7 Brilliant LinkedIn Hacks That Will Skyrocket Your Brand

The best growth hacks LinkedIn offers in 2022

B2B marketing is much more nuanced than mass-market consumer advertising. You have to prospect, generate leads and sometimes promote something intangible such as services, or consulting. This can be tricky when dealing with a niche audience, as the question always arises: where do I find leads?

As it turns out, LinkedIn is an excellent place to promote products & services to other professionals!

LinkedIn is one of the most influential social media platforms in today’s world. It’s the number one platform for B2B marketers, and for good reason: LinkedIn says that over 80% of all B2B leads are generated on LinkedIn.

But with so many brands with huge followings on LinkedIn, it’s hard knowing where to start. By creating a solid marketing strategy, your company can join the ranks of LinkedIn’s most valuable brands.

This article will go over the seven best LinkedIn hacks you can use to gain more followers, leads, and customers. We’ll explore some of the best practices and share insight into what the top LinkedIn marketers are doing that you’re not!

1. Create a Compelling Company Profile

It takes approximately 50 milliseconds for users of a website to form an opinion on its appearance. Your company profile is no different.

An excellent first impression can be the difference between success and failure. How often have you clicked off a website because it looked unprofessional or incohesive? How many brands have you turned away because something about their messaging just felt “off”?

If you hope to achieve marketing success using LinkedIn, the first step should be to optimize your profile for conversion. We’ll use Hootsuite as an example.

Utilize your header and profile picture

Using a well-designed header and profile picture instantly creates a professional impression and attracts more prospects. It allows you to communicate what your brand is about before the user even reads any text. LinkedIn has stated that companies with logos on their page get 6x more visits.

Notice how Hootsuite employs a simple but effective strategy. The user is immediately drawn to the “TikTok | Hootsuite” text in the header by Hootsuite’s use of negative space. The presentation gives the impression of either integration or partnership with TikTok (impressive, right?) - either way, this elicits a response that encourages the user to read on.

Write a powerful one-line summary

A concise summary sums up all of your success into a 5-15 word sentence, and as every good copywriter knows, every word counts.

Think about communicating what problem your business solves and its most significant achievements. Ideally, you want to include keywords your prospect will search for to make your page more discoverable.

Hootsuite’s summary is only seven words, but it packs a punch. “Global leader” is a pretty big achievement, after all. Using a keyword like “social media management” boosts their search rankings, driving more traffic to their page.

Your description is a pitch

Instead of writing an essay on how your company has grown and how many offices you have, speak directly to the audience’s needs. Let them know that you’re the best company for the job.

Most importantly, focus on the first three lines. Why? LinkedIn puts a “See more” button on the About section for text longer than three lines. Like your one-line summary, you need to grab users within the first few seconds; otherwise, they won’t read the rest.

As a rule of thumb, companies with more brand equity can afford to use longer descriptions; people are still interested in Microsoft, even if they have a longer description. As a smaller company, you probably don’t have that benefit. Keep your About section below 100 words if possible, ideally no more than 150.

Using Hootsuite as an example, notice the language used. “Unparalleled expertise,” “at scale,” and “succeed with social” all benefit the user. What B2B owner doesn’t want to succeed with social media?

2. Publish Valuable Content

The term “thought leader” is often thrown around on LinkedIn. You should follow the underlying principle instead: producing value. As LinkedIn hacks go, creating content that users engage with is one of the best ways to enhance your brand awareness.

In a 2020 study by Edelman and LinkedIn, only 17% of decision-makers surveyed rated the quality of most thought leadership they read as very good or excellent. To stand out, you need to publish meaningful posts that demonstrate your company’s position as an industry leader.

Keep it interesting by consistently publishing a variety of insightful posts, such as:

Industry reports and trends
Testimonials
Customer insights
Links to high-quality blog posts
Employee stories

More practically, there are several steps you can follow for LinkedIn’s algorithm to promote your post for longer.

Encourage a response

Firstly, only tag people you know will respond. Then, use keywords that you know prospects will be searching for. Lastly, ask questions to spark engagement.

LinkedIn uses initial engagement to determine how much your content appears in others’ feeds. If the post does well in the first hour, it’s much more likely to succeed over the following weeks and months.

Focus on quality over quantity

LinkedIn’s algorithm prefers high-quality content and pushes it to the top of users’ feeds. Take the time to provide value to your readers; the principle of gratitude-reciprocity will subconsciously prompt your audience to return the favor.

Use multimedia to stand-out

Did you know that articles with images get 94% more views? If you have an original photo to share, excellent! If not, you can use a site like Unsplash or Pixabay for royalty-free images that you can use.

Post at the right time

Lastly, consider your target audience. For example, are you primarily dealing with clients on the east coast of the US? Be sure to post at a time when your followers are online. Generally, most people are active between 8 am and 2 pm, as people are in “work mode” earlier in the day.

For more tips on creating meaningful content, follow LinkedIn’s advice here.

3. Use Video Marketing to Achieve Tremendous Growth

Video marketing has grown massively over the past few years, and it’s proving to be an effective tool for B2B marketers. 73% of B2B marketers said that video had a positive effect on marketing ROI, and companies using video in their marketing are experiencing 49% more revenue growth than those who don’t.

Video allows you to demonstrate much more complex ideas than text and conveys your brand’s value almost unlike any other medium. You can present products, tell a story or even host a live webinar to show your latest developments.

Grab attention in the first 3 seconds

Facebook found that 65% of people who watch the first 3 seconds of a video will watch for at least 10 seconds. Getting users excited for the rest of the video boosts the number of viewers who will stick around until the end.

Keep videos short and sweet

In the age of TikTok, short-form content reigns supreme. Discuss the topic instantly and get to the point. Keep the length of your video under 30 seconds (ideally under 15 seconds) to reduce the cognitive load on viewers. Longer content may be more helpful in telling stories, but try to keep it under 1-2 minutes.

Optimize for mobile

57% of all LinkedIn users are on mobile. Keep file sizes down, and test how your video looks on mobile before publishing.

Many mobile users watch videos on silent, so add closed captions to ensure the highest viewership. Using descriptive images, infographics, and body language will complement closed captions.

Keep it professional

Creating videos that feel premium boosts your brand’s equity and image. Using fancy shots or editing techniques gives you the edge over other videos on users’ feeds. Outsourcing this to a video production company that will be able to build a quality lighting and camera setup will give you the best results.

Include a call-to-action

At the end of the video, use a call-to-action to encourage clicks. Leave viewers with clear steps on what to do next to maximize ROI.

4. Host a Live Stream

There are many LinkedIn hacks, but live streaming is one of the platform’s most under-utilized tools. Nonetheless, it can be one of your most valuable. LinkedIn says that LinkedIn Live videos get 7x more reactions and 24x comments than the average video posted to the platform. It’s one of the incredible growth hacks LinkedIn users have been employing to engage with their company’s audience in a way never seen before.

You’ll need to apply for LinkedIn Live before you can start a live stream. Below, we’ve collected some handy tips to maximize the potential of your live stream.

Boost attendees by using LinkedIn Events

Start a LinkedIn Event a few days ahead of your broadcast. It will allow your followers to schedule and prepare for your stream, giving them time to think of any questions they might have.

You can also encourage employees to share these events on their personal pages and link to the event on your other platforms to gain even more attendees.

Choose a relevant topic and be prepared

Demonstrate value with a unique twist. Your audience on LinkedIn is likely going to be interested in more professional aspects than your Facebook audience, so announcing partnerships or doing Q&As with your team will be more suited to LinkedIn.

Ultimately, you want the audience to participate and feel like they’ve received some form of value from your live stream. Perhaps it’s sharing some industry trends they’re unaware of or new developments in your field. Either way, be prepared to answer questions and demonstrate your knowledge.

Invite speakers from your industry

Taking this approach will put your brand in the backseat. However, it’s an effective way to provide value to your audience. Bringing influencers or authorities in your industry will demonstrate your brand as one that appreciates genuine discussion and expertise. You also tap into your guest’s audience, boosting your potential leads from the stream.

5. Encourage Active Employee Engagement

Having a great brand page is a strong start - however, social media is about people, not brands! When employees engage with your posts, the impact on your company page is unbelievable. Engaged employees can produce up to 8x as many views and 4x as many followers for your company page.

Not only can an employee become an industry influencer in their own right, but LinkedIn also favors content shared by your employees. They can post real insights into your industry that appear more genuine and trustworthy because it’s straight from the source.

Employee engagement is ultimately a win-win: your employees grow their networks and status, and you benefit from further prospects and original posts to share! It’s one of the most potent LinkedIn hacks if used regularly.

Engage within the first hour

Engagement in the first hour is an indicator of how well LinkedIn’s algorithm will perceive your content. Ask employees to share their thoughts on your posts as soon as possible to boost your reach significantly.

The Employee Notification feature can help you remind your employees to engage with your newly-posted content.

Share their insights

Your staff knows more about your products and services than anyone else. They have an insight that others in your industry are dying to hear; they just need to post it! You can then reshare this first-hand knowledge on your company’s page for maximum impact.

Build your CEO’s profile

At the start of this section, we emphasized the point that social media is about people. “People buy from people” is an adage you might’ve heard before.

As the representative of your company, your CEO’s profile is just as important, if not more important, than your company’s page. People eagerly seek personal insight from leaders on LinkedIn and are quick to press the “Follow” button if they see something they like, even if it’s from someone in an unrelated field.

Enhancing your CEO’s profile opens up further opportunities for prospects to discover your company. Even if they just like your company’s posts, these likes will appear in their networks’ feeds and boost your engagement. This is one of the growth hacks LinkedIn power users love, so use it to your advantage!

6. Create a Group

Groups on LinkedIn are an excellent way to find like-minded people who can help you build an active community that promotes your business subtly. Many existing groups are filled with self-promotion and spam, so starting thoughtful discussions is highly valued in community groups.

Instead of creating a group to directly promote your brand (seriously, who wants that?), create a group based on a topic your customers care about. Hubspot’s group is about inbound marketing - not Hubspot. By taking a broad approach, you foster creative discussion and organic growth. For example, start a group for email marketers if you’re developing AI-powered email marketing software.

Bring value to your group

Members often join groups to get advice from experts. They are looking for help with their problem, and providing genuine answers will encourage them to stay.

Participate with users

Keep an eye on discussions going on within your group. When you start or contribute to discussions and recommend resources/experts, users will naturally feel that your group is a valuable place to be. This appreciation leads to further group growth and brand awareness.

Keep it informative

If you believe that your product has a feature a member could use, feel free to suggest it. However, spamming links to your website or constantly pitching puts people off you and your company. Be genuine, empathetic, and kind, and the leads will generate themselves.

7. Leverage LinkedIn’s Most Valuable Tools

LinkedIn provides many tools themselves and a multitude of other third-party integrations. Here, we’ll discuss the two most powerful: Sponsored Content and Sales Navigator. Both are incredibly effective for B2B marketing and are some of the best LinkedIn hacks you can use to boost your brand’s awareness.

Sales Navigator

LinkedIn’s Sales Navigator is an advanced tool that makes it easier to find and secure leads. It allows you to create dynamic searches based on a wide range of factors, such as geography, company size, and seniority level, providing in-depth targeting of your buyer personas. LinkedIn’s algorithm then recommends further targeted leads using these saved searches.

Furthermore, a Sales Navigator subscription permits you to use InMail, letting you send messages to prospects even if you’re not connected. You also can see if the message was accepted or declined.

If you’re serious about B2B marketing, Sales Navigator is one of the best tools offered by LinkedIn.

Accelerate Your Brand with These LinkedIn Hacks

LinkedIn can be your best friend if properly employed or a nightmare if mismanaged. By now, you should be able to work out the underlying principle of LinkedIn success: providing value through quality content.

The LinkedIn hacks listed will expand your brand in ways you never thought were possible. It can seem like hard work at first, but as with anything worthwhile, it’s worth taking the time to sow the seeds of your success.

If you’re ready to start establishing your brand’s LinkedIn presence, try one of the ideas shared in this post and see where it takes you. You never know what opportunities might be waiting for you.