LinkedIn is the redheaded step child of social media networks.
When Internet Marketing experts talk about social media marketing, they usually never utter the word LinkedIn.
They usually talk about Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and occasionally Twitter.
No matter what you do in digital marketing, networking will always benefit you and your business.
So the more you can network and expand your connections the better chance you’ll stumble upon someone or some business that will benefit you in some shape or form.
If you’re into consulting and working with local businesses, then you know how hard it is to get business owners to respond to cold emails, craigslist replies, and Facebook ads.
It’s all about the KLT (know, like and trust) factors.
One way to break the those barriers down is through referrals.
Ever notice how much easier it is to get a client that’s been referred to you by an acquaintance?
It’s night and day…
I don’t know the exact numbers, but I probably close 80-90% of referred business vs about 3-5% of cold business.
LinkedIn is constantly evolving with new features and making it a more viable option to really benefit from using it.
If you want to expand your connections, one of the best ways is to go out connect with 2nd and 3rd tier associates.
But if you are going to do that, you need to make sure you don’t over do it in a 24 hour period.
LinkedIn like Twitter, has limitations to how many people you can connect with in a day. So don’t try to connect with more than 20 or so per day.
Also when you connect add a note and put something like, “Hi, I see we’re a 2nd degree connection. I’m interested in hearing more about what you do and if there’s anything I can do to help you or your business. Talk soon! :-)”
I suggest trying to connect with everyone in your city or area, to do that I would say something about being in the same city (i.e “Hi, I see we’re a 2nd degree connection and also in Las Vegas. I’m interested in hearing more about what you do and if there’s anything I can do to help you or your business. Talk soon! :-)”).
This works great to get people to connect and typically even starts a conversation, but can become burdensome and a daunting task.
As an alternative you can just click on people’s profiles as it then notifies them of who has been viewing their profiles. This usually will peak someone’s interest and they will view your profile back and if you have a strong call to action the traffic will eventually result in new business.
But to click on profile after profile can also be a tedious task.
Wouldn’t it be cool if there were some sort of application that would automate this task for you?
Well you’re in luck…There is!
There’s a new piece of software and some training called LI Client Igniter that is a Google Chrome extension to automate this entire process.
Now if someone would just put out a Chrome extension that would do all the connections with a note on autopilot then we’d really be cookin’!
Maybe the guys behind LI Client Igniter are working behind the scenes on a second Google Chrome extension…
We’ll have to wait and see.
In the comments below, please let me know how these couple techniques workout for you and your business.
