let your prospects know in a couple of paragraphs what kind of person they are talking with and what to expect from future cooperation.
If the photo is your look, the summary is your voice, so make sure it matches the impression you want to give off.
If you are struggling with writing a good bio, LinkedIn has compiled a list of great story-like examples.
LinkedIn will not let you go until you add your current role and past work experience — that’s true.
But make sure your current company is listed right on top of your profile.
If you wish, you can also include your education in the second row — use it if yours is a well-known school. The more ways you can relate to your prospects, the better!
It’s a good practice to fill out attractive benefits and achievements in your current job description.
For example:
These will give your potential clients a clear idea of what kind of results they can expect by working with you.
Profiles with a larger connection pool get more trust — and that’s a fact. Professionals with “500+ connections” written under their names are perceived as knowledgeable, trustworthy potential partners.
How do you build a following? That’s simple — start with your desired audience. The UMG team have been building profiles and connections with relevant audiences for a while now — contact us if you want to to grow your network of potential leads.
Once you’ve gained your following and connections, it’s time to offer them some value.
Before starting any kind of direct outreach, it’s important to gain your audience’s trust.
The best way to do that is to share valuable, free info on your feed.
A company blog post, a relevant industry article or the news — all these are great examples to share with your audience.
Nurture your leads with free material first, and watch how the responses to your direct marketing will flow!
Here at the UMG we do profile optimisation as part of our overall ABM strategy.
If you want to optimise your LinkedIn profile for maximum lead results, talk to our team!
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