LinkedIn is an invaluable social network for B2B marketers. It gives you unlimited information on the users you care about, the firms they work for, and what they’re up to.
It works the opposite way, too. Other professionals and firms can learn about your products and services right from your company profile, directly from your killer content and thought leadership. Your firm has the potential to be in front of more relevant eyes than ever before.
This puts the power in your capable hands—how do you set your LinkedIn page up for success? What do you monitor to gauge this success, and where you stand in your industry?
Here are the key LinkedIn marketing metrics to measure so you don’t miss the opportunity to tell your brand story, engage with interested professionals, and generate qualified prospects for your business development team.
1. Start tracking engagement with your brand to keep tabs on the buzz around you and within your industry.
It’s vital to know how folks are interacting with your brand on LinkedIn. Administrators of your LinkedIn company page can access these insights by clicking the “Analytics” tab at the top of your page.
Use LinkedIn’s analytics to decipher how the content you’re sharing and what other people are saying about you influences your engagement levels. Check engagement both daily and week-over-week, so you can see any serious spikes or lulls happening in real time and react accordingly. This will also provide a good idea of the progress your firm is making over time.
2. Join any relevant groups in your industry. This will give you a fuller idea of what people are talking about more generally.
A great way to quickly gauge if a group truly consists of your target audience is to take a look at how the group’s members describe themselves. LinkedIn provides an overview of members in a group even if you’re not a member. This can be accessed by clicking the “i” at the top righthand corner of a group page. From there, click on “Group statistics.”
Alternatively, you can also accomplish this by checking out the most common words in their titles by running a Simply Measured LinkedIn Group report, or something similar:
The more you know about both your brand specifically, relevant groups, and your industry at large on LinkedIn, the better you’ll be able to craft killer content that harnesses the serious professional conversations taking place on this powerful network.
SEE ALSO: 3 Strategies to Take LinkedIn to the Next Level
Actionable tip #1: Sift through LinkedIn's rapidly growing number of members, learn a ton about how to attract the best job candidates, and gain visibility as an industry leader by compiling a list of the LinkedIn groups most relevant to you and keeping tabs on what's being said within them. Use this insight to get involved by crafting your own content—like SlideShare presentations—and linking to content that propels your brand.
2. Find your major conversation drivers and influencers.
Pay attention to the right people. Choose a metric to measure members by—company type, position, industry, location, number of connections, or all of the above—and compile a list of influencers you care about and want to engage with to broaden your own LinkedIn reach.
Actionable Tip #2: Discover who is well-connected in your industry, not just who has the most connections.
Ask those folks to guest post or partner with your company. Consider targeting folks active in a few industries to spread awareness where there might have been very little previously.
3. Keep track of where the clicks are.
Once you have a good idea of what’s catching visitors’ eyes, you can make more of it. What entices LinkedIn members to click through to a post? Is it a certain kind of image, title, topic, or the perfect mix of all three?
Actionable tip #3: Be a news source. More and more, professionals are heading to LinkedIn for industry information on Pulse channels, Companies feeds, and Groups categories. LinkedIn’s recent Newsle acquisition only enhances LinkedIn’s power as a news source, allowing you to find the names of your Facebook and LinkedIn contacts on the web by sifting through news articles and blog posts.
Don’t remain a spectator on LinkedIn. Start tailoring content to drive conversation—and do it by accurate, context-driven measurement.
Learn other ways to leverage LinkedIn for your professional services firm in the free guide, The LinkedIn Guide for Professional Services Executives.
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