These common mistakes could be killing your LinkedIn leads and this episode provides practical solutions to fix them. We cover three main areas: branding, optimising your LinkedIn presence, and ensuring your activities are effective.
Today's episode is sponsored by Metricool. Make sure to register for a FREE Metricool account today. Use Code MICHELLE30 to try any Premium Plan FREE for 30 days. https://i.mtr.cool/NEDXVZ
Key moments in this episode:
00:00 Introduction: Why Your LinkedIn Leads Are Drying Up
03:25 Branding on LinkedIn for leads
08:50 Optimising Your LinkedIn Presence
12:27 Effective Activities to Generate LinkedIn Leads
18:59 Final Thoughts
ABOUT MICHELLE J RAYMOND
Michelle J Raymond is an international LinkedIn™️ B2B Growth Coach. To continue the conversation, connect with Michelle on LinkedIn™️ and let her know you are part of the community of podcast listeners.
Connect with Michelle J Raymond on LinkedIn™️ - https://www.linkedin.com/in/michellejraymond/
B2B Growth Co offers LinkedIn™️ Training for teams to build personal and business brands and a LinkedIn™️ Profile Recharge service for Founders/CEOs.
Book a free intro call to learn more - https://calendly.com/michelle-j-raymond/book-an-intro-call-15mins
Social Media for B2B Growth Podcast is a fully accessible podcast. Audio, Video, Transcript and guest details are available on our podcast website - https://socialmediaforb2bgrowthpodcast.com/
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#LinkedIn #LinkedInMarketing #LeadGeneration
00:00:00
Michelle J Raymond: If your leads have dried up on LinkedIn, don't blame the algorithm.
00:00:03
Don't blame the market.
00:00:05
It's time to look a little closer to home and check.
00:00:08
Are you making one or more of the 10 most common mistakes that are killing your leads on LinkedIn.
00:00:15
And today's episode, we're going to talk about more importantly, how you can fix them.
00:00:38
G'Day, everyone.
00:00:38
It is coach Michelle J Raymond.
00:00:40
And I'm excited to be back again this week for another episode on how you can leverage
00:00:45
LinkedIn better to grow your business.
00:00:48
And one of the things that kind of drew me to doing this episode this week is that I'm seeing
00:00:55
posts more and more frequently pop up where people are talking about the fact that this
00:01:01
year business has been really, really tough.
00:01:04
That finding leads on LinkedIn is getting tough and there can be all kinds of reason
00:01:09
for this, some in our control, some out of our control, but in today's episode, I'm
00:01:13
going to talk about the 10 things that I think are killing your leads on LinkedIn.
00:01:19
Three areas that we're going to be having a look at.
00:01:21
Number one is going to be Branding.
00:01:23
So we're going to look at the branding issues that are killing your leads.
00:01:27
Then we'll move into the second part, which is not having your presence optimised on LinkedIn.
00:01:32
And the third thing that we're going to look at is probably the thing that is most important and
00:01:38
avoids you wasting your time on the platform.
00:01:41
And that is making sure that you are busy with the right activities and not
00:01:48
wasting time on the wrong activities.
00:01:50
I remember my mum always telling me, Michelle, it's not practice that makes perfect.
00:01:56
So doing the wrong things over and over and over again, were not
00:01:59
going to get me closer to my goals.
00:02:02
She says, perfect practice is how that we can achieve those goals.
00:02:08
So it's about how can we improve what we're doing?
00:02:11
How can we focus on doing the right things?
00:02:14
In today's episodes, I'm not just going to focus on the mistakes, but more importantly,
00:02:18
I'm going to give you solutions and we're going to jump into all of these areas right after a
00:02:24
quick word from our podcast sponsors, Metricool.
00:03:25
Branding is something that I've come to love more and more, the longer that I have my business.
00:03:30
And as somebody that spent 20 years in B2B sales and always thought that it was the sales team that
00:03:37
deserved all the glory, marketing really didn't do that much, I've certainly changed my tune on this.
00:03:43
And I think if you are really struggling with your business and not getting leads on
00:03:50
LinkedIn, branding is the first place that I would recommend to everybody to take a
00:03:55
look at, and there are three key mistakes that we're going to talking about, which
00:03:59
I think really kill your chances of leads.
00:04:02
The first one is not having clear positioning and messaging.
00:04:08
And what this does is this sets you apart from your competitors but it also gives you
00:04:15
clarity on how you want to show up on LinkedIn.
00:04:18
So before you even write a piece of content, before you update your LinkedIn profile, before
00:04:24
you write your company page about section, you need to understand exactly where you fit.
00:04:30
Now, I'm going to put a link in the podcast show notes to an episode that I
00:04:34
did in detail on positioning and messaging with Diane Wiredu, and it was fabulous.
00:04:40
So if this is something that you're like, Michelle, I'm not really sure
00:04:43
what positioning and messaging is.
00:04:46
I don't know how to do it, that I'm recommending that you take a listen to that episode.
00:04:51
The other thing, which I know is going to help so many people and the reason that I co authored
00:04:58
this book, The LinkedIn Branding Book is I needed a resource when I was starting my business.
00:05:04
I didn't know where these things really fit, you know, for me, branding was
00:05:10
always just colors and fonts and logos.
00:05:13
You know, that kind of stuff that makes every marketer listening
00:05:15
to this podcast rock in a corner.
00:05:18
And I totally get it, but the fact was I didn't know what I didn't know.
00:05:23
And the funny thing is, is that even when I've worked with some really big global clients,
00:05:28
I'm not sure that when it comes to social.
00:05:31
They're particularly clear on their positioning and messaging and how they want to show up.
00:05:36
So I don't think that there's any particular type of business that's immune to this, or if
00:05:41
you're an individual showing up on LinkedIn, it is definitely worth doing the work.
00:05:46
Not sure how to do it.
00:05:47
The good news is if you buy a copy of The LinkedIn Branding Book, which is available
00:05:51
on Amazon, it is going to give you a free workbook, which you can download.
00:05:57
Now, this workbook is going to step you through all of the steps that you need to address
00:06:02
to set up your brand from a foundational perspective, including positioning and messaging.
00:06:08
If you don't like reading and prefer to listen to podcasts like this one, you may not know, but I've
00:06:14
got another podcast that I co host with Michelle Griffin called The LinkedIn Branding Show and
00:06:19
we talk about this in detail every single week.
00:06:28
The second mistake that I see happen under branding, which I think kills leads is when
00:06:34
people don't have unique perspectives, unique points of view that really, you just blend
00:06:41
into the background, you sound like almost like the help desk or the Wikipedia or the
00:06:47
ChatGPT response, any of those kinds of things.
00:06:50
Cause what you have to say is just the same as everybody else.
00:06:54
So what makes you different?
00:06:56
I'll use my own case as an example.
00:06:58
So originally I was the only LinkedIn trainer in the world that was talking about the power
00:07:06
of company pages, everybody else was anti them.
00:07:09
Now it felt lonely and it was a bit tough and I wanted to give it up along the way.
00:07:13
But I realised that by being unique and having my own point of view and going against
00:07:19
the grain and not being contrarian for the sake of it, has allowed me to stand out.
00:07:24
And you know, that's how I'm getting to speak on global stages like Social Media Marketing World
00:07:30
next year in San Diego and Uplift Live in the UK.
00:07:33
So I hope that I'll get to meet some of you listeners at either of those events.
00:07:37
What's the third mistake that I see when it comes to branding on LinkedIn and how
00:07:42
that relates to killing your leads, is that you're missing from your content.
00:07:49
And what I mean by this is that there's a lot of people that share links to
00:07:53
other people's work, that they reshare.
00:07:56
Now I'm a fan of reshare if you are not at a point where you can create your own content.
00:08:03
But I'm not a fan of reshare, if that's all that you're doing and trying to get noticed.
00:08:08
The problem is you're putting the spotlight on everyone else and not
00:08:12
on yourself and your own brilliance.
00:08:14
Now, if you're not creating content, this would apply to the comments that
00:08:18
you also leave on other people's posts.
00:08:21
And if you're not doing either of those things or sending direct messages.
00:08:24
Ultimately you become invisible.
00:08:26
I can't buy from somebody that I don't know exists.
00:08:29
So this will also kill your leads.
00:08:32
If you are using LinkedIn to grow your business, you have to be visible.
00:08:37
So they're my three most common branding mistakes.
00:08:47
What else is going to kill your leads on LinkedIn?
00:08:50
Well, let's move into the next section, which is all about optimising your presence on LinkedIn.
00:08:56
And there's three main mistakes that I see under this umbrella, and they're really easy to fix.
00:09:02
That is making sure that your profile and your company page have been set up and fully optimised.
00:09:11
And fully optimised when it comes to company pages can be as simple as
00:09:15
making sure everything's been completed.
00:09:17
You will get 30 percent more weekly views on average if you do this task.
00:09:23
So go back, take a look and have a think.
00:09:27
What keywords do I want to be discovered for?
00:09:29
How can I really make it obvious what I do and who I do it for?
00:09:33
You want your potential leads to know that they're in the right place.
00:09:37
You also, with your personal profile, if you're one of those people that your profile
00:09:42
undersells, you hasn't been completed properly.
00:09:45
There are episodes of this podcast that I have done to help people go back and update it.
00:09:51
If you're someone that doesn't want to do it yourself, maybe you're time
00:09:54
poor, maybe you don't like writing.
00:09:55
It is really tricky to write about yourself.
00:09:57
Then why don't you reach out to me?
00:09:59
Let's book a session and I can talk to you about my LinkedIn profile done for you service.
00:10:06
That's right.
00:10:06
You can pay people like me to do it for you, and then you can cross it off your
00:10:10
list and make sure that you are there and an obvious solution to your ideal clients.
00:10:18
This is how we get leads.
00:10:20
If it's not completed, not optimised, then they're going elsewhere.
00:10:24
It's that simple.
00:10:25
You are not going to show in as many searches.
00:10:27
And that's why this work is so important.
00:10:30
This is another thing that I think you need to be mindful of when we're optimising your presence
00:10:34
on LinkedIn is having a strategic outreach plan.
00:10:38
By building a strategic community, ie not just scrolling the home feed and
00:10:43
hoping that the right people show up.
00:10:46
It means going to the search bar, using the many different filters that we've got there
00:10:50
and looking for people in your target audience.
00:10:54
The more times you're strategically connecting, you increase your chances of getting leads.
00:10:59
Why?
00:10:59
Because you've built the right audience of people that might be interested in your service.
00:11:04
The same goes with company pages.
00:11:06
Use your 250 page invites each month and use the filters to make sure that you're inviting targeted
00:11:13
industry members to come and follow your page.
00:11:16
The third thing that I want to raise with you listeners about how we optimise
00:11:21
our presence on LinkedIn is making sure that your actions are consistent.
00:11:29
If you are all over the place and you go through stages where you're really
00:11:33
hot on LinkedIn and really doing a lot of activity, and then you disappear.
00:11:37
Then maybe when you want something, or you haven't got enough leads, you come back again.
00:11:42
What happens in that gap is that your competitors are stealing leads from you.
00:11:47
They may not be as good as you.
00:11:49
But if I can't remember who you are or who your business is, it makes no difference
00:11:54
because there is so much research that basically says people buy what's good enough.
00:12:01
Doesn't have to be the best.
00:12:02
Doesn't have to be perfect.
00:12:04
It has to be good enough.
00:12:06
They have to be confident that you can get the job done.
00:12:09
So it could be that the average person or the average company page is showing
00:12:14
up and stealing your leads and I don't want that for you listeners.
00:12:23
As we head into the last section, which I'm just going to call.
00:12:27
Are you busy being busy or are you busy doing activities that will generate leads?
00:12:33
Let's have a look at the four remaining mistakes that I see, which are most common.
00:12:38
Because the last thing that you want to do is waste precious time.
00:12:42
That's a thing that we can't get back.
00:12:44
The first message that I desperately want to get across in this section is that when it
00:12:51
comes to LinkedIn, when it comes to social selling and leveraging it to grow your
00:12:55
business, you must, I can't say it loud enough.
00:12:59
You must focus on quality, not quantity.
00:13:05
And I know that there are tools out there, especially the AI tools that have come
00:13:09
out that make the dream of getting higher numbers, you know, connecting with more
00:13:15
people, leaving more comments, and I can see the appeal, but sometimes more isn't better.
00:13:21
And I would say on LinkedIn, it definitely isn't.
00:13:24
When I talk about my G.R.O.W.T.H framework with my clients, when I'm working with
00:13:28
them, we start with the game plan.
00:13:31
What is it that you're trying to do?
00:13:32
Who is it that you're trying to target and what services do you have that
00:13:36
would make a difference to those people?
00:13:38
And when we go into activities on LinkedIn with this in mind, then you'll
00:13:42
realise that it's not a big numbers game.
00:13:46
We can really shrink down the amount of work that you have to do, which for a lot of my
00:13:51
clients, it's the biggest sense of relief.
00:13:54
Because they're actually doing less work after we do the training than what
00:13:58
they were trying to do by themselves.
00:14:00
When we focus on quality, that could be quality of connections.
00:14:04
That could be quality of content, quality of comments.
00:14:07
It doesn't matter which area you're looking at, but every step and every
00:14:13
activity that we do is intentional with a target audience and a goal in mind.
00:14:20
And this is how we can generate more leads for our business.
00:14:24
This is how you can make sure that when those leads come into the business,
00:14:30
they are the best fit possible.
00:14:32
Not just getting big numbers just for the sake of it.
00:14:35
I always cringe when I get people reach out to me and send me those
00:14:38
emails or direct messages on LinkedIn.
00:14:41
Like we can generate a thousand leads for you or I got one where they offered
00:14:45
to generate a million leads for me.
00:14:48
Like.
00:14:49
What the heck am I going to do with a million leads?
00:14:51
So slow down if you're feeling overwhelmed and think where is the best bang for my
00:14:56
buck when I'm spending time on LinkedIn.
00:15:25
The second thing that I want to talk about when it comes to activity, which
00:15:28
probably is a follow on from the mistake of trying to go for quantity over quality.
00:15:34
And that's the distinct lack of personalisation on LinkedIn.
00:15:38
It's when you get those messages, which you just feel like you're one of a thousand that
00:15:44
was sent out that week, and they haven't done their work to take a look at anything to do
00:15:50
with who you are, what you do, checked out your profile, had a look at your recent content.
00:15:55
And if you're guilty of this, think about what it feels like to you when
00:16:00
it's done to you on the platform.
00:16:02
Everybody's got horror stories of their LinkedIn inbox being full of spammy sales messages
00:16:09
that are completely unrelated to the person.
00:16:12
In a world of AI, where these tools are making it easier and easier, be the opposite.
00:16:18
This is how we get more leads by not following the crowd.
00:16:22
You can't automate or outsource relationships, relationship building is done human to human.
00:16:29
I want people to start to think, how can I show up and have a conversation with another human on the
00:16:36
platform that is targeted for that person only.
00:16:40
And I think this is probably a great segue into mistake number three that I think is
00:16:45
killing leads on LinkedIn when it comes to being busy with the wrong activities.
00:16:49
And that is, I don't know, how do I put this nicely being self absorbed.
00:16:55
If you're on LinkedIn to make yourself look amazing, make yourself look better.
00:17:00
It gets really tired really quickly.
00:17:03
So being self absorbed and not curious about what's going on in the other person's
00:17:08
world, and by being curious, you could ask questions in comments on posts, ask
00:17:13
them to explain things a bit further.
00:17:16
If you're in the direct messages, a lot of people to me say they get
00:17:19
stuck after that first connection.
00:17:21
They've done a little bit of work to personalise the invite request.
00:17:25
But what they haven't done is gone back and taken a look and said, well, how can
00:17:30
I ask another question as a follow up?
00:17:32
So there's the, hi, thanks for connecting full stop game over nowhere to go.
00:17:38
So think about what is a question that you could ask them?
00:17:41
So I often ask people questions like, what is it that you love most about your job?
00:17:45
What's the biggest frustration that you have going on right now?
00:17:49
Have you been to such and such?
00:17:50
Have you seen this release of this new feature?
00:17:54
Find something else that's that common interest and get interested in knowing about them.
00:17:59
The more that you can relate to them, the higher your chances of them wanting to work with you.
00:18:04
And the last thing that I'm going to put, which I think is a big mistake, and that
00:18:10
is ignoring direct messages and comments on your posts and not responding to them.
00:18:16
Now I'm putting my hand up.
00:18:17
There are times when my LinkedIn direct message inbox gets out of control and I
00:18:23
end up, you know, going back to people and apologising that's taken me a little longer
00:18:27
than I would like to, to respond to them.
00:18:30
If you can relate to that, that's a different scenario to people that think posting
00:18:35
content or getting a ghostwriter to do it on their behalf is all that you need to do
00:18:39
on LinkedIn and it will take care of itself.
00:18:42
I've seen people do that.
00:18:43
And I've seen the ghostwriters get frustrated because they're saying, you know what?
00:18:48
I write the post, but LinkedIn comes from having conversations and building communities, and
00:18:53
that takes engagement and not just on your own posts, go and support other people as well.
00:18:59
You've now got a list of 10 things that are potentially killing your leads on LinkedIn.
00:19:03
And more importantly, you've got the solutions on how to fix them.
00:19:07
We're coming into the final stretch of this year.
00:19:10
You have three months left.
00:19:12
We're not slowing down.
00:19:13
We are the kind of people that are going to keep pushing to get better results
00:19:18
when our competitors are giving up and they're taking the foot off the pedal.
00:19:22
I just want to do a quick shout out to Regina Larko, who is now officially the head of the
00:19:28
Social Media for B2B Growth podcast fan club in Austria because she loves listening to
00:19:34
this podcast and I really appreciate the post that she did to share with her audience about
00:19:40
the value that she gets from this podcast.
00:19:43
It's just the coolest thing to know that these things are making a difference to people
00:19:47
and it's helping them grow their business.
00:19:49
So if this sounds like you and you are kicking goals, I'd love to hear about it.
00:19:54
Let me cheer you on and celebrate with you.
00:19:57
Until next week.
00:19:57
Cheers.
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