Does LinkedIn Fit Your Online Marketing Strategy?

If you still think that LinkedIn is just a social media platform for job seekers and recruiters, think again. LinkedIn was founded in 2002 and today has over 500 million members and more than 250 million members logging in each month.

A large number of those members are the movers and shakers of the business world. Approximately 61 million are senior level influencers, and 40 million are in decision-making positions. It’s the most-used social media platform of Fortune 500 companies. More than half of all social traffic to B2B sites comes from LinkedIn, and 94% of B2B marketers use LinkedIn to distribute content.

How do you know if it’s worth the time and investment for your business? And if it is, where do you focus your efforts? Here is some research to help you answer those questions.

Although LinkedIn doesn’t share the number of users with specific types of accounts, they do report that Human Resources is the most connected job function on LinkedIn followed by product management, business development, marketing, and consulting. In addition, LinkedIn has over 10 million job listings. Staffing and recruiting is the most connected industry on LinkedIn followed by: · venture capital and private equity · human resources · management consulting · online media

According to a recent LinkedIn earnings report: · talent solutions made up about 65% of its revenue · marketing solutions made up about 18% · premium subscriptions made up about 17% So, where do you think LinkedIn will put most of its focus? It’s a safe bet to say talent solutions because it makes up more than two-thirds of the platform’s revenue. This suggests that LinkedIn probably won’t be putting as much effort into marketing and advertising improvements as other social media platforms do. Therefore, consider other ways – besides paid advertising – to utilize the power of LinkedIn.

One way to leverage LinkedIn is to focus on developing long-form content. The amount of material posted on LinkedIn has had phenomenal growth. Data shows that in 2014, approximately 1,000 blog-length articles were published each month. In 2015, that number went up to 80,000, and by 2016, there were about 130,000 articles posted on LinkedIn each month. Unlike other social media platforms where visual content performs best, it appears that long-form content performs best on LinkedIn. The most shared content were articles of 1,000 to 3,000 words, but surprisingly only a small amount of material posted on LinkedIn was more than 1,000 words (approximately 17%). BuzzSumo discovered that the subject matter that seems to perform the best on LinkedIn is focused on personal, professional, portraying (a path for change), and point (towards past experiences). The popularity of this more serious content on LinkedIn makes sense since it is more of a business-networking site than other social media platforms.

There is a lot of interest in LinkedIn among marketers. More than 56% of marketers surveyed, currently use LinkedIn as part of their social media marketing strategy. It’s no surprise that 81% of B2B marketers use LinkedIn while only 44% of B2C marketers are using it, that’s nearly a 2:1 ratio. Over the last year, 31% of marketers have increased their use of LinkedIn, and they’re posting an average of four times a day. Over the last year, approximately 31% of marketers have increased how frequently they post on LinkedIn. As for the future… More than half say they’re planning on increasing their posting activity and only 2% say they’re planning on decreasing their activity on LinkedIn.

However, for the first time in the history of Social Media Examiner’s social media marketing industry report , Facebook has surpassed LinkedIn by a minimal margin as the most important social media platform for B2B marketers. It seems that many marketers are still trying to figure out how to make LinkedIn work for them.

Still not sure if or how LinkedIn fits into your online strategy? Give Power Marketing International a call at 484-297-6395 or contact us online . We can help you design and manage a digital marketing strategy that’s optimized for your business!

This post is adapted from “ LinkedIn Marketing: What the Latest Research Reveals ”