Published: Thursday, November 15, 2012 | Tags: Chamber of Commerce, chambers, LinkedIn, networking, social, social media
Of all the social networks, chambers should be paying particularly close attention to LinkedIn. While it’s important to use Facebook and Twitter to connect with people on a friendly level, LinkedIn provides members with a strong platform for professional networking.
Traditionally, professional networking events were organized almost exclusively by chambers and other business associations. So does that mean LinkedIn poses a threat to the relevancy of your chamber? ONLY IF YOU RESIST IT!
Instead of fearing LinkedIn, embrace it as an integral component of your chamber’s marketing strategy.
For the next two weeks, we’re going to take a deep dive into LinkedIn. Today’s post will bring us back to the fundamentals of Linkedin. Next week’s blog is going to cover LinkedIn tactics for engaging your followers. In a later post, I will discuss advertising on LinkedIn.
Table of contents:
Connection - a person in your LinkedIn network. There are three degrees of connections:
Follow - how people connect to Company Pages
[NOTE: You must have a personal LinkedIn account before you can create a company page for your chamber. Head to the LinkedIn account creator page to do so now.]
To create your chamber’s LinkedIn page, click Add a Company and complete the short form. After completing the steps in the confirmation email, your page is created and ready for content!
On your Company home page, click Edit. You'll be directed to the Overview editing page. It is important to complete all fields because this information will be displayed when a visitor first lands on your chamber’s LinkedIn page. The following are a few tips and best practices for completing this page.
Encourage all chamber employees to link to your chamber page in their Experience section. Not only will this create more links to your chamber page, but it will also make your employees visible in your chamber’s Careers section. For instance, 立博客户端app下载's Careers page shows all of our employees!
The LinkedIn Services page has a unique function that allows you to display different services to different audiences.
To get started, click the Services tab, then click Edit in the top right corner.
To create a new variation of your page, click Create New Audience. You can build a target audience based on company size, job function, industry, seniority, and geography. [Idea for chambers: Promote different levels of membership benefits based on whether a visitor is a manager, VP, or CEO.]
After you create your audience, write a description of your services and add up to three banner images. Your banner images will be displayed on a rotator, and each can be linked to a specific page of your chamber website.
You have the option to promote one of your products or services. Your promoted product will be visible on your Services page AND in the sidebar of your LinkedIn homepage. Promoted products and services can be recommended or shared by your followers and employees.
To post a new product or service, hover over the Edit arrow button in the top right corner of your page, and click Add product or service.
Check out the Charlotte Chamber’s Products & Services LinkedIn page for a great example. The top image is one of three featured banners, and five products/services are promoted below it.
You should post to LinkedIn less than you post to Facebook and Twitter – once a day, at most. LinkedIn posts should also be more professional and business-oriented (and less personal) than your posts on Facebook and Twitter.
Your posts should include as many links to articles, videos, and pages as possible to attract viewers. And don’t forget to add a photo by selecting the box when posting! The Columbia County Chamber makes good use of a LinkedIn post by linking to an upcoming event.
There are two types of LinkedIn Insights. The Insights page on your Company page is visible to your followers and displays employees who have recently left your chamber, as well as other pages your visitors have viewed.
If you hover over the Edit arrow button, you’ll see two other options – Follower Insights and Page Insights. These can only be accessed by a page administrator.
Follower Insights allow you to measure:
Page Insights provide:
LinkedIn is one social network chambers should not ignore. It’s the perfect social network for finding and connecting with local businesses, as well as reaching out beyond your community to potential relocation candidates. So you see, LinkedIn doesn’t have to be the competitor. Instead, it can be a valuable partner for your chamber of commerce.
Our posts 4 Ridiculously Easy Ways To Find People You Know On LinkedIn and 7 Best Practices for Advertising on LinkedIn tell you exactly how to kickstart your page's rise to stardom. Or to learn LinkedIn basics for another type of organization, you can read the post How Nonprofits Can Use LinkedIn Groups for Networking.
What do you think - is LinkedIn a friend or a foe?