A company’s LinkedIn page serves as its online presence and identity on the professional social media platform. Similar to an individual’s profile, an organization’s LinkedIn provides information about the business, its work, and its culture to viewers. The company can actively manage its LinkedIn page to connect with potential customers, engage with a broader audience, attract talent, and build its brand. An organization’s LinkedIn presence has become an essential part of its digital marketing and recruitment strategy in today’s internet-focused business environment.
Why Companies Need a LinkedIn Presence
There are several key reasons why having a strong LinkedIn presence is crucial for modern organizations:
- Reach a massive audience – LinkedIn has over 740 million users worldwide as of September 2022. This presents a huge opportunity for companies to get their brand, products and services in front of a large relevant audience.
- Enhance brand awareness and visibility – An optimized LinkedIn page with complete information helps companies improve brand visibility and awareness. Viewers can better understand the business, its work, values and culture.
- Attract and engage customers – Companies can attract new customers by sharing content like posts, articles, images, videos, etc. Engaging existing customers also builds loyalty and retention.
- Recruit top talent – LinkedIn is leveraged by over 95% of recruiters to find and contact potential hires. A strong company page attracts and recruits suitable employees.
- Thought leadership – Businesses can establish thought leadership in their industry by regularly sharing insightful content. This positions them as an authority.
- Lead generation – LinkedIn’s lead generation tools allow companies to collect contact info and generate sales leads from interested webpage visitors.
- Networking – Organization pages connect with other companies and professionals to build partnerships, relationships and word-of-mouth.
In short, LinkedIn provides the platform for companies to increase awareness, engagement, recruitment, leads and revenues through their page and presence.
Optimizing a Company’s LinkedIn Page
To maximize the benefits of its LinkedIn presence, organizations must optimize their company page. Some key optimization tips include:
- Complete page – Filling in all sections provides full information about the company to visitors.
- Utilize media – Images, videos & presentations make the page more engaging and humanized.
- Followers – Building up followers increases visibility and reach for content.
- Be active – Post regularly, share content, comment and engage with the community.
- Leverage ads – Sponsored content and InMail ads further boost visibility and leads.
- Page analytics – Track performance metrics to identify opportunities to refine page strategy.
- Claim company page – Take ownership of the company’s existing unofficial pages.
- Optimize SEO – Use relevant keywords so the page appears in search engine results.
- High quality content – Share valuable and engaging updates instead of overly promotional messages.
- Consistent branding – Maintain the company’s visual branding and tone throughout the page.
Companies must invest sufficient time and resources into their LinkedIn presence for maximum impact. The page should accurately reflect the brand and provide value to the LinkedIn community.
Key Sections of a Company’s LinkedIn Page
LinkedIn provides several sections and features to convey information about an organization on its page. Some key sections companies should focus on optimizing include:
Profile photo and cover image
The profile photo displays the company logo and the cover image banner visually represents the brand. High-quality images make a strong first impression.
About section
This overview section describes what the company does, its mission, offerings, history and culture. It summarizes the brand and value proposition.
Products and services
Detail the organization’s main products, services, and solutions that it provides. This highlights its areas of expertise.
Company details
Key facts like industry, company size, headquarters location, website, and founding year are featured. This provides context about the business.
Life section
Photos, videos, and posts sharing company culture, values, team events, and work environment give an inside look.
Jobs section
Current job openings listed attract and funnel suitable candidates to apply for available positions.
Feeds section
The posts feed allows publishing regular updates including articles, news, links, images, and videos to follower feeds.
Optimizing these key sections ensures viewers quickly glean the most relevant information about the brand from the company’s LinkedIn profile.
Content Best Practices
The quality and type of content an organization publishes on its LinkedIn page has a major impact on engagement and results. Here are some top content best practices:
- Educate – Share advice, how-to’s, reports, and insights that provide value.
- Entertain – Engaging videos, photos, stories, polls and quizzes connect more.
- Inspire – Motivational company culture content attracts talent.
- Promote sparingly – 80% useful content, 20% promotional content is ideal.
- Vary content forms – Combine articles, infographics, SlideShare, live videos.
- Monitor engagement – Track likes, shares, and comments to see what resonates.
- Leverage hashtags – Include relevant hashtags to extend reach and discoverability.
- Optimize for SEO – Target keywords so content gets found in search engines.
- Consistency – Post consistently, not just occasionally, to stay top of mind.
- Relevance – Tailor content specifically for a LinkedIn business audience.
Thoughtful, valuable content allows companies to genuinely engage their target audience on LinkedIn while subtly promoting the brand.
Advertising Options
In addition to organic content, LinkedIn advertising presents opportunities to further boost a company’s visibility, leads and traffic. Popular LinkedIn advertising options include:
- Sponsored content – Native ads displayed in LinkedIn feeds similar to regular posts. Appear in follower feeds based on targeting.
- Sponsored InMail – Send customized direct messages to members matching the target audience criteria to drive engagement.
- Text ads – Display targeted text ads along the right rail of the desktop LinkedIn feed.
- Dynamic ads – Automatically show customized ads based on profile data like job title, industry, skills, etc.
- Message ads – Display image and text ads in the LinkedIn messaging inbox area.
Savvy companies allocate a portion of their marketing budget towards sponsored LinkedIn ads to complement their organic efforts for amplified results.
Measuring Performance
To assess the effectiveness of its LinkedIn presence, organizations should regularly monitor key performance metrics and analytics. Some important metrics to track include:
Follower Growth
Month | Followers |
---|---|
January | 2500 |
February | 2800 |
March | 3100 |
Growing followers indicates increasing engagement and reach for company updates. Aim for follower growth every month.
Engagement Rate
Engagement rate = (Likes + comments + shares) / total followers. Benchmark to industry averages. Higher is better.
Click Through Rate (CTR)
CTR on Company Page = Company page visits / Impressions.
CTR on Updates = Clicks on links in updates / Impressions.
Measure how appealing content titles and descriptions are to get visitors to click through. Higher CTR is preferable.
Update Views
Post view counts show content visibility and discovery. Compare views between different updates to identify highest performing content types and topics.
Website Referral Traffic
Monitor website visits generated through LinkedIn to evaluate how the presence converts to actual site traffic. Optimizing based on this helps maximize ROI.
Leads & Customers
Ultimately, track LinkedIn generated leads, prospects contacted, and closed customers. Tie metrics to revenue to assess true business impact.
Continuously monitoring and acting on these metrics transforms an organization’s LinkedIn presence into a lead and revenue generator.
Tying to Business Goals
To maximize value, companies must align their LinkedIn objectives and presence to core business goals. Some examples include:
- Brand awareness – Share content highlighting company values, culture, and personality.
- Thought leadership – Publish and promote C-level authored articles and corporate reports.
- Lead generation – Create gated assets for lead capture and run sponsored InMail campaigns.
- Recruitment – Highlight employer brand differentiation and utilize LinkedIn Recruiter.
- Customer acquisition – Share vertical-specific content and run targeted ads.
- Partnerships – Connect with strategic companies and engage mutually beneficial content.
This linkage ensures the time and resources spent on LinkedIn directly support business priorities and goals. The specific strategy and approach depends on the objectives being focused on.
Conclusion
An optimized LinkedIn presence is essential for today’s companies to build their brand, attract talent, generate leads, and drive growth. Organizations must actively manage their Company Page by sharing valuable content consistently, leveraging ads, measuring data, and aligning to core business goals. With a strategic omnichannel approach, LinkedIn can generate significant ongoing value and competitive advantage for businesses.