LinkedIn has proven to be a valuable platform for businesses small or big when it comes to networking with other professionals and generating leads. With more than 300 million members all over the world, the social media giant presents a big opportunity for businesses and professionals to connect with potential clients.
If you are a small business owner or a marketing agency, social media will only eat up a big chunk of your time and will take you away from important things in your business. But how can you grow your LinkedIn network without losing focus on critical business matters?
Getting Help From Your Virtual Assistant
Your virtual assistant will help you not just in managing your LinkedIn account but also in growing your LinkedIn network. Here are a few LinkedIn-related tasks you can delegate to your virtual assistant:
1. Managing your LinkedIn company page
Just like for your website or your other social media accounts, a virtual assistant can help you promote your company through LinkedIn and keep your page up and running. Treat your LinkedIn page as your company’s digital business card, which means that to make a good impression, it should be updated, active and well-managed.
2. Finding connection
The easy part is creating your profile and your business page. But to make LinkedIn work for you, you have to build an extensive network so that your profile will appear within similar networks in your industry. The real value here is in finding contacts. If you don’t have time to do this, your virtual assistant can help.
But first, make a criteria profile of your target connections so your virtual assistant will know whom to connect with. Work with your virtual assistant to craft an invitation script to make sure the message they send out for you is personal and professional. Your virtual assistant can check and review the invitations you get from other members so you’ll only connect with quality people in your network. Get your virtual assistant to add members who work in related industries, connect you with your existing customers, potential customers, business associates and partners.
3. Getting recommendations (and recommending others)
In LinkedIn, members can be endorsed for certain skills through the recommendations feature. Recommendations can help prove your business’ authority and reputation, as well as give people more reasons to connect with you. Once you’ve made connections, your virtual assistant can help you request for recommendations from people you’ve done business with. You can start asking recommendations from your colleagues, business partners, clients and former employees.
Likewise, you also need to recommend your connections to keep your professional relationship mutually beneficial. Have your virtual assistant draft a short description for your recommendation, including the person’s position and why he/she should be recommended for it. You can check and approve the recommendation before it gets sent out.
4. Researching and creating content
Just like other social media networks, LinkedIn is also a content-driven platform. And one of the best ways to demonstrate your authority in your niche is to utilise the article publishing feature. If your virtual assistant is assigned to write blogs for your website, have him/her post the same article on LinkedIn. Or ask your virtual assistant to develop niche content focused on your professional experiences or an important topic in your industry. Don’t forget adding links to your article to drive traffic to your website.
Aim to be an influencer in your niche by publishing regularly and sharing articles, images and quotes. Get your virtual assistant to help edit your videos to make it look professional with subtitles. Have your virtual assistant organise a LinkedIn content calendar just like what you have for Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and schedule them on your favourite social media scheduling apps at pre-determined times.
5. Joining or creating groups
Groups are a great place to connect with more people within your category and an avenue to establish yourself as a thought leader. Your virtual assistant can help you search for groups relating to marketing or any other services you offer and join the ones that could be of value to your business. Joining groups can help you widen your indirect connections and get more opportunities to grow your LinkedIn network.
And why not create your own LinkedIn group, too? Your virtual assistant can set this up for you. Have your staff invite all your current connections to your group and ask them to invite their connections as well.
6. Engaging with your audience
Social media is really about engagement. Likewise, interaction with your connections and followers is a sure-fire way to increase your visibility in LinkedIn, and eventually, build new relationships.
Here are a few things your virtual assistant can handle for you:
- Liking pages in your niche
- Interacting with the influencers in your industry
- Commenting on your connections’ updates
- Congratulating connections for a new job or job anniversary, as well as sending birthday wishes
- Sharing other people’s content
- Starting a discussion and sharing your articles in your LinkedIn groups
- Commenting in one of the discussions in your LinkedIn groups
- Sharing your articles within your network
- Thanking people for their recommendations
- Book appointments for you
There is a lot to do within Linkedin so having a virtual assistant to help you will save you a lot of time. With the LinkedIn strategy mentioned above, you will not only save time, you should expect to also make money from the new connections and opportunities that your VA helped to generate. To succeed in any platforms, make sure you have a plan-of-action in place and are committed to it 100%. Consistency is the key when it comes to social media.
If you like to learn more about hiring a Virtual Assistant to help you grow your LinkedIn network, chat with us today.
