Are you using LinkedIn as a tool to promote your local business online? As the second most-visited social network in the U.S., just behind Facebook, LinkedIn is a great tool, and you can use both your personal business profile and a company profile to share about your business online. In part one of this series, we shared tips for using a personal profile to promote your business. Next, you’ll want to create and optimize a company profile for your business so you can share information about your company, open jobs, and products and services with LinkedIn users.
1. Create a Company Profile – Start by searching for your company first, to see if LinkedIn already has a record of it. If nothing shows up in search, you can select “Add a Company” to list yours. You need to have a company email address to do this. After you list or claim your company, create a company profile, which includes an overview, careers, products and services, a description, and more. When setting up your profile, you’ll want to make sure to optimize it for search engines by including core keywords and writing optimized content. Learn more about company profiles for local businesses.
2. Add Products and Services – Make sure to add your business products and services to your company profile, because this enables users to learn more and is a place for customers to leave reviews.
3. Promote Your Company Profile – Since people can follow your business on LinkedIn, promote your company profile in emails, on your website, and even on printed materials and signs.
4. Sync your Twitter and Blog Posts – Add a stream of your company’s latest Tweets and Blog posts to the Overview Tab to keep your page fresh and engaging.
5. Request Product and Service Recommendations – Just as you can request for happy customers to leave reviews of your business on sites like Yelp or Google Places, ask for product and service recommendations on your company profile. Simply provide a link to your company profile, or ask customers to search for your business on LinkedIn.
6. Create a Careers Tab – Many people use the site for job searching, and you can even pay to post job listings on the site, though that’s not always in the budget. Either way, use the careers tab of your company profile to share with potential candidates and recruits a little about what it’s like to work for your business. Learn more about using LinkedIn for hiring.
7. Try LinkedIn Advertising – You can even use the site to advertise your products and services, if you think the site is a good fit for your business. Learn more about advertising on LinkedIn.
Have you created a Company Profile for your local business? How are you using LinkedIn to build your network and promote your business online? Share your tips in a comment!
Author: Tiffany Monhollon writes about social media, marketing, and local business success as the lead blogger for ReachCast, a service that helps local business owners develop their web presence.