In today’s digital age, LinkedIn has become an invaluable tool for sales and marketing professionals to connect with prospects and generate new business. With over 722 million users worldwide, LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional networking platform and offers unparalleled access to working professionals across all industries.
For any business looking to increase brand awareness, establish thought leadership, generate leads, and build relationships with potential customers, having a strong presence on LinkedIn is a must. According to LinkedIn, 80% of B2B leads come from LinkedIn. Engaging with prospects on LinkedIn provides a huge opportunity to position your company as an industry leader, nurture relationships over time, and ultimately convert prospects into customers.
Here are some of the key reasons why engaging prospects on LinkedIn should be a priority:
Gain Valuable Insights on Prospects
LinkedIn provides a wealth of information to help you understand and segment your target prospects. You can view prospects’ full profiles to understand their work experience, skills, interests, education, accomplishments, and more. These insights allow you to personalize your outreach and framing. For example, you can identify shared connections, past companies, schools, skills, or interests that provide an opportunity to establish common ground and make meaningful connections.
Initiate Contact with Key Decision Makers
Unlike other social networks, LinkedIn is oriented towards working professionals. This makes it possible to directly engage with key decision makers and buyers at target companies. Using LinkedIn’s advanced search and filters, you can identify relevant titles and roles to find the right prospects at your target accounts. Connecting directly with the people who have budget and authority, rather than going through gatekeepers, can help you start conversations with those who matter most.
Build Relationships Over Time
Meaningful relationships cannot be built overnight. The connections and community nature of LinkedIn allow you to nurture relationships with prospects through consistent, valuable interactions over time. This could involve commenting on posts, liking and sharing content, joining relevant groups, and providing helpful information and advice. Gradually, you can build familiarity, trust, and credibility with prospects until they are ready to buy.
Establish Thought Leadership
By regularly sharing insightful content such as articles, videos, and presentations, you can organically establish thought leadership and credibility with prospects. Publishing long-form posts on LinkedIn allows you to demonstrate expertise and value. Prospects that consume and engage with your content get to know your brand better and may be more likely to buy from you down the road.
Retarget Website Visitors
If someone from your target account visits your website, you can retarget them with LinkedIn ads. This allows you to continue nurturing leads who have demonstrated interest but are not yet sales-ready. You can create customized audiences and deliver relevant content to prospects to guide them further down the sales funnel.
Generate More Qualified Leads
LinkedIn advertising provides powerful options for lead generation. You can create customized campaigns with accurate targeting options to reach your ideal prospects wherever they are most active on LinkedIn. From Sponsored Content to Sponsored InMail, LinkedIn ads allow you to drive more inbound leads into your sales funnel. According to LinkedIn, LinkedIn ads generate 3x more conversion value per click compared to other social platforms.
Stay Top of Mind
Out of sight, out of mind. LinkedIn allows you to stay in front of prospects by delivering a steady stream of value. Instead of relying on one-off sales emails, you can use LinkedIn messaging and content sharing to have repeated touches over time. This constant visibility will keep you top of mind so that when prospects are ready, they will already be familiar and comfortable with your brand.
Best Practices for Engaging Prospects on LinkedIn
Here are some best practices to follow when engaging LinkedIn prospects:
Personalize Outreach
Generic outreach is unlikely to get responses. Personalizing messages with relevant details about the prospect’s background makes a big difference. Mention shared connections, companies, interests, groups, or content. Ask specific questions to show you took the time to understand who they are.
Provide Value
Prospects will ignore self-promotional pitches. Instead, aim to provide value by sharing helpful advice, resources, insights, and market trends. Establish yourself as a trusted advisor rather than a salesperson. Eventually this goodwill can translate into sales.
Use multimedia content
Posts with rich media like images, videos, and presentations get higher engagement on LinkedIn. Mix up your content types instead of only posting text updates. This makes your feed more visually appealing.
Leverage Employees as Thought Leaders
Encourage your own employees to be active on LinkedIn with content creation and engagement. This helps build awareness and trust in your team and expertise. Employees can also connect with more prospects to widen reach.
Join Relevant Groups
Joining and participating in LinkedIn Groups related to your industry or niche allows you to connect with highly engaged prospects. Make sure to provide value before promoting your company or content.
Follow Target Accounts
Follow relevant companies to stay updated on new hires, achievements, leadership changes, and news that provide conversation starters and outreach opportunities. You can also advertise to your list of target accounts.
Connect with Recent Authors
If prospects have recently published content on LinkedIn, engage by liking, commenting, and sharing. This establishes a connection and reason to follow up. Offer congratulations or appreciation for their work.
Follow Up Consistently
Studies show it takes an average of 12 follow-up attempts to get a response. Don’t give up too quickly when prospects don’t respond. Nurture relationships by following up consistently via content shares or periodic messages.
Use Analytics
Leverage LinkedIn’s analytics to assess content performance as well as profile visits and engagement. These insights help you refine messaging and content to be more relevant for your audience.
Common LinkedIn Engagement Tactics
Here are some of the most effective tactics for engaging prospects on LinkedIn:
Publish Long-Form Articles
Publishing posts over 1300 words or sharing slideshares allows you to establish thought leadership. Include relevant keywords and optimize with SEO best practices.
Join Group Discussions
Comment on discussions and ask thoughtful questions in relevant LinkedIn Groups. Avoid overly promotional language and provide genuine insights.
Share Valuable Third-Party Content
Curate and share content from influencers, partners, media, and industry sources. This demonstrates you are a connector providing a valuable stream of insights.
Promote Content Visually
Use eye-catching banners, images, graphics, and videos to promote your best content. This makes it stand out in the LinkedIn feed.
Send Targeted InMail
For key, sales-ready prospects, send customized InMail messages to break through the noise in their inbox. Make it highly personalized and relevant.
Run Retargeting Ads
Create targeted ads for website visitors segmented by company or behavior like downloading resources. Keep nurturing visitors with relevant content.
Recommend Connections
This allows you to introduce prospects to potentially helpful contacts in their network. It establishes you as a connector who can add value.
Follow Companies
Follow target companies and brands to stay updated on news you can leverage, such as new hires, promotions, or initiatives. Send a message congratulating them.
Comment on Updates from Leadership
Monitor posts from executives at target companies. Comment with a relevant insight, question, or congratulatory message. This gets their attention.
Key Metrics to Track
To assess the success of your LinkedIn prospecting efforts, make sure to track these key performance indicators (KPIs):
Engagement Rate
Engagement rate measures the level of engagement your updates are receiving through likes, comments, shares, and clicks. Aim for at least 3-5% engagement from your followers.
Click-Through Rate
Click-through rate tracks how many people clicked on the links within your posts. Higher click-through rates indicate your content resonates.
New Followers
Look at how many new followers you gain each week or month. More followers mean greater reach for your content.
InMail Acceptance Rate
Measure what percentage of prospects accept your InMail messages instead of ignoring them. Higher open and response rates are positive.
Lead Conversion Rate
For your LinkedIn ads and gated content offers, assess how many prospects convert into sales or marketing qualified leads.
Sales Attributed to LinkedIn
Track the ROI of LinkedIn engagement by how much closed business originated from LinkedIn prospects.
| Metric | Benchmark |
|---|---|
| Engagement Rate | 3-5% |
| Click-Through Rate | 2-3% |
| New Followers | 5-10% follower growth per month |
| InMail Acceptance Rate | 25-35% |
| Lead Conversion Rate | 10-20% conversion rate |
| Sales Attributed to LinkedIn | Aim for 15-30% of sales influenced |
Conclusion
Engaging prospects on LinkedIn needs to be an integral component of your sales and marketing strategy. With its unmatched targeting capabilities, wealth of insights, and relationship-building opportunities, LinkedIn provides a massive platform to connect with your ideal buyers.
To maximize results, focus on personalization, establishing thought leadership, and providing consistent value. Track key performance indicators to refine your efforts over time. With a thoughtful and strategic approach, LinkedIn can become one of your most powerful avenues for generating qualified leads and growing your business.