We all know that having a LinkedIn strategy to accelerate LinkedIn lead generation has become mandatory for every brand that doesn’t want to be left behind. This is especially true for B2B brands, as the competition is getting bigger each day and you need to keep finding ways to evolve. Even if you have a well-known brand with a lot of followers on the platform, leads won’t just land in your lap.
Putting together a LinkedIn lead generation strategy is an important process that shouldn’t be rushed, but a rewarding one at that. When you start recognizing the little specifics that give you the edge over the competition, you’ll be eager to continue experimenting and keep improving each day.
Let’s take it from the essentials, going one step at a time, to reach an all-around presence that will get you qualified leads, while also helping nurture them into conversions.
Set up your company page for lead generation
Most brands approach their company page as a business card. They’re often looking for how to post jobs on LinkedIn, talking about company history, tradition and values, but they forget to show their visitors “the goods” right away. And as a result, they’re missing out on potential engagements.
One of the first things users that land on your page should see is a prompt or call to action that will help you put people in the sales funnel and, eventually, generate leads. You can do this by pinning a post at the top, or just by simply adding a button that leads to your website.
This doesn’t mean you should stop with the lead-oriented mindset at your about section. This is just a preview of everything you got in store.
The process can be long, especially if you didn’t pay much attention to your LinkedIn presence before, but it will come together in the end and bring you the leads you need.
Using the right content is essential
The key points needed to check off your list to get the most out of your page content are consistency and knowing what your audience needs.
For your content to really shine as a tool to aid your LinkedIn lead generation, you need to build up your presence by showing up with enough frequency to always stay on your prospects’ radar. It’s always better to put in half an hour each day to stay present, than spending a whole day trying to improve everything and then forgetting to even check it for the rest of the week.
We can split the relevant content into 3 different types:
- Short newsworthy posts
- Thought leadership materials
- Solution-oriented content
Short newsworthy posts
The first category is there to show the audience that you’re constantly on top of trends and developments of your industry and you can recognize what’s relevant to them.
You will be posting this kind of content with the most volume, but don’t worry – it’s not as time-consuming as it may seem. It’s enough to know your way around the area of your business (and we sure hope you do) and to act quickly. Pick a relevant news article, add your two cents and post it to start a discussion.
Of course, what’s important here is to top it off with a call to action. There are two options here – either ask for the followers to engage in a discussion or direct them to your website to learn more. Even if the latter seems like a better option, you do need visibility for new prospects to keep coming and that’s exactly what comes from post engagements.
Thought leadership materials
The second pillar of your communication should be thought leadership content. Even though the phrase may seem overused, it didn’t become so ever-present by accident.
The idea behind thought leadership is to present yourself as a brand with innovative ideas that is worth listening to. It also builds on the previous type of content, while adding various tips and foresight on burning industry topics.
When you can convince prospects that you can prepare them for what’s coming, you’ve done half of the job already. Try rethinking the how-to format and really dive into preparing materials that can be beneficial for your buyer persona. Whether it’s a market report or an analysis of rising trends, be sure to gauge the pulse of your market.
A good way to get a feeling of what you should focus on is simply by asking – put up a poll and let the audience decide between important topics. This way you’re showing both that you care about their opinion, while also providing valuable information.
Solution-oriented content
Finally, the third step of the way is the solution. Prospects mostly come looking for something to fix their issues and you need to show them that they came to the right place. This content comes in many forms, but one of the best to use is video. It’s not a coincidence that you’ve been seeing a lot of videos on social media lately – it’s hard to imagine LinkedIn lead generation strategies without engaging content to keep the audience coming.
Attention spans are fleeting, so make use of materials you may have lying around and repurpose them as dynamic, polished bite-sized videos to get your prospects informed and ready to make a favorable decision. To provide a more flexible watching experience add captions to your videos, it will make your video useful when a person is watching it with the sound off or in a noisy environment.
Branch out to get more specific
When you freshen up your page, it’s time to get even more involved with other options at your disposal. Depending on the type of your product, there are some simple ways to branch out your Linkedin lead generation strategy, while also complementing the core setup.
Create showcase pages to segment LinkedIn leads
These specific pages are designed to help businesses promote different products, multiple brands, events, or other aspects that could have a more specific audience than the core brand as a whole.
Affiliated pages allow you to curate and promote content through different categories that also help you segment your leads more effectively, providing even more relevant content.
The extra effort you need to put in here pays off, as it showcases everything you have to offer without compromising the content we talked about and making things too cluttered on your page.
Hold webinars and online networking events
As a continuation of thought leadership and positioning your brand as the expert in your niche, online lectures and discussions can provide a massive boost to your LinkedIn lead generation. Focus on content that already proved to be a success – pick a topic that gathered the most traction on your page or notice a trend that appears frequently on your feed and invite prospects to participate in a webinar. Entry fee? Their contact.
Similarly, networking events put you in the center of your industry happenings, where you can connect with like-minded people, while also leaving an impression in the process and getting your business in front of some fresh eyes.
Create LinkedIn events for these occasions and encourage your colleagues to help spread the word, as the user engagement makes or breaks your reach.
Further Reading: 21 LinkedIn Best Practices for Business Professionals to Follow for Success
Moving away from your page to generate leads
Investing resources in quality content and making the most of your page is a great foundation, but it can be improved upon by considering some additional options to try getting to those prospects who haven’t been following.
Relevant users aren’t always going to find their way to you, so you need to get out there and find ways to gauge their interest with a well-timed and targeted presence that will feel tailor-made when they stumble upon it (and by stumbling we mean you will make it easy for them to do so).
Create niche groups
Whether you’re a sales rep, a decision-maker, or a professional looking for new opportunities, chances are you’re in at least a couple of groups. Those can be a good source of leads on their own, but you should aim to become the center of attention with a group that covers a specific subject in your area of expertise.
Even though it takes some time to build up a base for a good discussion to start developing, this helps you establish your brand as a leader in your niche, eventually providing you with a brand new qualified leads base along the way. To make it easier for the right users to find your group, use the right keywords and, similar to your “about” section, get straight to the point.
The conversations started in these kinds of groups can help you both get a better feeling of your ideal prospect types and how to reach them, but also identify influencers in the given area who are good targets for staying in the midst of industry talks. Their posts also come with big engagement, so that’s yet another opportunity to create a prospect list.
Introduce paid ads
When you’re forming your advertising strategy, try getting specific with your ads and combining them depending on the type of prospect and the funnel stage you’re currently at, keeping the shorter forms at the beginning and introducing more directly personalized ones down the line.
Types of ads you’ll be using are:
- Lead Gen Forms – as the name implies, these are one of your essential tools for LinkedIn lead generation. They can be combined with Sponsored Content and Sponsored InMail campaigns, while the visibility is reserved for mobile devices.
- Text Ads – similar to search engine ads, they provide a good opportunity to do A/B testing, with two models available – cost per click or cost per thousand impressions. Just keep in mind these are only available on desktop.
- Sponsored Content – the placement is directly in a user’s news feed. You have more text and larger images at your disposal and this is a good way to bring more users onto your landing page.
- InMail Messages – a well-known method that is made for getting more leads, as well as for engaging your prospects with personalized, direct messages to their inboxes. InMail also has an advantage of 100% deliverability, as they are sent to every user from your target audience that is online and places you at the top of their inbox.
- Dynamic Ads – same as the text ones, these are also presented only on desktop. What makes them stand out is their personalization, as they are dynamically created and personalized. They are also very good at bringing visitors to your landing page and can be the perfect tool in building up a bigger follower base.
We discussed some of the sources that can help you create your perfect audience for targeting ads. Aside from that, using Matched Audiences options can be crucial in your paid ads’ success.
This allows for different types of targeting:
- Company targeting – used mostly in reaching decision-makers and key companies
- Contact Targeting – useful for already known contacts, such as leads gone cold
- Retargeting – delivering unique content based on their interactions with your brand, ideal for landing that conversion
When in doubt about which method to use, you should refer back to the content on your page. See what worked the best with each group and use that material in your paid ads.
Implement tools
When it comes to automation, whether it’s for prospecting or CRM, you shouldn’t shy away from LinkedIn tools that make every day easier.
Not only that you save time by including quality platforms, but nurturing your leads and following up on your results becomes far more efficient.
Advertising on LinkedIn also becomes easier with the right tools, both in terms of creating the ads and the follow-up that’s needed to convert those well-earned leads.
Tools also come with the benefit of personalization, making it simple to make each prospect feel like they matter (as they should) and saving you the time needed to focus on other parts of your strategy.
Further Reading: The Top 14 LinkedIn Tools to Grow Your Business in 2021
Summing up this LinkedIn lead generation advice
Take a step back and assess your current LinkedIn presence. Then start acting on it and filling out the gaps. We’re all facing a lot of competition each step of the way, so it’s essential to be thorough and give each phase the attention it needs.
Start building up from the look of your page, then work towards being more present, providing value to your followers.
After you’ve taken control of your everyday communication, start branching out and reach an even wider audience across the platform. Unfortunately, not all prospects will flock to you, but you can meet them halfway.
Of course, both LinkedIn’s and external tools are there to give your strategy a much-needed boost that will help you tie everything together and put together a sound plan that will see your results soaring.
Further Reading: Current Trends on LinkedIn Lead Generation
Guest Post Author Bio
This guest post was written by Stefan Smulders. Stefan is a SaaS Entrepreneur | Founder of the World’s safest software for LinkedIn Automation – Expandi.io | for more than 5 years Founder of LeadExpress.nl.
Hero photo by LinkedIn Sales Solutions on Unsplash
LinkedIn Lead generation FAQs
Here are the ways to generate leads on LinkedIn:
1. Always include Call to Action on your landing page.
2. Know what your audience needs and be consistent with posting content
3. Set up showcase pages where you can promote your products and services.
4. Create LinkedIn events, online webinars and discussions.
5. Build niche groups
6. Create ads strategy
LinkedIn has a feature called LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms which helps businesses who have accounts on the platform collect quality leads through pre-filled forms with LinkedIn profile data. It works when a user clicks that call-to-action button in an LinkedIn ad where the Lead Gen form is attached. The form is then automatically filled with the user’s contact information. In this way, users won’t need to manually type in their information.
The leads from LinkedIn go to wherever you target them. Users who click your call-to-action or sign up to it can be lead to your website, e-commerce store, everywhere. You also have an option to download the list of your leads from the Campaign Manager section or sync your leads with your chosen CRM system. You can only do this if you are a Company Page admin, or has Lead Manager Access.
Realistically speaking, 1,000 leads a day sounds impossible to achieve. However, we can still never say it cannot happen. If you are aiming for 1,000 leads a day, you need to create a game plan on how you can generate that number of leads monthly. Be consistent and stick to it and who knows, you might just get surprised that you did it!
Here are the ways on how you can get free LinkedIn leads:
1. Optimize your LinkedIn profile and create a good impression of you there.
2. Create high-quality content that will get the interest of your LinkedIn followers.
3. Join groups in your industry and get involved in the discussions.
4. Follow LinkedIn influencers and engage with them on their posts.
