Last week we talked about why to use LinkedIn, so now let's discuss how.
Whatever your LinkedIn strategies are, it's important to have a clear action plan. This will help you make the most of the platform, rather than become lost and confused.
It can take a while to get used to LinkedIn (and longer to master it), so here's a headstart:
1. Build your network
Obviously!
But be smart about it. One of my mistakes when I first started using LinkedIn was connecting with anyone and everyone. I quickly gained thousands of connections, but most had no benefit to me.
As soon as I started disconnecting with people and instead focused on only keeping professionals who were relevant, my engagement and requests went up. Suddenly only people who would actually be interested in my content were seeing it, so the algorithm seemed to favour it more.
So, think about who you might benefit from connecting with. Is it editors? Graphic designers? Small publishers? You can also be clever here and look at the target audience of your writing. If the people you're targeting are likely to be middle-aged female doctors looking for something to read on their lunch break, connect with them and post about your books in the middle of the day.
2. Interact
It can be hard to dedicate time to scrolling through LinkedIn for a few hours each week (especially when platforms like Instagram are a lot more fun!), but it's a must.
Commenting on your connections' posts is a great way to build your relationship with them, and also get your name out there. You might also go through the trending hashtags in your genre and find posts to engage with there.
If you want to establish yourself as an expert, you should also aim to answer questions and add your opinion or knowledge to your connections' posts. Don't comment about your book. On LinkedIn, it's more important to sell yourself!
3. Post, post, post!
I'll talk more about what to post next week, but the biggest LinkedIn influencers will tell you much of their success comes from posting consistently and often. Most LinkedIn users, however, don't post at all.
Look at what your connections are posting and think about which posts get engagement, and which fall flat. What might your connections want to see you post? How can your posts provide more value than your competitors?
4. Use hashtags
Many people seem to forget that like most social media platforms, hashtags are very beneficial on LinkedIn. Why not make sure your post will get that extra reach?
Although you can use common sense to think of hashtags for your posts, do a Google search and see if you can find the top hashtags for your niche. You can also look at the hashtags being used by your connections that post similar content.
Make sure to check your hashtags, too. Does it seem to be trending, or dead? Are people engaging with the posts that use it? Try out similar keywords for hashtags to see if others work better.
5. Promote authors in your genre
By endorsing, sharing, or recommending similar authors to you, you'll create a good friend in that author. Just make sure you check out their work first - if you give a bad book a good review, your credibility is gone!
It's best to do this with authors at a similar level to you, since they're most likely to return the favour, but by all means target smaller and bigger authors too. If a successful author endorses you, that's going to look very impressive.
Will you start using LinkedIn as an author? Make sure to send me a request and leave a comment if you do!
Don't forget about my Social Media packages, with slots still available this month.