Tips to Generate Quality Leads on LinkedIn (Plus Tips to Optimize Your Profile)
Updated: Jul 30
LinkedIn has become a powerful lead-generation tool. You can use LinkedIn as a lead generation tool by creating content that is designed to target very specific groups of people who might be interested in your products or services.
Save this post for tips on optimizing your profile and how to use LinkedIn as a lead generator.
LinkedIn has become a powerful lead-generation tool.
LinkedIn is a powerful tool for driving leads, especially if you know how to use it right.
LinkedIn can be used for both B2B (business-to-business) or B2C (business-to-consumer) lead generation purposes because LinkedIn enables you to find potential customers who are actively looking for solutions from your industry or niche market.
It can also be a great tool for generating high-quality leads in specific industries because people come to LinkedIn to research topics and read valuable content. LinkedIn is also a place where people go when they want to learn more about something specific like business practices or trends within certain industries.
According to LinkedIn "75% of would-be buyers say thought leadership helps them determine which vendor to put on their shortlist. And then in terms of where to share your content, 70% say LinkedIn is one of the most trusted sources of information"
So to drive leads you can post helpful content related to the products or services that you offer. How do you do this? Continue reading to get tips and tricks.
First and foremost, optimize your profile to reflect your professional image and business objectives.
Your LinkedIn profile is your online business card. It allows you to establish credibility with potential clients, so it's important that yours reflects your professional image and business objectives.
When you're writing your profile, it's important to make sure that you're optimizing every part of it. To do this, make sure your profile includes keywords relevant to your industry that will help others find you in search results. Use the tips below to optimize every part of your profile.
Use a profile picture that reflects the image you want to convey
Your profile picture is a visual representation of your brand. It's often the first thing people see, so it needs to make a good first impression. You want it to feel authentic, warm, inviting, friendly and sharp with confidence. Consider getting a professional to take it. They're experts in their field for a reason.
Consider creating a customized background image
You can customize your background image with any image you want. You can use something that reflects your company's brand, or include a call to action or contact information. Whatever it is, make it stand out—you're looking for people to notice and remember you.
Make your headline stand out
Make your headline more than just a job title. LinkedIn recommends "Use the headline field to say a bit more about how you see your role, why you do what you do, and what makes you tick."
Your summary section is key
The summary section is one of the most important parts of your LinkedIn profile, as it allows you to introduce yourself and define what makes you unique. Make sure that you include keywords that are relevant to your profession and industry. This will help ensure that when someone searches for these terms on LinkedIn, they'll see your profile first.
You can also use keywords that align with your business goals in this section: If you're trying to attract job applicants or make connections with similar professionals, use words like "career opportunities" or "talent acquisition." If what's important is increasing sales leads, look into using phrases like "leads generation services" or "lead generation consulting.
Optimize your job titles
Of course you can't just list any job title, but if your title isn't common you may consider adding a bracket with an equivalent job title. This can help with visibility and search rankings.
Don't forget about your experience details section
Your experience details section is one of the most important parts of your profile, so make sure that it has all the relevant information in it.
This is also a free space that you could use to elaborate further on what you can do.These include your core job responsibilities and duties. You should also include some more specific details about what you did at each company—and if there were any particular accomplishments or achievements that stand out in your mind as particularly impressive, make sure to include them too. keep this area succinct though, have a paragraph or add three to five bullet points of your key highlights.
Add in skills
LinkedIn also allows you to add up to 50 skills and to pin at least three. Think about the top functional skills you want to highlight and the relevant keywords you want to add.
Consider securing endorsements and recommendations
Social proof can be an effective tool if used correctly. Think about what skills you want to be recommended for and consider reaching out to former clients or colleagues for testimonials.
Consider creating a company page and linking it back to your profile.
This is optional depending on your strategy and the size of your company.
You can use a company page as a hub for the information you’re sharing on LinkedIn. It provides a platform for your business, and it helps to keep all of the social media channels connected. A company page is also an excellent way to share content and grow your followers.
A great place to start is with an interesting description that sums up what you do in one sentence. Add links to your website and blog, as well as social media accounts such as Twitter and Facebook so people have easy access to follow those sites from their LinkedIn profiles.
Join groups relevant to your industry.
There are many ways to find relevant groups on LinkedIn, but here are a few:
Search for keywords such as "marketing" or "professionals."
Visit the Groups tab and use the filters to narrow down your search.
Join an association and ask them for tips on finding other associations that may be a good fit for you.
Once you've found some groups, it's time to join them and start interacting. This will help you find relevant content, make new connections, and stay up to date on the latest trends.
Use LinkedIn’s connection suggestions to make the most of your content, and expand your audience.
LinkedIn has a feature that allows you to see potential connections based on your professional network. If a user is connected with someone else in your LinkedIn network, they can suggest that those two users connect.
The connection suggestions feature is useful for finding new people to connect with; however, it can also be used as an opportunity for content marketing. For example:
Find people who are connected to your current connections. If a person has a lot of connections, chances are that he/she has valuable knowledge and resources that you can learn from and share with others in your network. In addition, if they have already built up a following on LinkedIn (or other social media platforms), this could help extend the reach of your content even further.
Find people who work in the same industry as you do – but aren’t necessarily part of it yet. For example: if I run an IT consulting firm specializing in cybersecurity strategy development (which happens all over), then I will most likely have clients who are also interested in learning more about cybersecurity strategy development – so why not invite them over?
Find people who work for companies that might be interested in working with yours. Having open lines of communication now could make all the difference later on down the road.
Now that your profile is optimized and you're growing your connections the next step is to post content. See below for tips to get started.
Focus on being helpful.
In marketing, it's all about the customer. It's not about selling them something. It's about helping them solve their problems.
When you focus on being helpful first, you focus on the potential client, their needs, and concerns. Here's why: when people are looking for something—whether that's a new car or a new pair of shoes—they don't want to be sold to. They want to be helped. And when your brand can help someone find what they need, you've done more than just sell them a product; you've built trust and loyalty with them.
What does this mean for your business? It means that instead of spending time trying to convince people that they need your product, you'll spend time figuring out how your product can solve problems for them—and then let them know what problem they're solving.
Helpful content can be something as simple as saying "We're here to help." or "Have a question or looking to understand about XYZ? Reach out today"
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Post valuable content.
In addition to your content being helpful, it should be valuable as well.
Why? Because content that's helpful and valuable is a great way to stand out from the competition. It also helps establish you as a thought leader in your industry before you start using LinkedIn as a lead-generation tool. It also gives potential clients a preview of what they'll get if they hire you or purchase from your company.
To get started, select 3 topic categories that you will focus on that your target audience cares about. If you're a financial advisor consider speaking to succession planning, creating a legacy, or retirement. Then begin by providing them with information, resources, and links to other useful material on LinkedIn itself, as well as your websites.
It's worth noting that the platform offers a wealth of information on its own—including news stories on business topics (e.g., financial tips), questions and answers between users (e.g., what are the benefits of RESPs?), videos from experts in various sectors (e.g., questions to ask when retiring), and so much more.
Consider also including a call to action in your post when it makes sense. This allows anyone to connect with you, but it isn't the main focus.
Content is a powerful tool when it comes to generating leads.
It can be subtle and impactful and help you engage with your audience in a way that feels natural and authentic.
One way content can help generate leads is by posting answers to common questions you might hear in your meetings with clients or even just saying "We're here to help." This can encourage someone to reach out and ask a question—which then leads to a conversation and potential lead.
Another way is to speak to trending topics in your industry. For example, if you are a financial advisor you could speak to 'financial literacy" or "ESGs." Start your post with hooks like " 3 quick tips to..."
Finally, you could focus on life events. When someone has a change in their life like buying a new home, having a baby, retiring or getting married they look for support in specific industries. Consider speaking to these life events in helpful ways that offer more than just an advertisement for your business: how can you help them with the transition? What are things they should consider? Could you offer a free checklist?
See below for some examples:
There are a few ways content can help generate leads. One way is by posting answers to common questions you might hear in your meetings with clients or even just saying "We're here to help". It can encourage someone to reach out and ask a question. Those questions can lead to a conversation and a potential lead.
There are also some great ways you can leverage LinkedIn ads or InMail to generate leads. But remember, these are just tools. It is critical to understand the needs of your potential client and communicate how you can help solve their problems. Don't sell, instead focus on solving their problems and providing value.
Create ad campaigns that are designed to target very specific groups
You can use LinkedIn as a lead generation tool by creating ad campaigns that are designed to target very specific groups of people who might be interested in your products or services.
You do this by focusing on a narrow market/industry, creating your profile to reflect your professional image and business objectives, including a company page and linking it back to your profile, asking for recommendations from clients and colleagues, starting using keyword-rich descriptions such as "financial advisor" throughout the site, complete the summary section with keywords related to your profession such as "retirement, philanthropy and more.
However, it only works well if you know who you are targeting and what they want.
There are several ways of targeting on LinkedIn: by job title, industry and more. You can also target people by interests and skills if you're looking to reach an audience with similar goals as yours or who needs your assistance in some way. Finally, if you have an existing customer base (or even just a list of people who've expressed interest in your business), LinkedIn's Company Pages feature makes it easy to find those potential customers on the platform.
Retargeting ads on LinkedIn can bring more people back to your site who might have forgotten about you.
Retargeting ads allow you to reach out to more people who have visited your site and give them a second chance at purchasing the product or service that they were interested in. This is especially useful if someone has visited the website but didn't make an immediate purchase or get back in touch with you for whatever reason. When that happens, there's a good chance that person will forget about it entirely unless something reminds him or her later on down the road.
Retargeting ads are also useful when trying to reach new customers who haven't interacted with your business before but may still be interested in what it has to offer them because they've been shown advertisements related specifically to their interests when browsing other websites before visiting yours without even knowing yet. That way as soon as they do find themselves browsing through some content published by "XYZ Company", then we'll automatically show up right there next time too - just waiting patiently until someone takes notice.
You'll need to add a tag to your website. For more details, you can visit LinkedIn Retargeting overview page here.
Promote Content or events using features such as Sponsored InMail, Sponsored Content, or boosted posts from your LinkedIn Page
Sponsored InMail is part of Sales Navigator or LinkedIn Premium. You'll need to sign up to get a number of in-mail credits to message potential contact. This are somewhat similar to email marketing. You can test Sponsored InMail messages when you want to advertise promotions, events, or even a blog post through the LinkedIn platform without posting it publicly on the site itself. It is more invasive and depending on your industry can get either a high or very low response. And be sure to check the rules for your industry as some industries are more regulated than others.
The Sponsored Content feature enables you to share web pages, videos, images, and other forms of media with targeted groups on LinkedIn. Text ads are a great option for reaching out to potential leads looking for jobs using specific criteria — like job titles and industries — as well as promoting products or services. Sponsored content can support all levels of marketing from awareness to lead generation.
You can also boost a post from your LinkedIn Page. As noted on LinkedIn " only events, videos, and posts with text or single image can be boosted." Doing this is a great way to extend the reach. I do find it's a great way to get extra eyeballs on your posts especially if you're just starting out. If you want to try it out, click here for the how-to instructions from LinkedIn.
LinkedIn can be a powerful lead-generation tool, but only if you know how to use it well. Make sure that before investing too much time into creating content and campaigns on LinkedIn, you have a clear understanding of what problems your potential clients are looking to have solved. And don't forget that it takes at least 8-12 exposures to your content/ads/brand before someone will consider your business, let alone buy from you. So don't get discouraged if you don't get a lead from your first post. It takes time.
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