3 Golden Rules For Using LinkedIn For B2B Marketing

If you are using or planning to use LinkedIn to drive your B2B marketing and awareness (and you really should be!), there are some basic rules that you need to follow. We’ve outlined them here so you can get more from the channel.

Rule Number 1: Be a thought leader

When advertising on your business page it’s important not to have the whole page riddled with how amazing your product or service is. What there needs to be is, that all-important buzz-phrase, “thought leadership”.

Your page should have important industry news, advice, interesting articles. Things people want to follow you for, and an insight into how you’re up to date and doing so well. All of this, speckled with product information and what you have coming in the future.

In doing this, you create an effective content strategy for your business’ followers who will not only appreciate some valuable content, placing you at the forefront of their mind, but will also bring new followers and potential customers. All from a platform that allows you to interact with people in a direct and prospect-centric way.

If you’re interested in finding out how to improve your thought leadership, take a look at our whitepaper.

Rule Number 2: Post at the right time

Remember to think about when and how often you're posting your content. According to findings, the best days to post content on LinkedIn are between Tuesday and Thursday, either early in the morning, lunchtime, or early evening with an additional bonus sweet spot between 10am and 11am on Tuesday.

This actually makes a lot of sense considering the type of platform LinkedIn is. When you’re trying to engage a professional audience, you need to keep your working week and working hours in mind. Also, people are going to engage with content when they have the most time. With people trying to catch up on work and meetings on Monday you’re going to see a drop in engagement rates. And on Friday people are ready to go home and start the weekend.

There are still reasons to post on Monday and Friday though, especially when you’re aiming to vary the mix of content that you share, in order to drive ongoing engagement throughout the week.

For example, on a Friday you might not get the highest engagement rates, but it’s a great time to release light-hearted, accessible content to prepare people for the weekend and help them power down.

On the other hand, Monday could be a good time to release inspirational and focus lead content that helps people solve problems and tackle challenges in the week ahead.

Rule Number 3: Utilise your employees

Something a lot of business’ forget about when it comes to LinkedIn is the support of their employees.

Studies have shown that your average employee has up to ten times the followers of your average B2B social page and even though only 3% of employees re-share content from their business, they’re responsible for a 32% increase in the engagement of that content.

If just 3% can produce that kind of impact, imagine if 25%—or even 75%—of your employees shared what you sent them. It sounds like a pipe dream, but it’s possible with the right combination of pushes and incentives.

Your business has to create the kind of environment that encourages social sharing by posting goals and values regularly, providing a bit of social media training and guidelines, and always remembering to recognise and reward those who always post.

If you need more info or help on increasing your activity on LinkedIn and the best hints and tips for business’ on the platform take a look at our LinkedIn guide.

Jonathan Burns

Written by Jonathan Burns