LinkedIn GPS!

She is your LinkedIn genius. She is actually amazing with the information she has about LinkedIn. So today we get to pick her brains and learn some really cool things about the new stuff that LinkedIn is offering. So welcome, Laura.

Dotty, gosh, thank you for that wonderful introduction. I do love LinkedIn, and anybody who's ever heard me speak knows that it is my passion. So I'm thrilled to be here and sharing with your audience some of the things I've learned.

So tell me, why LinkedIn over all the other options out there?

Oh my goodness, right? Well, about, I don't know, 8 or 9 years ago, I realized I really wanted to expand my reach and had done all of the, like, in-person networking in town. And we're a pretty small town here in Knoxville, Tennessee. And, you know, you see the same 20 to 50 people every week, right?

Yes. With that in-person networking.

Right. Right. And I was either doing business with them already or it wasn't the right time or whatever. So I thought, I've got to expand. So for my own uses, I really— I spent thousands and thousands of dollars and hours and energy reading, learning, digging into every aspect of LinkedIn and then created some systems for myself to get business, and it worked. So then I trained my little tiny small sales team on my, my product, our stuff, right, to use it, and it worked. So that went on for years, and I knew that LinkedIn was the place for business owners, right? And then, um, it's so funny, I started— when the pandemic hit, started showing up on networking, online networking, and somebody would have a question about LinkedIn and I would know the answer. So I would just put it in the chat, you know, and that became commonplace. And then it started with, do you train on this? Is there a course? Do you know, can I consult with you? And I said, sure, I train on this, and proceeded quickly to create some options. But yeah, and, and you know what I found is that when you understand how to use LinkedIn, um, you can get business there. It doesn't have to be a headache and it doesn't have to be overly complicated. And it works across industries.

So what is it that most business owners do on LinkedIn that they're like missing? Like, because I always hear I don't get much results, but I know you get results and I get results. So what are they missing?

That's a really good question. So it really starts with the profile. Oftentimes someone's pro— profile is not, um, optimized. And by that I mean, for example, they don't have a good headshot, because everything's a first impression, right? Everything. You get that one chance. And so they don't have a good headshot, they may not even have a banner picture— oh my goodness— um, and if they have one, it may not really be telling people what they want to know. Like, if you're not talking to your target audience from the very beginning they're moving on. If they are not self-identifying based on your profile, they're going somewhere else. So that's one reason. And then they really don't have their sections turned on. They don't understand what those sections— the purpose of those sections. Oftentimes their About section will look more like a resume. It should not ever look like a resume unless you are actually looking for a job. And even then, I would say not really. It is about your prospect. It is about your target audience. It's a, it's a sales page that we don't call a sales page, because one thing they also get wrong on LinkedIn is thinking they're selling. You are not selling on LinkedIn. You are connecting. You're building relationships with the right people. And that's the other thing. Yeah, they just accept every connection request that comes through and they connect with everything that LinkedIn suggests. Well, that's not what I would call a curated connection list, right? That's not a cultivated one that has your target audience of connections, right? So you could have 10,000 connections, but if they're all with the wrong people, who cares, right? So those are some of the big mistakes, uh, and then if they manage to get a, uh, connection with somebody that would be a possible prospect, they don't know how to engage with that person. So they pitch them in their first message. Oh my gosh, please don't.

Oh, I can't tell you how frustrating that is.

Right. I mean, most people will ignore you, if not unconnect, disconnect you when you do that. It's just not the place.

So, so I want to invite people to go ahead and put your questions in the comments. I should see them, and if I do, I will read their question out to Laura. Otherwise, I'm gonna pick her brain with all of my questions, which may not be yours. So feel free to participate, we would love that. Laura, I do want to comment about the, the thing that you said about the profile picture. I can't tell you how many times somebody has connected with me or tried to connect with me, sent me a message, whatever, and there's like no picture. I find that such a turn-off. What about you?

Well, it is a turn-off. It is also a signal of a bot.

Oh, tell me more about that.

Don't accept those, okay? So, you know, unfortunately, the world we live in today is all about automation and bots and not— and I guess trying to get out of doing the actual work. But anyway, um, you still have to do the actual work. So, but when you get those connection requests that have no identifying information, and maybe it looks like maybe they have 5,000 connections, and you think, how can that possibly be, right? Yeah, well, it's a lie, okay? It's a lie, people. They have gotten in there and manipulated the system, and it's a lie. Um, but there are ways to detect that that I really don't have— I don't want to take the time to go into right here, but one of those ways is just looking at their connection request. So if somebody's sending you a connection request and it doesn't have a note with it. Ah, and pictures, right? Then that's a, a, a red flag. When it doesn't have a note, here's a cool thing that you can sometimes do. So not everybody has this feature, but look for it if you do. If they send a note and it's like one of those notes that says, I'd love to connect with you, your profile looks great, or I'd love to connect with you and add you to my network, okay, that's just generic. Right, right, right. So instead of just accepting it, you can reply without accepting. Oh, and what you do is say, well, what was it that made you want to connect? What about my profile made you want to connect? And then you can decline because you've sent them a message. Now if they reply, then you'll get an answer and you can decide then. And it'll show up in your inbox. If they don't reply, they're not for real.

Got it. Great tip. Yeah. Now I have this burning question and it has to do with my personal profile and my business profile. What is the difference in— how do we like make that all work together?

Great question, Dotty. Really, they're both needed. Um, at the very least, you want a company page for the sole reason of being able to put your logo on your professional page, on your personal professional page. So on your personal page, as I think you know because I have coached you to get your business page, uh, and you have your logo by your name in your intro section. Instead of the gray box, right? That's another thing, guys. People— if you have a gray box by your company name in your intro section, you have less credibility immediately. Just immediately. Like, is this even a real business? Are they serious? You know, it's just— and it's not a conscious kind of bias, it's an unconscious bias, but it is one you will see the effects of. So that's— if, if for no other reason you want to create a company page and have your logo on your profile page, your personal profile page. The company page, if you're not going to use it, I recommend putting up a picture, a banner picture that says under construction. That way people will not go, well, what's going on? I thought she had a business. Oh, she does, she's working on this page. Okay, cool, right? You're not going to be inviting people to it until you start using it. Now, okay, once you start using it then you want to be inviting people to follow it. People who follow your company page are automatically pre-qualifying themselves as prospects. Oh, perfect, right? So that's a reason right there, in my opinion, right? And you can invite, um, I think 250 people a month to your, uh, personal comp— I mean, to your company page. So you just go through your connections and, you know, select those people who you think would have an interest., right? Don't just click everybody. Don't do that. Um, be selective. And then start posting. And you can post once a week, right? And I'm all about scheduling posts. We have to schedule. And LinkedIn has that great new feature now. Everybody should have it. You can schedule your post directly from LinkedIn. And how you do that is when you go to make a post, just like normal, you type out your post, and then you'll see a clock icon. Somewhere on that post, usually at the top right of the post option. Sometimes you have to click the more button, but usually it's now at the top or bottom right there for you to see. So you type out your post, click the clock, schedule when you want it to come out. You're done. You could do 5 of those at a time, right?

That's awesome. So you mentioned that that is a new feature.

Yeah.

Can you give us a rundown of some other cool new features that LinkedIn's put out?

Well, I think I can. So there are so many, right? And this next one, it's not so much new as underused, and I really want people to know about it, and that is turning on Creator Mode.

Oh, what's that?

Creator Mode is the tool that LinkedIn gives us to better market ourselves. So what's better than that, right? And here are some of the things it allows you to do. One, it will give you better analytics, which we can always use to grow our business, but also it allows you to publish newsletters. Newsletters, which can really grow your business in a big way. Newsletters had a rocky start, uh, they took off like, uh, you know, wildflowers or something at the beginning, and everybody realized they had too many and they didn't want any of them and they all canceled. And so they kind of took a downturn. But now people have figured out there are newsletters that I want to see, I just need to be selective. And so what we're finding is if you are niched down good enough and your profile is optimized and your newsletter provides value, you will get subscribers rather quickly. I had over 600 subscribers in my first 24 hours to my newsletter.

Wow.

Blew me away, right? And I know others who have had, you know, similar successes. I, I was shocked I got 30. Like, I didn't expect to get 30 initially, right? I figured this is a slow burn. Right? And it's okay if it is, because let's face it, LinkedIn training is something people want and are always like willing to look at. And I typically do like a 3 tips. So anyway, so that's not a new feature, but when you definitely want to turn on— another reason for turning it on, and this is huge, folks— you can put a hyperlink right in your intro section. So your call to action could say Click on the link below to get whatever your asset is, whatever your— if you want them to go to your website, probably not my recommendation, but if that's what you want, you can send them there. I would think a landing page with a checklist. And the point of this is twofold. One, to educate your people, but also to collect and build your email list.

Perfect. And I just wanted to clarify, the link comes with Creator Mode, not the newsletter, right?

That is correct. So the newsletter and the link come with creator mode.

Is there anything else that comes with creator mode that's significant?

You know, not really.

Okay.

It switches the button from connect to follow. So you can tell people that, but I think most people know how to connect if they can't follow. But if they don't, you just click on the 3 little dots and you can choose connect instead of follow and If you have follow on, though, here's what you do, okay? You're the business owner, you got to be proactive here. So when you switch to creator mode, keep up with who follows you, and you can see this on your notifications tab, okay? So, okay, see who follows you and then invite them to connect. Hey, thank you for following me, wanted to just send out a connection to, uh, an invitation to connect with me directly so we can message each other. Would love to get to know more about you and your business. And I just gave you the message that you need to use.

Great tip. So now what else for new features?

Yeah, yeah. So another, and this is, I think most people probably have this by now, so look for it. And that is the ability to add a video behind your headshot.

I saw yours yesterday and I was wondering how you did that.

Yes, ma'am. So I'll be honest, I've had it for a little while. I'm a little video camera shy, believe it or not, and, uh, and I wasn't sure how to do it. So, so I did it. And, uh, the way you know if you have it, you have to do it from your phone. Ah, so that is huge. So you go to your— that's another thing, I don't ever work on my phone, so had to shift. So, uh, so go to your phone, click on your headshot and you will see an option to add a profile video. There are a lot of ways to add that video. You can pre-record it and upload it, which is what I did because I wanted my—

so you're pre-recording it on your phone, right?

No. Oh, no.

Okay.

I pre-recorded it on my desktop, emailed it to myself, and downloaded to my phone.

Okay, so it just needs to be on your phone or accessible from your phone.

Correct, correct. Okay, so, uh, so that's what I did because I, yeah, I couldn't manage the little screen. And anyway, I'm— yeah.

So does that little green dot that's now on your profile picture, it— does it indicate there's a video, or is that something different?

That is something different. People get this so confused. I'm so glad you asked that. The green dot simply means that the person you are Who has the green dot is currently on LinkedIn. Oh, that's all it means. Oh, they are currently on the platform. That's it.

So that means if I never really sign out, I always have a green dot even though I'm not really there.

Yep. Pretty much.

Is that a good thing or a bad thing?

It's not. It's neither. Right.

Okay.

It may, it may encourage engagement. Right. If you know. Um, but yeah, it's neither. And oftentimes it'll say, um, it'll tell you mobile even if you, um— oh, if you look at it, then not everybody has that ability. So I don't know, you know, the thing about LinkedIn, and I just want to say this, guys, they don't give us a roadmap to the features they're going to roll out. And when they do roll them out, it is not all at once. Regions, right? So they, right, they beta test it and then it may never get to everybody, right? And if, and if it seems well received, then they'll roll it out in two more regions or whatever. And who knows the rhythm for that, right? And you know what, the way we find these things are is so-called in the wild. So I am always looking for new features and here's how I found a couple. I routinely check out my ad sections, button, and I recommend you do the same.

Your ad section?

Yeah, if, um, I don't mean like an advertisement, I mean to add. Yes, thank you for that clarification. So on, when you're on your profile page, your personal profile page, you will see a button that says add section. Click on that, make sure you have looked through all of them and that you have activated as many as are appropriate. And if you are a coach consultant, trainer, anybody who has courses of any variety, there is now a cool section called Course Listing or Add a Course. I can't remember exactly what it says, may just say Courses. But anyway, click on the one with the word course in it under the Add sections, and I believe it's under Recommended or Additional. You'll just have to look at where it is on yours, but it's there. And what that allows you to do is show people immediately, right off the bat, the kind of work you do. Oh yeah, right. They can just look at that and go, oh cool. Now if you do this, you'll need to do it, refresh your page and scroll to the bottom because that's where it lives right now.

Can I move it higher?

No, not right now.

Okay.

That may come. Hopefully it will. But right now that is on my list to do today.

And I challenge anybody listening that has courses, you likely haven't done that. So let's do that today.

And here's another thing you can do today, and that's— and it doesn't take much time— along those same lines. Now when you go to your endorsement section, we all have that in, right? So you go to the endorsement section and you will see a button that allows you to add to it. And what you get to add is credibility, so people know why they should endorse you. Like, what gives you the right to say you train on LinkedIn, right? Well, what I can do there is, guess what, add my courses.

Oh, so you would do that after you actually add them onto the platform, right?

Correct. Right, right. And you can also— I mean, you can add anything from the experience section. This is all different kinds of things you can add. So Well, you're limited to what LinkedIn tells you you can add, but there are a lot depending on your profile. It depends on how many options there are, that sort of thing.

But so if you have like, let's just say you have not put in your experience for some reason, will that not show up for you at that point?

That is right.

So the key is, is to get your profile as robust as possible first.

Yes.

And then go into the— that— this, um, which section was it, Laura?

Yeah, that is the endorsement section.

Okay, perfect. Yep. So we will— two things I'm gonna do today: add my courses and then go into my endorsement sections and connect it for credibility. Perfect tip.

Thank you so much. Do we have time for one more for me to share one more thing?

Oh, we've got all the time in the world.

Excellent. Okay. So speaking of experience, okay. Even if you have your experience section quote filled out, let me suggest that you reframe it on the experience section. First of all, you can add subheadings and you just do that with the edit pencil on the appropriate section you want to edit. So let's say I wanted to edit Barker Business Solutions. I— and if you look at my profile, you'll, you'll see how I've done this. Um, what you want to do there is frame that really as a sales page. So you're talking again to your ideal prospect or client, and you're saying, here's what— we don't use these words. Don't say, here's what I do for people. No, no, no. You say— that's not what you'd say on a sales page. Or if it is, maybe rethink that. What you want to do is list your experience, list your services as part of your experience.

Okay.

So if you offer a course, you're going to put it there too. It allows you to add media on the experience section, which you can't do other places. So you've got media.

Is that photos and videos or is it something else?

Photos and videos. Absolutely. Or PDFs, even whatever you want. OK, so you can add that there under each different subheading or under the main subheading, however you want to do it, right? But you want your experience section to inform the people reading it about what you do. Right. It's not just like I run the company. OK, no, that's not enough, right?

So back in the day when I started LinkedIn 16, 17, 18 years ago, It was promoted to me as this is your online resume, and that's how I filled out my profile in the very beginning. And so really it's evolved. It's no longer your online resume. It's more of your sales page advertisement. Here's why you want to use me kind of stuff.

Without selling.

Without selling.

OK, so, so here's the funny thing about that. Yes, it has really evolved from the job recruitment and job searching, although that is still a huge feature on LinkedIn. People get tremendous number of jobs on LinkedIn, but again, there's a strategy for that. It is not just like you put up there, I'm looking for a job. That's not going to cut it. But when I say you're not selling on LinkedIn, of course we all are, right? Just not directly. So that's what your profile is for. Your profile is there to do the heavy lifting for you. So that I actually get box, uh, messages in my inbox from people saying things like, I see you do LinkedIn training, I'd like to know a little more. Who doesn't want a message like that, right?

Yeah, that, that's like a client.

Indeed it was. And, and it's happened more than once. Not those exact words, but very similar, you know. Um, So it is phenomenal, and everything— pretty much everything you need to do can be done on the free version.

Perfect.

I will say this though, LinkedIn is shifting more and more features to their premium versions. So if at one point you were— you used to see more analytics than you do now, for example, you would have to get the premium version to see those increased analytics now.

If we're using a feature like that, that may be on the profile that is now premium, do they grandfather us in if we're already using it?

Well, they haven't taken a— okay, so no, there'll be no grandfathering in, I don't believe. Okay, but they haven't taken away anything except like reduce the size of the analytics that you see. Well, they— so they have to give away a few things, so You used to be able to see, um, without premium you could see 5 people a day who looked at your profile. Okay, I think, I think it's 3 now. So that means if you don't want to pay for premium, right, make sure you get on your notifications tab every day and make a note of who viewed your profile. You don't have to interact with them that day, although it's not a bad idea to. And, um, you know, send them a connection request, or if they're not already connected— if they are connected, then reach out authentically and say, hey, you know, we haven't chatted, we'd love to know what's going on in your business, how's 2023 starting for you? Ask a simple question that they can answer.

This be something that a VA could do for you? Yes.

Okay. A VA could go and collect that information for you.

Okay. And then you can do whatever kind of follow-up you want.

Correct. Correct. So let me say this. Never, never, never, never, never automate. Did I make that clear?

Automate your responses or automate what?

Anything on LinkedIn. Your responses, your posting. Don't automate it.

Now, that doesn't mean scheduling is automating, isn't it?

LinkedIn has scheduling now. So it's okay. Oh, right. Don't put extensions, Chrome extensions, or links on your LinkedIn. Don't do it.

I didn't even know they had any.

Oh, they do. Oh, believe you me, they do. It is— you will be detected now if you are using automation, and they frown on that. Yeah, by that I mean, like, let's say you've signed up for one of these services that says, you know, 100 new leads a week on LinkedIn and we do it all for you.

I get those messages all the time.

Never, ever, ever do that. First of all, you're going to get in trouble. It may not happen immediately, but you will get in trouble. And in trouble means at the best case scenario, a warning, but you might actually get put in what we refer to as LinkedIn jail, where you're suspended for a month. Mm, yeah, you can't use it for a month. Imagine, right? And kill me for sure. And then, and a whole lot of other people, right? I mean, we're all on here trying to get new business, and a month is a month. That's a long time. And worst case scenario, if they really didn't like your violation right, then they can shut you down. And I know people that has happened to, and they have to start— you have to start all over again.

And who wants to do that?

Not me. Not me. Right. And, you know, I just— there is so much that we can do with LinkedIn now. They have shifted from the whole job search recruiting mission, if you will, to understanding that, look, business owners are using this for business. We— and what they decided to focus on is relationship building. That's why I say we don't sell on LinkedIn. That's what your profile does. It informs people of what they need to know about. So then— and let me also say this, you've heard this before, I think, probably, um, there's riches in the niches, right? Or something like that. So, um, the more narrow your focus on LinkedIn is, the more successful your business development from LinkedIn will be. Yeah, the more you can narrow it down— you think you're, uh, limiting your prospects, right? You're not. You are enlarging them. Because what happens is the people who want to connect with you, the people who follow you like what you're saying. They are coming across your profile and thinking, where have you been all my life? And that's what you want them to think, right?

And they're reaching out to you and waving their hand going, hey, I'm here, right?

So get this, on that newsletter, yeah, I've got over 800 now, maybe 900, I don't know. It thankfully keeps going up. But, um, I get to know who all those people are. I can message them. They have self-identified as liking my stuff, right? So, and I want to make clear too, but when I said no automation, that doesn't mean you can't copy paste, okay? You can create a good message, copy paste, copy paste, copy paste. Always, always personalize it though. Always.

Yes.

If it looks like a message that could be just sent to anybody, it will be considered automation, if not by LinkedIn, by the person looking at it.

Yeah, which is a big turnoff. We all know that.

Huge, huge turnoff. I even got—

well, we are approaching the bottom of the hour.

Yes.

And I'm, I'm curious, Laura, is there anything you would like to tell our audience that you offer as far as LinkedIn goes, and how would they get to it?

Absolutely. Thank you for that. Yeah, so it's so important to me that everybody have at least a good start on your LinkedIn profile. I created a guide, 3 Secrets to Highly Effective LinkedIn Profiles, and it's a gift for me. I don't charge for this. I just want everybody to at least have a starting point. And if you've been on LinkedIn for a while, you might take a look anyway, just because we all kind of need to stick to get back to the basics sometimes. So all you need to do is go to the website Barker Business Solutions. And you will see right at the top when you go there the way to get the guide. You just click a button, says something like send me the guide now, or I don't know what it says, something like that. I can't remember what I wrote, but, um, get that and then, um, start working on it. And then we can interact. You can— I would love for you to connect with me on LinkedIn, and my, uh, LinkedIn name is Laura Barker J D, that stands for Juris Doctor, because I am an attorney. Ah, so I throw that in.

That means that you are one smart cookie.

Oh, as are you, my friend. Let me tell you, I have learned more from Dotty Scott and her Ask Dotty, uh, membership. I got Dotty— you have saved my life so many times. I, I am not tech savvy, but this woman is more than tech savvy. She is a genius. So if you haven't gotten on to Ask Dotty com. I highly recommend you do that even before going to my stuff. She's the bomb.

Well, we will put those links in the comments when this live is over so that everybody has access to them. We're just about ready to sign off. Laura, is there one last thing you want to say before we go?

Use LinkedIn. There's over 840 million users worldwide. And I know how to find your tribe. Let's connect. Yay!

Everybody have an awesome day, and I want to see your profiles. Put them— put links to them in the comments after you go in and spruce it all up, because we would love to check you out.

Awesome. And I will be— and I will be answering questions if you put them in the comments too. Can I do that? Is that something I can do?

Um, once the, the stream is done, yes, we can go back and we can put anything we want in those comments.

Wonderful, thank you.

Have an awesome day, everybody.