How Do You Use LinkedIn To Better Your Business?

Richard: We talked about groups and answering questions. What other ways have you found to interact on LinkedIn that helps you in your business?

Lynda: I want to talk to you about my very simple system, which anybody can use. You do not have to do it exactly the way I do. Here’s what I do.

I have a generic message, which I keep on my desktop. You can steal this. I don’t care. It says, “Great to meet you.” I put the person’s name in. “Hi, Bob,” or “Hi, Susan. It’s great to meet you on LinkedIn. How can we help each other?” I think that is powerful.

I do not start off saying, “I want your business,” because I don’t even know if there is anything we can do together. Very often, when I do that somebody comes back and says, “I need your services.” However, that does not always happen.

I start with, “How can we help each other?” Then, I say, “I have a free report, the Five Step System to Generate Fresh Customers Daily. Would you like a copy? If so, please email me outside of LinkedIn, and I’ll send it right over.” Then, I put my email address.

Richard: This put an idea into my mind as an alternative to your greeting. You can say, “Bob, thanks for connecting with me on LinkedIn. I’m curious, what prompted you to connect with me today? How can I help you?”

Lynda: Yes, you can put anything that is just a nice, personal message. When you want to connect with somebody, LinkedIn will put in a generic message saying, “Thank you for connecting on LinkedIn. I’d like to add you to my professional network.”

I tell people do not use the generic message. Whatever you put, just make it a little bit personalized. Even just add a line ahead of the generic message.

I think it is really important, also, to somehow lead them to some other step. That could be your website, or to connecting or having a conversation. Somehow, try to get to a next step. That is my goal. Do not just leave it as a connection. Then you never hear from them again.

Let’s say you see somebody you want to connect with. You can connect with somebody that is your level; or somebody sends you an invitation. If someone is your second or third connection, there is something you can do.

You could ask somebody you know. Often, you can find an intermediary connection that knows both of you to connect you. I find that kind of takes a long time. It’s kind of a lot of effort for the other person.

A sneaky way to do it is check what groups that other person you want to connect with is in. If you belong to the same group, LinkedIn allows you to connect as a group member. If you’re in the same lawyers group for Happy Lawyers, say, “Hey, Steve. I noticed you’re in the Happy Lawyers group. I am too. What’s going on in your world?” Then Steve is probably going to say yes. Right?

Richard: I noticed when you send a request to connect with someone that is not in your circle or outside of your circle, it asks why you want to connect. It leaves a box open. It looks like a personal message.

If you don’t know Bob, you could say “Hey, Bob. I was hoping to connect with you because I do this kind of work. I thought because you do that kind of work, it might be interesting to learn from you, and vice versa. Do you mind connecting with me?” That’s a lot more personal than just, “Hey. Connect with me on LinkedIn.”

Lynda: Exactly. If you personalize it a bit and have some reason to connect, most people will connect.

Richard: Is there a certain threshold of the number of contacts where things will change for you? Do you need 100, 500 or 1,000 contacts? Does it matter?

Lynda: I think you need a few hundred to have enough to get some business. If you only have 50 contacts, maybe those 50 people do not need your services. Reach 200 to 300 maybe. This is not scientific. It is just my feeling.

You need a certain threshold of people because you just do not know who is going to need your services. You just need to keep connecting with people. You also need to be visible in the groups. Sometimes I get clients and we are not even connected. I realize later that we never even connected. They saw my blog post in the group.

Richard: Really?

Lynda: Yes, I often get clients just by them reading my blog post, and then they sign up for my newsletter. They like what I am writing. So they call me, and I get business from them.

Richard: What volume are you getting, in terms of people visiting your site or joining your list?

Lynda: It is not a huge volume of people. I get 10 to 12 a week. I do not have a huge list, and yet I get business from a small list. My list is very targeted. I think that is the key also. The more targeted you are and the more you write and participate in groups targeted to your market, the easier it is to get business. If you are very general, then it is always harder.

Richard: That is nothing to shake a stick at. 10 a week is over 500 people a year getting to at least see your content on your site because of LinkedIn. I see how that could add up tremendously.

Lynda: Yes, it is true, actually. I have only been on LinkedIn just about over a year. I went from zero to, I think, over 1,000 now.

Richard: That is amazing.

Lynda: Yes, to be honest, I spend not that much time. I spend a few minutes a day on it. I probably spend 15 minutes a day connecting with people. I do not spend hours a day.