24: How to Promote your Online Business Using LinkedIn

Welcome to the Course Creators MBA Podcast. I'm your host, Destiny Kopp. And in this podcast we're covering actionable tips to grow your online course business. But before I begin, I want to let you know that this episode is sponsored by my free mini course Course in a Box, which is your plug and play system with templates and videos to get your online course created. You can grab your free Course in a box by going to destinycop.com and this link will be in the show Notes. And today we are talking about how to promote your online business using LinkedIn. And I have a special guest with me today. I have Donna Serdula. And Donna is the foremost expert on LinkedIn profile optimization and author of the book LinkedIn Profile Optimization for Dummies. She's proven that a strong LinkedIn profile is the key to performing well on LinkedIn. And through her website, LinkedInMakeover.com, donna and her team of over 30 writers help thousands of LinkedIn users strategically write their LinkedIn profile in order to engage with their audience and grow their online brand. Donna, thank you so much for joining me today. I'm so excited to talk to you about LinkedIn. It's one of my favorite social media platforms and quite frankly, it's where I have the biggest presence. And I know a lot of the online course creators who are listening here today. They are very interested and want to learn as much as they can about using LinkedIn to grow their online course business. So can you tell me a little bit about yourself, your journey as an entrepreneur and how you came to focus your business on LinkedIn profiles rather than just social media in general?

Sure. Well, Destiny, thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate this.

Oh, I'm so looking forward to our conversation.

I love talking about LinkedIn. So this is, this is a treat for me. I will tell you this. I'm really excited to tell you that today. This month we are celebrating our 10 year anniversary of my business of starting Vision Board media. Back in 2009, when I first started, it was just me writing LinkedIn profiles and the deep dark dead of night. And it was in 2012 that I brought on my first two writers to assist me. They are still with me today. We've now over 30 writers. We've written over 5,000 LinkedIn profiles for executives and entrepreneurs and professionals from all over the world. It's been a crazy ride. But you know what I recognized very early on is that one, your LinkedIn profile is not your resume and number two, it doesn't matter if you're a high performer, if you are an amazing leader, if you're a great salesperson, or if you're a fantastic project manager. It does not matter who you are or what your capabilities are. It's always hard to write about yourself.

I can relate to that too. As you were talking through that, I'm like, you know what? I think my LinkedIn profile looks like my resume. And you're telling me that is not what we want to do.

It's not your resume. Which is funny because for the longest of time, now, now, Destiny, when did you join LinkedIn? Do you remember?

The year, you know, I was one of the first adopters, so I have been on it for a long time.

I joined.

Exactly.

I joined back in 2005. Isn't that crazy?

That is crazy.

A long time now. And I'm not even one of the earliest adopters because the LinkedIn was started in 2003 by Reid Hoffman. So I joined a few years after it started. But here's the thing back then and you hear today, just copy and paste your resume, copy and paste your resume, you'll be fine. That's all you need to do. But if you think about it, you know, not Everybody is on LinkedIn for job search. Some people are on it for branding, some are on it for reputation management. Some are on it to be seen as a thought leader. Some are on it for prospecting and sales. Not everyone is on it looking for a job. So if you, if you consider your resume, your resume simply is your professional past and it should align you to a job, that future job, whatever it might be. But with LinkedIn, you know, people are, anyone can see it, anyone can look at your LinkedIn profile and it really should be a digital introduction, it should be a first impression and it should be written very specifically to whoever your target audience is and what they need to know about you, what matters most to them. And that, that is how we want to write the LinkedIn profile for, to truly be successful.

So you, you brought up a lot of good points. So it's really your branding, your. Some people are on it for branding, reputation management, thought leadership, and you know, a lot of the course creators, I think listening here, they're, they're, they are personal brand. So what would you suggest to them? So let's just say they need to go in and revamp their LinkedIn profile. And I think most of them are on LinkedIn, but they may not be using it like they have been using in the past, like or the other social media platforms like Facebook or Instagram. But let's just say that they know there's a gold mine out there for LinkedIn. I'm sure you're going to kind of expand on that today. How do they get started? What do they need to do? What do they need to look at?

All right, well, there's, there's. My methodology is four points, but I'm going to add a fifth point for you, Destiny.

Okay. Okay.

I'm going to say to all of those, those coaches and your audience, you know, those, those providers that are out there. The first thing I want them to do is I want them to get out their smartphones and I want them to make sure that they have the LinkedIn app installed on their phone. Because what I have found through the years is that a lot of people think of LinkedIn as being a website that they visit. It's that desktop experience. It's on their laptop. It's on their desktop. And to get onto LinkedIn, you gotta open up a browser and pull it up. And the problem with that is it's so much more. And who really wants to be doing career stuff, work stuff on their computers? Especially in the evening, put it on your phone, They've got an amazing app, it's fantastic. And start using it that way. Because I find that a lot of people don't want to be on LinkedIn or they're not using it because they actually think they've got to sit down at a computer to do so. And you don't.

I want to do it by my pool. So, yes.

Put it on your smartphone, load up that app. That's number one. The second thing is, and this is typically my number one point is really try to figure out, why are you guys on LinkedIn? What are you really trying to get out of it? Why do you want to be on it? Figure that out. Some people will say, oh, you know, I'm doing this because, you know, I want to target my audience, I want to market to them, I want to be seen, I want to sell more, I want to prospect. But really, you know, get clear on what you're hoping to accomplish. And when you think in terms of that target audience, you know, again, be very strategic. Who are these people? What are they interested in? What is it that you. What are you going to be providing them? What is that value that you have? Get this out up front, because a lot of people just get on LinkedIn and they don't really think this through strategically, and then they scratch their Heads and wonder why they're not accomplishing anything. It's because they don't have the goals clear, set up front. So, you know, they're just sort of doing things, you know, spur of the moment, but really be very clear, you know, why Are you on LinkedIn? Who is your target audience? What is, what are the value? What is the value that you add? You know, how can you help them? And then the other part of this strategy is really think in terms of the keywords. And when I say the keywords, what I mean by that is LinkedIn is so much more than just a network. I really think of LinkedIn as being a search engine because a lot of people go on LinkedIn because they have a pain point. They have a need. There's a service out there that they need to know that a person fulfills and they need to reach out to that person. And so they don't know that you exist, but they know that there's someone doing that. You know, there's a way of describing it. So figure out, if a person didn't know who you were, they didn't know your name, but they were searching for someone like you, what would be those keywords? Because once you have those keywords, you're going to want to sprinkle them throughout your profile. So you're more apt to turn up in searches that way. When you're turning up in searches, you're colliding with opportunity that you wouldn't be otherwise.

I love that. So. And I've never heard Anybody refer to LinkedIn as a search engine. I've heard them refer to Pinterest, right, as an. As another search engine. But I've never, I've never even. That's never even crossed my mind to think about LinkedIn as a search engine. And that really does change things, right?

Yeah. Because here's the thing. The Beautiful part of LinkedIn is the results are really just a few things. People, company and at this point, posts. Right. Because people are posting things on LinkedIn now. But, you know, if you go to Google and you search, you know, you know, I'm just trying to think of like a service or something that maybe your audience might provide, you know, life coaching. You're going to get pages and pages, billions and millions of hits of all types of things, books and people and websites and articles, and it's overwhelming the results. But if you're looking for a life coach and you go onto LinkedIn and you type in life coach, you're getting people, you're getting people in your area, and you're getting people that know, people that you know. It's a perfect way of getting to exactly that person that you would potentially want to work with.

I love that. I love that. So that was so. So far we've covered, you know, get the LinkedIn app on your smartphone and get very clear on why you're there on LinkedIn, and then think of LinkedIn as a search engine. So there we go. What other tips do you have?

Okay, so that's. So we discussed getting it on your phone and then the strategy, really thinking this through. You know, who you are, what you provide, who your target audiences, what are those keywords a person might be using to describe you so you can get, you know, you can turn up in those search engines. Now, the next part of this is you need to optimize your LinkedIn profile. You need to make sure that it markets you, it sells you. It's a digital introduction. It's that first impression. When a person reads it, they know that you. You tried that. You put some effort into this, that you sat down and you were thoughtful, and you created an about page, basically, that really talks about who you are, how you help, it traces your trajectory. So they see that you didn't just, you know, rise from some ashes and you're suddenly this. This beautiful Phoenix, but know that. That you have a history, that what you're doing now comes from this deep, beautiful background where they could see that all of this has come together to culminate in the person you are today, making them trust you and feel good about you and making them want to work with you. So we want to craft a profile that tells a story that is very, very strategic, that it's written for that target audience. We're not saying too much, we're not saying not enough. We're just saying the right amount to get that person interested. So they want to reach out. They want to do something.

So how do I know, truly, if my profile has been optimized? I think mine is, but now that you're saying that, I'm not so sure. So I think I need to go back and look at it.

Well, you need to look to see how many hits you're getting. Are you getting a lot of hits? Are you not getting many hits? Are people reaching out to you? Are people messaging you on LinkedIn? Are you finding that opportunity is flowing? If you're sort of saying, you know what I mean? Not really. I don't get a lot of hits. I'm not getting a lot of messages. I'm not seeing a lot of opportunity. The answer is it's not. It's not optimized. And I'm going to tell you this, Destiny. Very few people spend the time necessary to make that profile, one that makes a person go, wow. But we all have a story. We all have a story that can be told. We just need to take that time and sit down and put it out there. And put it out there in a manner that gets others feeling good, feeling impressed, seeing this polished professional, because that's the type of person most people want to work with.

I love that. So I will know if my profile has been optimized based on the number of people who are viewing it, reaching out to me. You know, maybe. I don't know if dming on Instagram is the right way to say it, but that's, you know, that's what I use. So that. That would give you an idea on, should I go back and, you know, optimize it? Does it need tweaking here and there? So thank you for that.

And I find that, you know, I see this as something through all of social media, you need to constantly. Well, maybe not constantly, but with some frequency. You need to go back and audit your presence and really say, hey, am I on Facebook the way I should be on Facebook? Am I on Pinterest the way I should be on Pinterest? When was the last time I updated my LinkedIn profile? And I say, you should be updating your LinkedIn profile once a month, which might blow people's minds. But I say that for a number of reasons. One, this is a snapshot of who you are right now, and you're always having successes. Things are always happening to you, and you should be taking the time and putting it into your LinkedIn profile. Because if you think you're just gonna remember it, you're not. Our memories are terrible. So as good things happen, make sure you're putting them onto, into, right into your LinkedIn profile. Because there's honors and awards and there's publications, and there's so many areas of your LinkedIn profile that are just waiting, dying for you to put, you know, information in there to really showcase how robust you are as a professional. But there's another reason, Destiny. And the reason is if we think of LinkedIn as a search engine, just like Google, LinkedIn wants to serve up the best results. And a profile that is freshly updated is a much better result than a profile that hasn't been touched in six months or a year. So if you Want to. If you want to get a better search ranking with your profile, you want to turn up higher in the search results. If a person is searching for someone like you, the best way to do it is to make sure that your profile has been freshly updated.

I would have never thought about that, but that's a great point. So really, on your calendar, you need to go in and make sure every single month you are updating not just LinkedIn, but all of them. Thank you for that tip. Any other suggestions?

Well, in terms of optimizing your LinkedIn profile, I always say there's a few. There's just. There's a. There's a couple really easy, easy hits. The first one is your profile picture. And I know it's kind of silly. It's like, Donna, it's 2019. Do we really have to still be talking about this? Yes, we do. Most of these profile pictures out there are terrible. And if you want to put yourself out there as that brand, you better have a strong, beautiful, professionally taken headshot. Because when you see a professionally taken headshot, most people, when they see that, they recognize, they know that was professionally taken. And that means money, that means success. And people want to work with those types of people. So go out there and hire a photographer to take your photo. It's going to make all the difference in the world. The other thing is, if you're looking at your LinkedIn profile and I ask this of your entire audience, right this very second, go onto your LinkedIn profile and take a look at your profile and tell me if at the very top, right behind your picture, there's like a big rectangle. And if you see a blue image that kind of looks like a constellation, that means you do not have a background image uploaded. And this is a great opportunity for really setting your profile apart from the masses and truly branding it with your own flavor, with your own flair. And what you want to do is you want to get into your edit mode and you want to upload a background graphic. And I would say to you, maybe get an image of some of your online courses that you're selling, or maybe think back to your website or to your logo or think of a way of just illustrating your brand. If you're someone who really helps people do insurmountable tasks, maybe think in more of. In a manner of a person climbing a mountain or maybe a Sherpa helping guide people up a mountain. It's a great way of really illustrating your brand and subtly getting people to see you in a very specific way.

And one thing that jumped out to me when you were saying that, I was like, you know what, I should probably go in and add some of the PR type stuff that I've been on and just said as showcased here. So that was a great tip.

Oh, that's a fantastic thing. You know, if you could put in all the different places that you've been interviewed, that you've appeared, that you've been featured on, it's a great, it's a way of really letting people know, hey, I'm somebody, because I've done all of this great media outreach. So that's a fantastic thing. The other area of the profile that is so very, very important and so many people just leave it to the default. And that is the headline. The headline is right below your name. And this is so on the mobile version as well as the desktop version of your LinkedIn profile. And the headline by default is simply your current job title and your current company. But you have 120 characters and you can edit this. And I want you to turn it into your tagline. I want it to be a benefit statement. I also want you to infuse those keywords that a person might be using to find you. Because if we put keywords into your headline, that's also going to buoy you up in the search engine, in the rankings, in the search results. So when you think of that headline, I want you to think, how can I, in a very succinct, quick type of way, define myself to that person? And that headline follows you all throughout LinkedIn. It's not just on your profile, but if you are posting an article, if you're posting a blog on LinkedIn, if you're posting like a status update, if you're messaging someone, if you've written a recommendation, no matter what, it's always your name and your headline. And so if you do it in a really attractive, purposeful, thoughtful, but at the same time engaging, attractive way, you're going to find that more people are going to go, oh, who is this Destiny? This tagline is amazing. I need to know more about her. And they'll click your, they'll click on to read your, your profile and you're going to start to see more clicks, more views to your profile. And if you've optimized your profile, you might find that more people are converting to wanting to learn more about you. Reaching out to you. Now, I will tell you that if you Visit my website, LinkedIn makeover.com under the free resources, I have an online tool it's the LinkedIn headline generator and it's an app that anyone can access. You just, just fill in a couple, click a couple buttons and it will spit out a beautiful benefit statement optimized with keywords headline that you can immediately copy and paste right into your LinkedIn profile.

I am definitely going to check that out as soon as we get off the phone here. Oh, I love that. So as you are speaking, I had to pull up, of course, my LinkedIn app on my phone. I'm like, I'm not even sure if my headline is the way it should be, but I'm gonna definitely go look at your app, check it out and see if I need to make any tweaks there. I do have a question for you.

I'm ready.

And so many people, and myself included, we. You know, social media is very overwhelming. Right. I feel like I could spend, quite frankly, all day on social media. And the platforms are also different. Whether you're talking about LinkedIn or Facebook or Instagram or Pinterest. Could you talk to us or suggest a manageable way to approach working with LinkedIn specifically so that we can get the benefits of it without saying spending a ton of time on it all day long?

Yes. So here's the thing. You do want to make sure that LinkedIn is the right place for you and for your target audience. You know, with, with LinkedIn, it's still one of the very few, very few social networks out there where you can have amazing success, even in a very passive way. And so simply having a strong profile that's been optimized that you update once every couple weeks, you'll find that people will be looking for you, will be searching for you, perhaps on Google, perhaps directly on LinkedIn. Your profile pops up, they read it, they feel good, and they want to continue that conversation. And you're not even posting and commenting and liking and sharing. You're just simply having that, that just, you're just having a presence on LinkedIn in terms of that profile. And for some people, that is enough. And that's a beautiful thing. Now if you want to have a lot of success and your target audience is on LinkedIn, LinkedIn is a fantastic place for you to do that drip feed marketing where you're in front of them and you're posting things and you're responding and you're engaging with them. And in that situation, make sure that you have some Google alerts out there that you're being introduced to, topics that are within your wheelhouse, articles that other people have written. And when you get these things, you can post them on LinkedIn. It really shouldn't be something that is overwhelming to you. But definitely when you're first starting with LinkedIn, you know, I think a lot of people get a little overwhelmed with, oh my gosh, I've got to create all this content. But simply scrolling through your LinkedIn feed, whether it's on your phone or it's sitting at your desktop, as you scroll through, you should be seeing posts from your network. And these are people who are first degree connections, people that you know. And as you're scrolling through and you see this stuff like it, comment, share, and simply just doing that is going to get you in front of people. And if you do it for five minutes a day and you like just a, you know, 10 or 20, you know, posts, those people are going to see it, they're going to be reminded of you. People within their network work will see it. And it's a great way of just dipping your toe into the water. And then the more you do that, then you can start looking and seeing are there articles and there's things that I want to say and then you can start doing that. But with LinkedIn, you can do it once, once a day, you can do it five times a day, but it really depends. And I think once you start doing it and you really start to see what it means in terms of opportunity, what it means in terms of engagement, you might find that you're going to put more and more time into LinkedIn.

So you mentioned something just a second ago that I definitely want to kind of drill down on. And I think a lot of the folks listening here today probably have this question you mentioned. First of all, make sure that LinkedIn is the right platform for you, that your audience is there. And we know that it's a great platform for people who are looking for jobs or that sort of thing. But what would you say are the primary benefits for, you know, coaches, consultants, you know, basically people who are personal brands, should they be on LinkedIn, is it a good place for them to spend their time?

Well, I always say if what you do is, you know, your business is based upon contacts and even more so business contacts, people who are in business, people who have careers, people who might be in corporate, LinkedIn is the place to be. LinkedIn is the place to be. LinkedIn is very much a professional network. And so if you are interfacing with professionals, with executives, with entrepreneurs, LinkedIn, LinkedIn all the way. Because it's for your career, it's for your work, it's your industry. We're not talking about Game of Thrones, posting pictures of weddings or our kids soccer games. This is very much a professional network and it draws these types of people who are busy, they're running a business, they don't want to, you know, be talking about silly things. They're here because they're using LinkedIn to manage their network. They are making connections, they are using it to find people, to research people. They're using it for business intelligence. It really is a fantastic place to be.

So let me ask you this. What if you're a dating coach or a health and wellness coach and maybe you're, you know, your target market is people in the corporate world. Would you suggest them to be on LinkedIn or do you think that Facebook or Instagram would be a better fit for them?

I don't think it's an either or situation, destiny. I think it's really deciding who is most open to listening to that message. And so for that, you know, that dating coach or even that health and wellness coach coach, I think it's saying, look, I'm going to be on LinkedIn, I'm going to be presenting the most polished professional image possible and I'm going to be in there building my network, making sure that if a person is searching for someone like me, I'm in as many networks as I can, so I will be found. But you know, perhaps if what they're posting about on a day to day basis isn't exactly, you know, it might be construed as being a little bit off topic, then perhaps, you know, Pinterest or Instagram might be a better place. But they can always take that and, you know, change the message a little so it fits a little bit more in on the LinkedIn realm and they can still post there as well. But you just need to be clear, you need to be aware of the nuance. And I think just being on LinkedIn for a little bit and so seeing what people are chatting about and talking about, I think you'll find that even if, you know, even as a dating coach, there's things to state within the LinkedIn realm that would make sense. And even for that, the health and wellness. We have written so many profiles for individuals who are in the health and wellness field and LinkedIn is very welcoming because, you know, health and wellness and fitness, all of that comes into making a strong professional. HR is very much open into hearing how having a strong workforce is going to help the bottom line. So I actually think the health and wellness message is well received and absolutely belongs within LinkedIn.

Thank you for that clarification. I have, like, one more question for you, but it's really related to. I know that LinkedIn offers the free account, right, that we're all familiar with, but they also have the paid account. Can you talk about what are the pros and the cons and should we even consider the paid account? Or when is that a good fit for folks?

Destiny, Whenever I am out and about, people ask me, should I be paying for LinkedIn? Whether I'm doing a presentation or I'm conducting a workshop or how, heck, I was even at a funeral and someone came over like, should I be paying for LinkedIn? It's such a hot topic and people are so curious. At one time, I used to tell people, yeah, pony up, it's worth it. LinkedIn has really changed their platform over the last three years. It's really radically changed. They really are trying to make it super easy and simple. They really want to attract, you know, a much broader audience. And what I say is this, don't even worry about paying for LinkedIn. Don't even put that into your head. Just use it. Just use the free version. Use it and start to find success. And once you start finding success on LinkedIn, LinkedIn will let you know when it's time to pony up. LinkedIn will very much give you certain signs that it is time to start paying. And some of the signs will be, you've run so many searches this month that we're limiting you and you'll see reached the commercial search limit. And if you start to see that, basically what LinkedIn is saying is you're running so many searches, you're doing company searches, people searches, we think you might be prospecting or recruiting on our platform. And once you've done so many, they're going to. They'll give you a limit. And at that point you might say, wait, you know what? I am doing a lot of prospecting. I'm doing a lot of business intelligence and research. And at that point, it might be time to pay the money. Another reason why you might want to start to pay is you like to see who's checking out your profile. And you've used my LinkedIn headline generator, you've optimized your profile. You're really finding that a lot of people are landing and they're looking at you. And you want to see more than just the last five, because it's a rolling five for the free accounts. If you pay for LinkedIn you get to see the last 90 days. And so if you're finding that a lot of people are looking at you and you want to see all these people who have such great taste looking at your profile, then it's time to start paying.

Thank you for that. And you know, I have had the paid version and passed, or maybe I did the trial, I can't remember and I wouldn't have known that they would have limited the results and then said, you know, now's the time for you to start paying. So I didn't know about that tip.

Yeah. Another thing is if you want to start communicating with people outside your first degree network, okay, that's another reason why you might want to consider upgrading. So maybe you're in, you know, you're using LinkedIn for prospecting for sales and you're doing searches, you're finding people and you think to yourself, I'm not connected to them and I don't know them well enough to just send them a connection request, but I still want to reach out and ask them a question or I want to reach out and introduce myself. If they're not a first degree connection and they don't belong to a group that you belong to, you can't message them within the LinkedIn platform. You need to use an InMail message. And when you pay for LinkedIn, you get, you get, you know, I can't even recall how many. It's like usually between 5 to 30 inmails a month. And you can utilize one of those in mail messages to communicate with a person who's outside your network.

Okay, that's great information. So Donna, any last minute tips you have for the course creators who are listening here today?

Yes, I would say, you know, take, take some time and just look at your LinkedIn profile. Read it through and read it as one of your target, you know, someone from your target audience, read it through their eyes and say to yourself, is this the person that I want them to be seeing? Is this how I want to be perceived and recognize you have control? And so many people are landing on your profile and they're looking, they're looking to figure out who you are and what you do. So make sure that message that you're communicating is the right one. And if you do need help, I've got books and we've got services to help you tell that story because it is hard, it really is hard to write about yourself.

I know that I struggle with that. So Donna, can you tell me where people can find you? I want to make sure that they can grab that app that you mentioned, that headline app.

Yes. So everyone can always, of course, Visit me on LinkedIn. You can visit my profile and follow me there. I always am putting forth great information. But to visit, to visit my website, it's LinkedIn makeover.com and to grab access to my free online app, all you need to do is look at that black navigation bar that goes across the screen and click on Free Resources. And right underneath that, you'll see the LinkedIn headline generator. And it's a great tool. It's a fun tool. And like I said, it's just a click, click, click, and you copy and paste it right into your LinkedIn headline and you're going to find more views and more opportunities heading your way.

Very good, Donna. Thank you so much. I greatly enjoy our conversation and course creators, thanks so much for joining us today. I hope that you enjoyed this episode on LinkedIn. Would love for you to rate and review the podcast on itunes or your favorite podcast platform. Have a great rest of your day. Bye for now.