LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional networking platform, with over 810 million members worldwide as of 2021. Many businesses and organizations utilize LinkedIn to establish an online presence, connect with customers and partners, share content, and build their brand. One way they do this is through LinkedIn business pages.
A LinkedIn business page allows a company to create a customizable presence on LinkedIn that is separate from an individual’s profile. With a business page, companies can publish content, promote products and services, communicate with followers, advertise job openings, and analyze page analytics.
One common question that comes up regarding LinkedIn business pages is whether one business page can follow another business page. The short answer is yes – LinkedIn does allow business pages to follow other business pages.
Following another business page on LinkedIn allows you to see their posts in your feed and stay up-to-date on their company news, product updates, and job postings. It can be a useful way to monitor and learn from competitors, partners, or industry thought leaders.
In this article, we’ll provide a detailed overview explaining how LinkedIn business page following works, the benefits it provides, and tips for managing your business page followers and follows.
How Following Works for LinkedIn Business Pages
The functionality allowing a LinkedIn business page to follow another business page was introduced by LinkedIn in 2014. It works similarly to following individual profiles:
– Your business page can search for and follow any other public LinkedIn business page. This includes pages for companies, organizations, brands, institutions, nonprofits, government agencies, and more.
– Following is entirely optional. Business pages can choose which other pages they want to follow based on relevance, competitive intelligence, partnerships, common interests, etc.
– The “Following” number shown on a business page indicates how many other business pages are following it (not how many individual users).
– Your business page’s followers will see your posts in their LinkedIn feeds. But you can also broadcast posts just to your followers using targeted status updates.
– There is no limit on how many pages a business can follow, but LinkedIn does limit how many followers a page can have based on company size and engagement.
– Business pages have the option to follow back companies that follow them, but reciprocity is not required. You can follow any public page.
– Either page can unfollow the other at any time. Pages you unfollow will no longer see your posts.
So in summary, the business page following system gives companies visibility into what other relevant organizations are sharing while also expanding their own reach and visibility to new audiences. It’s a simple yet powerful way to leverage LinkedIn’s professional network.
Benefits of Having Business Pages Follow Your Company
There are a number of potential benefits that come with having other LinkedIn business pages follow your company’s page:
– **Increased visibility for your content**: When other pages follow you, your posts will appear in their feeds. This exposes your brand, products, and messaging to new audiences organically.
– **Monitoring competitors and industry trends**: Following competitor and industry-leader pages can provide useful insights into their offerings, messaging, and strategies.
– **Partnership opportunities**: Pages with overlapping customer bases or complementary offerings may mutually benefit from following each other’s content. This can lead to new business partnerships.
– **Improved search ranking**: Having an engaged follower base signals that your business page provides valuable content. This in turn can boost your page’s authority in LinkedIn’s search algorithm.
– **Market research**: The content from followed pages gives insight into customer pain points, open opportunities, media trends, and more that can inform your own marketing.
– **Talent scouting**: Following companies in your industry makes it easier to spot potential job candidates that may be a good fit for open positions.
– **Lead generation**: Sharing valuable content and resources could attract the attention of prospects interested in your products or services.
In summary, being followed by the right business pages can be a low-cost, effective way to achieve a variety of marketing, recruiting, and market intelligence objectives. But you need an effective follower strategy and quality content plan to fully capitalize on these benefits.
Tips for Managing Business Page Followers and Following
Here are some best practices to consider when developing your business page’s following strategy:
– **Be selective:** Follow pages that align with your brand values, positioning, and target audience. Avoid indiscriminate following.
– **Leverage lists**: Organize followed accounts into lists like Competitors, Partners, Industry Leaders, etc. This keeps your feed organized.
– **Follow back thoughtfully**: Evaluate follow back requests individually instead of automatically reciprocating.
– **Post consistently**: Followers will be more engaged if your page shares regular, high-value content. Mix up text, images, video, and live video.
– **Interact and engage**: Beyond broadcasting content, also like and comment on followed pages’ posts when appropriate.
– **Monitor analytics**: Review your follower demographics, engagement metrics, and content analytics regularly to refine your strategy.
– **Communicate your value**: Make sure your page’s About section and introductory posts communicate who you are and the value you provide.
– **Thank new followers**: When milestones are hit, thank new followers and recommend relevant content to get them engaged.
The most successful pages on LinkedIn strike a balance between producing great content, building strategic relationships, and analyzing performance data to continuously improve their approach. Patience and persistence are also virtues, as it takes time to organically grow an engaged follower base.
Can You Pay to Get More Followers for Your Business Page?
LinkedIn does provide paid opportunities to expand your business page’s followers, beyond just earning them organically:
– **Sponsored Content**: Pay to amplify your posts beyond just your current followers through LinkedIn’s advertising network.
– **Follower Campaigns**: Run targeted campaigns where you pay to display your page to specific demographics to get them to follow you.
– **Lead Gen Forms**: Attract followers by offering content downloads, subscriptions, event sign-ups, or other gated content in exchange for a follow.
However, there are downsides to relying on paid follower growth:
– **Lower engagement**: Paid followers often have less genuine interest in your brand and do not actively engage with your content.
– **Higher cost**: Continually buying followers can get expensive compared to organic growth.
– **Risk**: Aggressive paid follower tactics could get your page flagged or banned by LinkedIn.
– **Less data**: Paid campaigns provide limited data compared to analyzing organic followers’ demographics and interests.
That’s why best practice is to view paid follower acquisition as a supplement to organic growth, not a replacement. Focus first on producing quality content, identifying and engaging with your ideal followers, and leveraging other free marketing tactics like employee advocacy. Paid methods can then help accelerate the process once you gain momentum.
LinkedIn Business Page Follower Limits
LinkedIn does impose follower count limits on business pages to maintain the quality of the follower experience:
– **Personal accounts**: Up to 30,000 followers allowed
– **Pages for individuals**: Up to 50,000 followers allowed
– **Small business pages**: Up to 100,000 followers allowed
– **Company pages**: Follower limit based on company size and how well current followers are engaging with page content
So while you can follow an unlimited number of pages yourself, the number of followers you can acquire does have a ceiling. Larger companies with very active engagement can petition LinkedIn to raise their follower limit above 100,000 followers.
For perspective though, most companies will realistically max out at 10,000 highly targeted and engaged followers for their niche. The key is focusing less on chasing large vanity metrics and more on building loyalty with ideal customers. Quality over quantity.
Do Business Page Followers See Your Sponsored Content?
Any posts you explicitly sponsor will be pushed beyond just your current business page followers. However, your organic non-sponsored posts will only appear for:
– Followers of your business page
– Visitors who view your business page
– Profile visitors if you share the post directly to your profile feed
So to summarize:
– Sponsored Posts: Seen by followers + wider audience you target/pay to reach
– Organic Posts: Only seen by followers and business page visitors
This means you generally need to sponsor content if you want to extend its reach beyond your existing follower base. But know that fewer users will see sponsored posts in their feed compared to organic posts that primarily target engaged followers.
Should You Show a List of Companies Your Business Page Follows?
Most LinkedIn business pages choose not to publicly showcase the full list of accounts they follow. Here are some reasons why it may be better to keep your followed companies private:
– Prevent competitors from easily monitoring the accounts and brands you are tracking.
– Avoid overwhelming visitors with excess information.
– Keep the focus on your original content and media.
– Provide fewer openings for criticism if any followed accounts are controversial.
– Maintain flexibility to follow/unfollow companies without attention.
However, for some businesses there may be benefits to displaying followed accounts:
– Increased transparency into what content you find valuable.
– Visitors can discover new pages that align with your brand’s niche.
– Showcases variety of companies you partner/engage with.
– Helps attract followers who are interested in same accounts.
Weigh these pros and cons against your own business goals. You can always test showing your followed companies for a period of time to see if it delivers results or provides any benefit. Adjust based on learnings and follower response.
What Happens When You Unfollow a LinkedIn Business Page?
Unfollowing a previously followed LinkedIn business page produces the following effects:
– That page’s new posts will stop appearing in your business page’s LinkedIn feed.
– Your business page will disappear from the list of that page’s followers.
– Any of your posts the unfollowed page liked or commented on remain visible on your page.
– You can still view, like, and comment on the unfollowed page’s posts if you visit their profile.
– Similarly, the unfollowed page can still engage with your page’s content as a visitor.
– There is no notification sent when you unfollow a page. It occurs silently behind the scenes.
So in summary, unfollowing simply cuts the one-way subscription to that page’s posts. Any past engagements remain intact. And both pages can still interact on an ad hoc basis as visitors.
Should You Follow Competitor Business Pages on LinkedIn?
There are differing philosophies on whether brands should follow competitor business pages on LinkedIn. Here are some potential benefits to following competitors:
– Monitor their new products, campaigns, content, and messaging strategies.
– Analyze their engagement levels and follower demographics for benchmarking.
– Identify openings or weaknesses not being served by competitors.
– Keep tabs on employees that may be potential recruits.
– Study their approach to LinkedIn for new tactics or best practices.
However, some downsides to be aware of:
– May inadvertently validate competitors by connecting your brand to them.
– Risk of competitors repurposing or piggybacking off ideas they see.
– Can be demoralizing if competitor content/engagement dwarfs yours.
– Following alone does not reveal non-public competitor strategies.
– Raises ethical concerns around spying, even if info is public.
Overall, following select competitors likely makes sense for awareness and market research. Just be cautious in how you act upon any intel gained. Focus on your own strengths rather than copying competitors. Follow ethically and legally.
Should Your Employees Follow Your Company’s Business Page?
Having employees follow your company’s LinkedIn business page provides several benefits:
– Employees see and share company updates, amplifying reach.
– Helps employees stay aligned with company messaging and positioning.
– Familiarizes employees with products, initiatives, and achievements.
– When employees engage with page content, it helps signal quality to the algorithm.
– Encourages employees to consider how personal brand aligns with company brand.
– Allows employee referrals and recommendations direct from page content.
– Grows follower count and engagement metrics.
Potential downsides to be aware of:
– Risk of coerced behavior if following is strictly mandatory.
– Could present inauthentic perception if employees blindly share content.
– Employees may disengage if content feels too corporate or sales-focused.
– Follower count inflated if employees make up a large percentage.
Overall, encouraging employees to follow the company page makes sense as part of a multipronged advocacy strategy. But avoid forcing it or pressuring staff. Frame following as mutually beneficial, not just about metrics.
Content Recommendations to Attract Followers
Posting valuable, engaging content is key to attracting both organic and paid followers. Here are some types of content worth including in your mix:
– Industry educational resources like guides, research, and tools
– Thought leadership commentary on industry news and trends
– Sneak peeks at new products, features, or services
– Customer success stories and interviews
– Reports on company achievements, awards, and milestones
– Videos of products in action, demos, and employee testimonials
– Insider perspectives from leaders, experts, or influencers
– Polls, quizzes, and contests to encourage interaction
– Practical tips, how-tos, and best practices
– Responses addressing customer complaints and feedback
– Photos and visuals showing company culture and community impact
– Live video chats or AMAs with executives
Testing different types of content and analyzing engagement metrics will reveal what resonates most with your target audience. This informs what to produce more of. Make sure to share a mix of thought leadership, customer perspectives, experiential looks behind-the-scenes, and practical takeaways.
Should You Buy LinkedIn Followers for Your Business Page?
The option to buy followers from third-party providers exists, but has many downsides:
– **Artificially inflates follower numbers** giving false perception of brand size/popularity. But engagement and impressions remain low.
– **Followers may be fake accounts or bots** used solely to inflate follower counts. Provides no business value.
– **Risk account ban or restrictions** since buying followers violates LinkedIn’s policies.
– **No targeting or filters** to ensure fake followers match your customer demographics.
– **No guarantee of longevity** as fake accounts may be deleted later and unfollow you.
– **Unethical practice** that misleads visitors and manipulates LinkedIn’s algorithms through vanity metrics.
For these reasons, buying LinkedIn followers is not recommended. While growth may seem faster upfront, it is unsustainable. Focus time and resources instead on attracting real, engaged followers through valuable content, customer connections, and ethical practices. These followers translate into measurable business impact.
Conclusion
Following other business pages is a built-in LinkedIn feature that lets brands monitor relevant companies, expand reach, spark partnerships, and more. But thoughtful selectivity and an organic approach based on high-value content is recommended over indiscriminate or paid follower tactics.
Treat your business page following strategy as a way to build fruitful connections that provide mutual value, not simply a means to inflate vanity metrics. Analyze performance data continuously, and unfollow any pages that prove to align poorly with your brand over time.
Used strategically, following brands that matter to your business and audience can lead to real awareness, relationships, and advantage. By posting must-read content yourself, you can organically attract engaged followers without aggressive paid tactics. This Community Panel discussion sums the best practices well:
“The key is to ensure your business page provides authentic value and relevance to each follower. This earns real engagement and impact that quantified followers alone never will.”