Importance of LinkedIn to Social Media Marketing Strategy

Hi Everyone,

Today I would like to share with you about another important social media website. That is none other than LinkedIn which is the world’s largest professional website. Here we go,

LinkedIn is a social networking website for people in professional occupations, which was founded in December 2002 and launched on May 5, 2003. It is mainly used for professional networking. It is a business oriented network of decision makers, influencers and buyers. 

According to Wikipedia, as of June 2013, LinkedIn reports more than 225 million acquired users in more than 200 countries and territories.

Apart from that, following statistics of the site will give you a clear idea of web’s largest professional site, LinkedIn and how it works.

• Two new users join LinkedIn every second.
• 64% LinkedIn users are outside the US.
• Over 10 million endorsements are given daily.
• 35% of LinkedIn users access the site daily and 42% of users update their profile regularly.
• No. of LinkedIn business pages are 2.7 million while No. of LinkedIn groups are 1.5 million.
• 81% of users belong to at least one group.
• In June 2011, LinkedIn had 33.9 million unique visitors, up 63 %from a year earlier and surpassing MySpace.

In perspective of different views of people, LinkedIn is probably the most underestimated and underused social media site on the web. But according to Alexa, it is the most important social network after Facebook, Twitter and Flickr. 

In nature, people show more professional and unique mind set when they use professional websites than dealing with their personal contacts. Therefore marketers should make their strategies in accordance with the different roles that these social media sites perform to absorb people’s different emotions. Simply people are experiencing profound emotion when they use LinkedIn which is significantly more different than that of the situations which they are in Twitter or Facebook.

People share their thoughts, ideas and emotions freely on personal networks such as Twitter or Facebook since they highly interact with their family, friends and loved ones. But on professional network such as LinkedIn, people are purposeful and inspirational and they are focusing to build and maintain unique identity and goal oriented character. In that sense, they express feeling with lesser freely.

Most researches have revealed the fact that the content of brand activity in professional networks is perceived higher than personal networks. Therefore it is important to read professionals’ mind sets and how they differently perceive brands in their lives.

How does LinkedIn benefit you?

• You can involve with thousands of decision makers by creating LinkedIn profiles and groups. People in your group are always interested in becoming a valuable connection. Since most of your connections are great decision makers in their field, you may be benefited of being a member of the site.

• You can target new connections by using the site’s advanced features such as names, job title, verticals, companies, networks, geographic ranges, schools, education, industry experts, groups and interests.

• Since LinkedIn is web’s largest professional site, vast number of talented professionals is there which is capable enough of performing your expected campaign. It helps you to get your preferred task done in qualitative manner.

• You can link your Twitter, Facebook accounts, blogs and other web property to your LinkedIn profiles, which allows you to automatically update your LinkedIn profile with activity on the other networks.

• Since you deal with professional-based network of clients, companies, associations and vendors, LinkedIn helps you to increase your networking ability. Simply, LinkedIn isn’t about connecting with consumers like Facebook or Twitter, it’s about connecting businesses.

• LinkedIn Answers are used by the professional business organizations to find experts and to develop meaningful relationships. These LinkedIn answers are helpful to you to collect more new clients.

• LinkedIn Polls offers a great way to do market research within your own networks and within the LinkedIn community. Since your connections of LinkedIn are professionals and decision makers in a particular field, the result of your market research is very much productive.

Therefore you can improve your entire social media marketing strategy with the information provided by the site such as competitive analysis, polls, and researching tools.

Your social marketing portfolio will be valued greatly with LinkedIn’s integration tools. If you have not placed your brand engagement in professional network like LinkedIn, you may have missed a major opportunity in your social media marketing strategy. Therefore it is obvious to practise both personal and professional networks for a successful social media strategy. In that sense, a professional network such as LinkedIn helps one to succeed life goals and enhance one’s strong desire to influence others.

Cheers!!!