HOW TO MAKE YOUR LINKEDIN PROFILE COUNT

We all know about the social networking phenomenon that is Facebook but when it comes to online business networking, LinkedIn is leading the way.
 
With nearly 120 million users globally, LinkedIn is presently the ultimate network for business professionals because it offers users (both individuals and firms) the chance to present themselves as competent, competitive and desirable commodities to a much vaster audience than could be dreamed of just a few years ago.

For the job seeker or employer (and those who just want to keep their options open), LinkedIn is like an online business card, resume, power mixer and digital handshake that can lead to valuable employment and commercial opportunities. And, though many see it as mainly a job seeker’s resource, it is also proving itself as an engine for business development by allowing you to connect to an ever expanding number of professional contacts.

TAKE A BUSINESS-LIKE APPROACH TO LINKEDIN

That’s why it’s a shame that so many otherwise skilled professionals make such a poor presentation of themselves or their firms through their LinkedIn profiles. You see, unlike Facebook and other forms of online social networking, LinkedIn is a much more sober place (imagine yourself in business professional attire while on LinkedIn) where you should be especially conscious of managing your professional brand. After all, LinkedIn at its heart is about building business opportunities, not about amassing scores of largely superficial “friends.”

Each day, millions of people comb through LinkedIn looking to connect with business peers and get answers to problems. These people could be potential clients, prospects, salespeople, recruiters or even that highly qualified employee you need to hire.

If they connect to your profile and find anything less than your professional best, you’ll be leaving them with a bad impression that you may never have another chance to fix. That’s why it’s wise to think of your LinkedIn profile as the digital equivalent of you attending a trade show, job fair or meeting with a client in a business setting. In each of those cases, you would strive to leave them with a positive impression that would win you new business, qualified employees or a good job.

DON'T MAKE THE BIGGEST LINKEDIN MISTAKE

Probably the biggest mistake made by LinkedIn users is the failure to create a compelling or even accurate profile. For starters, too many people open a LinkedIn account only to neglect doing the most basic things such as uploading a good picture, writing a strong, descriptive headline or filling out a relevant work history that highlights their main accomplishments and greatest professional strengths. They also fail to take advantage of some of LinkedIn’s most powerful features like obtaining referrals from other professionals that extol their virtues, products and services.

To be persuasive, a profile must be more than a bare bones page littered with a few rudimentary facts. To grab attention, you’ve also got to be interesting, using key words and well turned phrases that arouse curiosity and give others an incentive to check you out.

It should go without saying that your LinkedIn information be kept current. One of the biggest complaints is that profiles are not maintained in a timely way. If you want to hinder your success on LinkedIn, expired data will certainly accomplish that. The good news is that with a little bit of initial thought (followed by proper maintenance), your LinkedIn profile can be the powerful tool it was meant to be. Here are a few simple tips to help you make that happen.

• Full name, good photo – It may seem obvious, but include a first and last name along with a good picture. Simply putting “John D.” won’t cut it and neither will a haphazard, “shoot’em at dawn against a brick wall” smartphone mugshot. Remember, profiles with pictures get more views and you don’t want people checking out your LinkedIn page to guffaw at an embarrassing photo.

• Good headline – A good newspaper editor will tell you that it’s the headline that gets readers hooked. It’s the same on LinkedIn. Make your headline a strong one, usually something that incorporates your job description such as “CEO of Widgets, Inc.” Also, make sure your summary section is sharp and describes you or your firm’s abilities and client list. Use key words to help you stand out from the crowd.

• Concise history – List your most recent positions under your work history. Don’t go into nauseating historical detail and also avoid lists of clubs and organizations unless they clearly speak to your strengths and potential. Instead, emphasize your professional accomplishments with attention grabbing specifics like how you boosted 4th quarter sales by 35%.

• Get referrals – Without a doubt, this is one of the most attractive and powerful features of LinkedIn. Each contact can open the door to dozens more and requesting referrals from contacts is as easy as sending a message. If you can, try to get authentic referrals (actually composed by the referrer) rather than the built-in ones provided by LinkedIn; they’re much more powerful.

• Complete a company page – If this applies, create a page to promote your firm but remember that it must exude professionalism and polish. Using LinkedIn’s tools, be sure to include basic information about your company, post job openings (under careers), include your products and, under Admintools, you can even advertise your company via a LinkedIn ad campaign.

written by SCOTT WIGTON

WHAT YOUR E-MARKETING STRATEGY NEEDS & SIX TACTICS THAT WILL MOVE YOU TOWARD SUCCESS

Read previous article: GOOD E-MARKETING CAN TRANSFORM YOUR BUSINESS

 

Last month, we explored the importance of a comprehensive e-marketing strategy and outlined what the goals of such a strategy ought to be: namely, to increase sales, decrease costs, build your brand, increase value to customers and build relationships. This month, we look at a few tactics to help you execute on your strategy.

 

In marketing, as in war, a clear strategy with defined, measurable objectives is vital to any successful campaign. You will never achieve the ultimate potential of your business without one, and that’s why it’s wise to consult with experts when designing your strategy.

 

Yet even the best strategy is doomed unless it is well executed and the necessary resources are devoted to it. Would any competent general send his troops into battle without the tools and detailed plans to accomplish their objectives?

 

Those detailed battle (or business) plans are called tactics. Tactics are basically the executable details of a strategy that lead to accomplishing your overall objectives; in other words, they are the day-to-day implementation of specific e-marketing practices that, over time, lead to strategic success.

 

it’s important to remember that each tactic you use in your e-marketing is itself a mini-project that requires forethought in design, implementation and measurement

 

Care is also required in the daily oversight and management of each tactic to ensure it has the best chance for success.

 

So, what are a few tactics that often go into an e-marketing strategy? Among them are:

 

1. website — Without a doubt, establishing an effective website is the foundational tactic of any e-marketing strategy. In fact, it is hard to imagine mounting and sustaining such a strategy without a website. Because of its importance, a website, whether new or a redesign, deserves the utmost attention when it comes to design and reaching your target audience. Don’t skimp here. Websites are where many customers go these days both to make purchases and to confirm a decision to purchase products or services.
   
   
2. strong website articles/content — A website is next to worthless unless it is up to date and remains relevant to your customers. Old information or uninspiring content will send your customers or clients looking elsewhere. Content is king, so keep it fresh and relevant. Informative articles are a good way to attract attention from surfers searching for information in your field, and they offer you the chance to prove your expertise and tout your services.
   
   
3. email/e-blasts/e-newsletter — These can be good tactics for keeping your customers informed and equipped with “actionable” or simply interesting information. Opt-in email can help to connect your customer to your brand and thereby build sales opportunities. One caveat, however, with these types of communications is to make sure your information is not too self-congratulatory or self-serving. Instead, always offer something valuable. Also, make sure it’s easy for people to “opt-out” of your e-epistles, or you risk running them off by flooding their inbox with unwanted messages.
   
   
4. webinars — Are you an expert? Perhaps you can enlighten your audience through a webinar (an Internet based seminar), which are becoming a popular alternative to attending conferences in person. They're relatively cheap and convenient and help establish you as an accepted authority in your field or business. And, nothing connects customers to your brand like YOU. If they can see and hear you, you’ve got a good opportunity to make them believe in your business through your personal credibility.
   
   
5. social media/blogging — Being so new, this tactic has yet to fully prove itself, but it should still be part of comprehensive e-marketing strategy. Jumping into social media to promote your business and raise awareness is cheap and uncomplicated, but requires effort to remain engaged and relevant. Blogging is a great way to remain relevant, but it requires constant updating and with the Blogosphere so crowded, it can be tricky to garner attention and repeat traffic.
   
   
6. search engine optimization — This tactic goes hand in hand with your website and should be included in the design process. SEO basically raises the “visibility” of your website by increasing the likelihood that your site will pop up high in the rankings when someone initiates a search using engines such as Google, Yahoo, Bing, Ask.com or others. The aim of SEO, which relies heavily on carefully selected keywords embedded in your website, is to increase traffic to your website.

 

These are a few of the important tactics within an e-marketing strategy. Chances are you already are employing some of them depending on your needs and audience. However, it is important to remember that your tactics must be flexible, measurable, and changeable. Part of e-marketing is risk management and the honest assessment of outcomes. If a tactic isn’t getting you closer to fulfilling your e-marketing strategy, it’s time to reassess.

written by Scott Wigton

Time To Hit The Dance Floor

Don’t Be Shy When it Comes to Social Media

Five years ago, tweeting was something only birds did and the words “face” and “book” didn’t go together unless you fell asleep reading a particularly dull tome. Today, these words have taken on new and powerful meanings as social media platforms exert an ever-growing influence on the way business is done.

Remember your first high school dance? There were those who stood along the wall, desperately trying to summon up the courage to cut a rug. Then there were the ones who hit the dance floor without a second thought about boogying the night away.

Today’s social media environment, at least from a marketing perspective, is not too different from this classic scenario. On the one hand, you’ve got some companies that already are gung-ho about social media, jumping headlong into the latest developments. On the other hand, there are those that are the equivalent of cyber wallflowers. They remain uncertain, and even skeptical of the value social media offers.

But Does It Work?

The big question on everyone’s mind is: Does social media participation lead to more business? Some argue yes, but there are no hard numbers yet to corroborate a growing chorus of anecdotal claims. One thing, however, cannot be denied — the huge phenomenon that social media has become. Over the last five years, various social media platforms have lured half a billion people into this brave new world.

What does this mean for companies that already have donned their social media dancing shoes? At the very least, it means they enjoy increased exposure to a customer-rich environment at a very low cost (If you’ve got an Internet connection and a handful of hours to spare each week for maintenance and updates, you’re pretty much looking at your overhead). And, by making a strategic commitment to social media involvement, they could be increasing their actual business volume.Chances are high that your existing customers, and potential ones, are engaged in some form of social media. This translates into new channels through which you can communicate with them. Social media also can offer you priceless insight (business intelligence) into your customers’ tastes, attitudes and behaviors, keep you up to date on trends, provide you with a venue to offer solutions and answer concerns, and allow you to build networks of friends and associates.

Define Your Goals

First, however, you’ll need to devise a social media strategy. Think about business sound reasons for participating in Facebook, or LinkedIn, for example, and the kind of exposure you and your brand can expect through those platforms. Most importantly, think about what it is you want to achieve. What are your main goals? Simple awareness? Building customer/client networks? Responding to customer concerns and feedback (reputation management)? Steering eyeballs to your website, blog or bricks and mortar location? Answering these questions will help you focus your social media participation in the most effective way and keep you from wasting time with platforms that don’t suit your aims.

So, if you’re willing to get on the dance floor, where do you start? The following are relatively quick, inexpensive and effective ways to get your social media efforts up and running. But don’t feel obliged to do all of them. Remember to shape your efforts around your time, objectives and audience.

Blogs — Technorati.com, a blog tracking service, has indexed 133 million blogs since 2002. An estimated 70,000 new ones are created each day. You may have hundreds or thousands of blogs in your own community. The problem is finding ones that are active and relevant to you and your business. Once you come across one that fits, begin to participate.Make sure, however, that your contributions are relevant and remember that you are participating in a conversation, not a sales pitch. It is bad form to show up on someone else’s blog and start advertising. Create a list of blogs and monitor them for references to your products and services.  Even better, start your blog, using a service such as www.typepad.com or www.blogger.com.

Through your blog, you can share updated information with your customers and provide them with a forum for feedback. A blog will also allow you to perform reputation management when necessary, responding to false or uninformed claims about your business. Sure, the number of blogs is mind boggling, but, according to Universal McCann research, 73% of online users read blogs. Yours could be one of them. Above all, the key to a successful blog is regularly updating content — and not just any content, but interesting, relevant stuff that keeps people coming back for more!

Facebook – Facebook has truly become a phenomenon. Just three years ago, it was a little known network for college students. Today, Facebook has the world at its feet with nearly 300 million users. Women are the fastest growing group of users, and nearly half of U.S. Facebook users are 26 years or older. Facebook has a more relaxed, conversational format than other platforms, and while primarily social in nature, it does offer easy-to-create fan pages. You can create a fan page for your business, allowing other users to promote it to their own network of Facebook friends. It is important to keep your fan page content fresh and to provide updates that keep people interested. To set up a profile for your business on Facebook, click here.

LinkedIn – This is a more business professional form of social media, connecting more than 35 million businesspeople from around the globe. Although used by some as a place to post a glorified online resume, LinkedIn is actually much more, offering participants the chance to interact with and learn from business professionals in their respective market sectors or industries. It may also help you to network with vendors and consultants who can build your business.

Twitter – As of this writing, Twitter users have “tweeted” more than 5.7 billion times. That number should be well over 6 billion in just a few days time. What is a tweet? It’s a simple 140 character message you can send to a group of friends via your cell phone, computer, instant message or other application. Basically, it’s you telling your friends what you’re doing. So what could be the business application of such a platform? Basically, it gives you a presence in a very large and active community. By building a following (be sure to add as many “friends” as you can), you can give them updates on your activities and point them to other content rich resources that promote your business, such as your own blog.

While social media marketing may seem like a dubious endeavor to some, it is far simpler and less costly than you might imagine. Remember, it’s about initiating relationships, strengthening existing connections and increasing awareness of your brand. With a little courage  — and the commitment to be active, timely, and relevant — you’ll be surprised how quickly you learn the steps to the social media samba.

written by Scott Wigton

Ahead of the Curve — or Treading Water?

At T.MOSS when we troll the waters of social and technological change it’s to make sure we’re keeping our friends informed of significant tidal shifts. Thanks for paddling with us.

Sometimes we note an undercurrent — a change in process, usage or style that draws our attention. A case in point –

You say tomato, I say tomahto

When we first started writing about “the Web”, there wasn’t a hard and fast rule for using the term “website.” We researched it, and based on usage common among leading publications, dictionaries and style manuals, we made an informed decision on the standard T.MOSS would follow. We decided to use Web site. That was then.

Well, we’ve taken another look around and now find that usage is trending toward website. Here’s what we’ve discovered. According to Dictionary.com:

“The transition from World Wide Web site to Web site to website as a single uncapitalized word mirrors the development of other technological expressions which have tended to take unhyphenated forms as they become more familiar. Thus email is gaining ground over the forms E-mail and e-mail, especially in texts that are more technologically oriented. Similarly, there is an increasing preference for closed forms like homepage, online, and printout.”

Further, though they do acknowledge “Web site” and “web site” as alternatives; American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Webster’s New World CollegeDictionary, Compact Oxford English Dictionary and Cambridge Advanced Learners Dictionary list “website” as the preferred spelling — just to name a few sources. Britannica Online Encyclopedia was the only reference we found that used “Web site” exclusively — and you know how fusty the old men in monocles can be.

Let’s see, is it Beyonce or Brenda Lee?

Our conclusion: though you’ll continue to see Web site and web site in print; it looks like website has won the day. So, lest your customers and colleagues assume you’re out of touch because you use Web site instead of website — remember the flak George W. Bush got when he made reference to “the Internets” — now’s the time for a little re-education.

Website  |  Email  |  Blog  |  Podcast  |  Facebook  |  Twitter

And, if you still think Facebook is a computer game teenagers play with their friends, it’s definitely time to step into the wide world of social media and do a little poking around. To stay literate, you should at least begin to explore the explosion of new tools businesses, large and small, now use to reach out to their customers – before the next generation of innovations comes along and changes the game yet again. Who knows, in a few years tweeting may seem as outmoded as shouting at your customers through a megaphone.

by Dianne Clay, Librarian