How to Post Shareable Content on LinkedIn

Why: Consistently posting content helps position you as a thought leader and provides valuable insights and information to your clients, prospects and partners. Research is an integral part of the buy cycle, with the average consumer viewing more than 11.4 pieces of content prior to making a purchase.[i]

How:

1. Go to the home page on your LinkedIn account (First page that will pop up when you log in).
2. Understand your options: You can share an update, upload a photo or publish a post. You want to reach as many people as you can with your posts; note that LinkedIn’s busiest times are morning to midday during the week.[ii]
3. Ask yourself, “What am I hoping to achieve?” Are you trying to bring individuals to your LinkedIn page? Increase awareness for your company? Are you interested in search engine optimization (SEO—Showing near the top in Google) traction? Know what your objectives are and develop a content plan to meet these objectives.
4. Ensure updates are relevant to your connections. What’s happening within your company or industry right now? Post compelling content that is relevant and shareable to your consumers.
5. Have call to action with each post, include a compelling image, engage consumers with questions and do this on a consistent and frequent basis.
6. Share the love! Share industry news, thought leader content and other relevant stories so it’s not “all about you.” Selecting other insightful articles and summarizing the content for your readers is just as important as writing original content.

Pro Tips:

• According to LinkedIn, a company’s updates that include links can have up to 45% higher follower engagement than updates without links.[i]
• Social Media Management Software like Hootsuite, Sprinklr, Spredfast, etc. makes it easy to manage your updates.
• Longer posts, those over 800 words, seem to perform well on LinkedIn.
• Use images whenever possible. On average, pages with images or videos draw 94% more views.[ii]
  • Visuals are processed 60,000x faster than text.[iii]
  • 90% of information transferred to the brain is visual.[iv]
  • 65% of the entire population are visual learners.[v]

• Many companies use Showcase Pages on LinkedIn, which allow you to create distinct platforms for the various aspects of your business, each with its own messaging to share with a target audience.

According to LinkedIn, the 5 steps to engaging followers are:

1. Establish your presence
2. Attract followers
3. Engage followers
4. Amplify through the network
5. Analyze and refine

Consistently posting value-added content will increase your credibility as a reliable source on LinkedIn; your post could be featured in the main LinkedIn newsfeed, which can result in millions of views.

There is a lot of confusion between Pulse, Posts and Publisher. They are all related, but slightly different. Here’s a breakdown by Viveka von Rosen:

• Posts are long-form blog-like articles that YOU write on LinkedIn.
• Publisher is the feature where you write and share YOUR posts.
• Pulse is the newsreader where Influencer and some member’s posts can be seen and read.

[i] LinkedIn. “The Sophisticated Guide to Marketing on LinkedIn.” Sophisticated Guide for Marketing. 2016. Accessed June 28, 2016. https://business.linkedin.com/marketing-solutions/c/14/1/sophisticated-guide-for-marketing

[ii] Bullas, Jeff. “6 Powerful Reasons Why You Should Include Images in Your Marketing – Infographic.” Jeffbullas.com. 2012. Accessed June 29, 2016. http://www.jeffbullas.com/2012/05/28/6-powerful-reasons-why-you-should-include-images-in-your-marketing-infographic/

[iii] NeoMam Studios. “Why Do Infographics Make Great Marketing Tools.” NeoMam Studios. 2012. Accessed June 29, 2016. http://neomam.com/blog/infographics-make-great-marketing-tools/

[iv] NeoMam Studios. “Why Do Infographics Make Great Marketing Tools.” NeoMam Studios. 2012. Accessed June 29, 2016. http://neomam.com/blog/infographics-make-great-marketing-tools/

 [v] NeoMam Studios. “Why Do Infographics Make Great Marketing Tools.” NeoMam Studios. 2012. Accessed June 29, 2016. http://neomam.com/blog/infographics-make-great-marketing-tools/

[i] Gross, Jenna. Forbes. May 6, 2016. Accessed June 30, 2016. http://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2016/05/06/social-selling-101-five-hacks-to-connect-with-customers-and-grow-your-business/#5507e3d21243

[ii] LinkedIn. “The Sophisticated Guide to Marketing on LinkedIn.” Sophisticated Guide for Marketing. 2016. Accessed June 28, 2016. https://business.linkedin.com/marketing-solutions/c/14/1/sophisticated-guide-for-marketing