In today’s episode of the Social Selling Show, Daniel and Will share tips on how to increase visibility on LinkedIn as well as pros and cons of riding trends on LinkedIn.
Featured on this episode:
Resources:
- The Daily Sales LinkedIn Page
- The Million Pound LinkedIn Message by Daniel Disney
- Meet Edgar – Social Media Scheduling Tool
Transcript
Will Barron:
Welcome to the Social Selling Show with myself, Will Barron, founder of Salesman.org, and the king, the freaking… I’m going to bash the table right now. I’m going to boom the microphone and make all weird noises for everyone listening on audio, the king of social selling, Daniel Disney, how’s it going?
Daniel Disney:
It is going very well. Appreciate the table booming introduction. I’m excited for today’s episode, Will. For anyone who’s watching the video of this you’ll see, I am now in day two of my brand new office. So quite an exciting time, although a lot of work now to do, to build this up.
Will Barron:
I’m interested, we’ll get into the topic, which is how to become more visible on LinkedIn in a second, but for anyone who’s watching this who is creating content and might be interested, what are your plans? Are you just going to replicate the studio that you built at home here, or do you have bigger, smaller, different plans moving forward?
Daniel Disney:
Do you know what, Will? Honestly, it took so much effort and thinking, and building in the home office setup, which has got four bookshelves and a lot of other stuff. I’m not going to replicate that, but I’m going to use this as an opportunity to create real branded video space. So I’m looking at some wall art and just make it suitable really good audio and video equipment to take the video game to the next level. So yeah, quite a lot of homework to do in preparation. But it’s exciting. It’s an exciting step. And actually tying this in and looping straight into today’s topic when we talk about being more visible on LinkedIn, yesterday I posted a picture of me holding the keys, standing in the doorway to the new office and the post did above average engagement.
Daniel Disney:
And I was sort of aware of the principle, but those momentous occasions are great opportunities to become more visible. Those moments and it could be the birth of a child, it could be a child’s birthday, it could be your birthday, it could be starting a new job. Those big occasions make great sort of extra visibility posts on LinkedIn. So I guess kicking this episode off and using this as an example, look for those moments where you think, actually this is something a bit different and they may happen once, twice, three times a year, but those are great opportunities to get that extra visibility.
Why Posting Major Life Events on LinkedIn Drives a Tonne of Engagement · [02:10]
Will Barron:
Do you think that is because it is a moment and people are sharing in that moment with you? Or is it because you’re actually being real and you’re not just, not you personally, but people are just so used to the day in business content and re sharing blog posts from your company blog and then they see something that is out of that world and something that is a… Someone pregnant, baby, marriage, whatever it is, new, amazing office space that it’s so real that that grabs attention in the platform. Is it because it’s just, people are buying into you, I guess it’s the same question people buying into or is it just because it is different?
Daniel Disney:
It’s both and I think there’s a key thing. You can’t have momentous occasions every single day. So people have that big occasion, they get lots of engagement and they try and repeat the same thing every single day and it’s not going to happen and that’s fine. You’ll have a handful of these across a year. It is partly the occasion. People want to join in and celebrate and follow that journey. But that ties into the fact that yes, because it is personal insights, people connect with it. Again, on the flip side, you can’t just share that type of content or otherwise people won’t know what you do. Won’t build trust and credibility with you and it won’t generate any sales. So it’s good to have it in a balanced… A balance where you can’t just do that. But the occasion just adds, I guess, the amplification.
Striking a Balance Between Creating Content That Drives Leads and Content That Nudges the LinkedIn Algorithm to Your Direction · [03:33]
Will Barron:
Sure. So let’s go back to basics here for a second. Clearly with social selling to drive leads, to get attention for our product or service to make some money. We’re not doing this… We’re not David Dobrik, we’re not getting paid on ad views on YouTube. It doesn’t matter if we get… I’d rather have 10 people consume a piece of content and get five prospects, than a million and nobody gives a shit about it, right? So with that said, is there a balance between content that perhaps nudges the algorithm in our direction that we should create versus contents that drives leads, which is perhaps the bread and butter? Is there a ratio between these two opposing forces that we need to both drive the LinkedIn algorithm, drive attention our way, but also pull leads from the system as well.
Daniel Disney:
So I guess we’ve talked about this in a previous session, the 80/20 split is what I have always preached. In terms of 80% should be value giving and 20% can be advertising. Now, if we take that 80% and break it into 50 and 30, 30% can be more personal based stuff. So about you, the selfies, the snapshots into your world, where then 50% should be more still value giving industry relevant, you sharing your industry stories, experience, tips, knowledge, et cetera, but it is done in a professional way, but it is good to have that 20, 30% where it is you and your stuff and it could be you at work, it could be you outside of work. It’s letting people get to know you. That digital relationship is super valuable and it can accelerate the sales process significantly.
“That digital relationship is super valuable and it can accelerate the sales process significantly because those first conversations you have with them, in their head, it’s not the first conversation. They feel like they know you already and that’s a very powerful thing for sales.” – Daniel Disney · [04:57]
Daniel Disney:
Because those first conversations you have with them, in their head, it’s not the first conversation. They feel like they know you already and that’s a very powerful thing for sales. But it’s getting that balance right/ build the personal side up, make sure you’re earning the credibility and then you still have that 20% to do… Promote and advertise what you sell. So that you are able to drive those conversions.
Will Barron:
Sure. Okay. So I want to get into consistency. I think that’s an easy one to get into and I’ve found, you’ll be proud of me Daniel, I’ve started using a software product called Meet Edgar, and it allows you to just schedule content. Which has then forced me, because I see this empty calendar in the software, to go, “Right. I need to actually create some content for LinkedIn.” And everywhere else as well. The same content goes out on our business Facebook profile on Instagram, few other places as well. But having that empty calendar in front of me has forced me to create some content and just posting whatever it is. It’s not even the best stuff we’ve ever produced, every day has led to almost every day the posts are doing between 1,000 and 10,000 views a post. And it’s not that I’ve reinvented the wheel. It’s not that I’ve come up with some amazing concept.
How Consistently Creating Content Improves Visibility on LinkedIn · [06:30]
Will Barron:
I’ve not done anything. In fact, the content isn’t even that good compared to what we do when we spend more time on it. But just that constant tap, tap, tap, tap, tap every day, these 1,000, 2,000, 1,000, 3,000 view posts have made a massive difference to the amount of leads that we’re generating from LinkedIn. Now I know you told me to do this 27 years ago and it’s the fundamentals. We’ve talked about it on the show, but how important is not even being the best, just being consistent if we want to become more visible on LinkedIn?
“You could go to a networking event every single week for a year. If you stand in the corner and don’t say anything, you’re not going to hear any conversations, any opportunities. But if you go in and you talk to people, guess what? Even if what you’re talking about is low value, low quality, they’ll remember you, they will get to know you. And at some point they will understand what it is you do and that’s how you convert.” – Daniel Disney · [06:46]
Daniel Disney:
It’s just crucial Will, let’s be completely honest. You could go to a networking event every single week for a year. If you stand in the corner and don’t say anything, you’re not going to hear any conversations, any opportunities. But if you go in and you talk to people, guess what? Even if what you’re talking about is low value, low quality, they’ll remember you, they will get to know you. And at some point they will understand what it is you do and that’s how you convert. Consistency is super important and that’s a good point to make. You don’t have to go out there sharing viral content every day to generate leads.
Daniel Disney:
You can go in and you could average 10 to 30 likes on a post and maybe a few hundred impressions. You can do that consistently and generate opportunities. So don’t be disheartened by fear of, “Oh, I’m not getting 1,000, 10,000 views.” Or “My posts aren’t going viral.” It doesn’t mean you won’t create opportunities. A lot of the real sales people out there on the front line, their averages are lower, but their consistency creates conversion.
Why You Need to Be Aware of the LinkedIn Algorithm and Analyse What’s Working and What’s Not Working · [08:01]
Will Barron:
For sure. I love this analogy. Because if you think about it, all the amazing conversations you’ve ever had in your life with the people that you care the most about that you got the most rapport with. Well, they probably came six months to five years, 20 years into the relationship. If you think back to the first conversations you had with them, you probably can’t even remember them because they were that boring. So that’s a perfect analogy. Is there anything else we need to do other than let people into our real world? Celebrate our wins? So when I don’t do enough of, and I’ve been told off on the Salesman Podcast a bunch of times by a bunch of people for not celebrate my wins. Celebrate the wins, be real, be consistent. What else do we need to do to become more visible?
Daniel Disney:
Have, and this is a tricky one, but be aware of the algorithm and look at what is working at any given point. So right now I’m sure you’ve seen this as well, Will.
Will Barron:
If you say polls, I’m sick of seeing polls. The front page… I did a poll the other day. It was just absolute trash, just out of interest. And it was like 500 people had filled in the poll and the question, which was just nonsense. I don’t understand why these people have got so much time to be doing these polls in the first place, Daniel. But yeah, sorry I cut you off then because I knew where you were going. But literally the whole first page, first five, six are just these crappy polls on LinkedIn. It’s rubbish. Obviously this is an over correction and LinkedIn will pull them back, but sorry mate. I’ll let you finish.
Daniel Disney:
No, that was a good outburst. And there are a lot of people Will that feel just like you. What I will say no matter what the algorithm pushes, people will do it and other people will dislike the fact that there’s so much of it on there. I get you’re presented with a choice. You can sit and complain about it or use it to your advantage as you did because the algorithm is pushing it and it is an opportunity even if it lasts for a week, four weeks, eight weeks for you to gain extra visibility, generate extra followers, audience growth, and even potential customers.
Daniel Disney:
So riding that algorithm wave whilst it may annoy a percentage of people clearly… I mean, some of the people… I did a poll the other day on the daily sales and I think it was 7,000 votes. That’s a lot of people that are putting time into voting on, obviously you’re right. There are some really bad polls. Like what did you have for breakfast today is offering no benefit to anyone. But there are some polls that offer insights where you think, “Well, actually I’m…” I read polls and I think, “I want to know what everyone’s voting for. I’m curious to know what the answer is.”
Explaining How LinkedIn Polls Work and Why They are So Effective · [10:05]
Will Barron:
Explain that phenomenon within the system that you’ve got to vote to see the results, right? So it’s in inherently viral in that nature.
Daniel Disney:
It’s very well created. So yes, to see the results, you have to vote, which as an author or creator of a poll, you want to create polls where people are going to want to know. In your industry and ideally your target customer, you’re going to want them to think, I want to know what everyone else is thinking or doing or saying around that subject area, because for them to see it, they have to vote. More that vote, the more people that are then going to want to see and gets that spiral effect. So it was very cleverly designed by LinkedIn. You’re absolutely right Will, the algorithm will probably push it for a little bit longer and then it will balance out and get the same engagement rate that any other post will.
Daniel Disney:
But we’ve had spikes like that consistently through LinkedIn history and as LinkedIn creator, if you’re looking for visibility, look at what the algorithm’s pushing. If you see text posts suddenly get huge numbers again, jump on that. If you see LinkedIn articles starting to get big numbers, start doing that. If there’s a new feature that comes out, whether it’s video live, whatever it may be, look at what people in your network are doing, what’s getting the most traction because if the algorithm’s pushing it, it’s your opportunity to jump on that wave and get that extra visibility.
How Salespeople Can Take Advantage of Trends on LinkedIn · [11:32]
Will Barron:
How do we, without having a page like yours, which I think is 750,000 people on it right now, which is insane and congratulations. How do we see this, for us mere plebs at the bottom of LinkedIn food chain, right? We have a couple of thousand followers or a couple of hundred followers. Is it very, literally you just look at the LinkedIn feed and see the trends that are at the top of it, what LinkedIn are proactively pushing to you? Is it as simple as that?
Daniel Disney:
It is. My insights don’t come from the daily sales. A lot of it’ll come from to just connect with people in your industry, connect with influencers in your industry and people that are active and just scrolling through your feed. Five minutes, 10 minutes a day on a daily basis, you start to pick up the trends. You start to see which posts are getting the most traction, whether it’s topics, whether it’s structure. I mean, vulnerability is quite a popular topic at the moment. That’s generating a lot of engagement for people opening up a little bit more. So there’s things like that where again, there’s nothing black and white. LinkedIn don’t tell you what they’re going to push, but you can just see through the results and it’s the best way to learn. So just read through the feed and make sure your network has people that are ultimately going to show you those results.
News Hacking Strategies on LinkedIn · [12:37]
Will Barron:
Are you familiar Daniel, with the term news hacking?
Daniel Disney:
No.
Will Barron:
So you you’ll know this concept because I’m sure you’re doing it and I think it’s describing in a grander and wider sense what we’re talking about on LinkedIn. So news hacking is this process and loads of companies have been built on the back of this of, for example, I feel like over the past few months, perhaps since the pandemic, mental health in sales and business has been a huge topic. So a traditional newspaper and magazine would run a bunch of stories on that and ride the wave of mental health in whatever it is.
Will Barron:
I feel like what you need to do the same, we need to news hack on LinkedIn, see what the topics are, see what the features are, see what LinkedIn’s pushing feature wise and then just… I don’t know how to describe this without being slightly derogatory of just hammer it into the ground or just do whatever the topic is over and over and over until we didn’t have that juice anymore. So I said like the Huffington Post is built on news hacking. All these tech startup and news organisations from the Buzzfeed was news hacking, so I’m guessing we need to do something similar on LinkedIn, right?
Daniel Disney:
I’m with you will, and I think whilst we talk about riding the wave and capitalising on the opportunity, you’ve also got to be very weary of overdoing it. So yes, LinkedIn polls a great right now. Would I say, go and do a poll every single day? Absolutely not because you can easily alienate your audience and push them away. So you’ve still got to find that right balance. You just want to make sure you do capitalise on it. So at the moment I’m sharing maybe one maximum two polls a week. I wouldn’t want to push further than that, but I wouldn’t want to ignore it either because I would miss out on an opportunity.
When Creating Polls, Should You Be Creating Viral Polls or Just Focus on Creating Value for Your Audience? · [14:10]
Will Barron:
How far do you lean into, and I guess the real question or the smarter question is what is the value of having eyeballs, right? How far do you lean into, for example, a poll? So let me formulate this more intelligently. Is the value in creating a poll that, you know will go viral or you hope that will go viral that will get 10,000 random people to view profile is the value in that, in that the LinkedIn algorithm goes, “Hey, this gets tonnes of attention. We’ll start sharing more of the content more generally.” Or is it always worth creating content for a specific audience? And LinkedIn goes, “Hey, this is the audience that this person’s after. So even if I get less views, it’ll be more targeted.” If that makes sense.
Daniel Disney:
You do always want to make sure it’s relevant. So again, doing really generic, bland polls, even though they might generate extra engagement, it’s going to dilute your personal brand and LinkedIn will ultimately end up connecting you with the wrong type of people. So you want to make sure it’s always relevant. And there are two benefits to a LinkedIn poll. Yes, there’s the visibility, there’s the views, but you can convert within it. So I’ve been selling tickets to master classes. I’ve been driving registrations to webinars just by promoting something in the text above it. Again, not every single time. Sometimes it’s good just for the exposure other times, you can sell and promote through it as well. The beauty being they’re getting value from the post and you’re still able to then direct them and say, “Have you checked out the Salesman Podcast? Here’s a link.” You get lots of click throughs and then the engagement pushes it even further. So I would definitely recommend making sure it’s always targeted to your ideal audience or otherwise it’s really hard to justify it.
How to Convert as Much of Your Acquired Visibility Into Paying Customers · [16:24]
Will Barron:
Sure. I totally agree. Unless you’re building a media company, which essentially you and I are building an attention driving machine for sponsorships, for other stuff and there’s value in that for individuals. Maybe that gets you your next job. Maybe it gives you a side hustle, but we focus on just generating revenue for the organisation that we’re selling on behalf, makes total sense. Is there anything else Daniel, that we need to include in our mission to become more visible on LinkedIn?
Daniel Disney:
No, I guess the last closing thought really on the visibility piece is we’ve about lots of different things you can do to be visible and visibility is good, but you want to make sure you convert as much of that visibility. So be smart in how you share your content. Whether it’s a poll, whether it’s a photo, whether it’s a big occasion, think about the subtle things you can include. So when I did this post yesterday, taking a selfie in the office, talking about how it was exciting day for me to have my first office. Within that post I talked about what I’m going to do here, which includes LinkedIn training and keynote speaking and so I’m subtly talking and essentially promoting what I do, but it’s in a… It’s wrapped in a post that’s marked as a big occasion and, and done in a way that’s going to be valuable to the audience.
Daniel Disney:
Do the same with polls, do the same with any form of content. I’ve seen a lot of influencers follow this route, use these opportunities for visibility. But if you want to convert that visibility, you need to make sure they know and understand and see on a consistent basis, what it is you do. That’s how you convert the backend. Visibility is hollow if you’re not going to get something on the outside of it.
Why There Has to Be a Point in Everything You Post on LinkedIn · [17:33]
Will Barron:
So is it fair to say that there has to be a point to the post?
Daniel Disney:
Yeah. And your audience are going to want that as well. Again, just following your journey and getting to know you and like you and being excited by random stuff is great. But, and that’s fine if again, like you say, Will, if you’re building a media company or if you just want the ego stroke, but chances are most salespeople listening will hopefully want some leads and customers off the back end of it. So there has to be consistency in what you do, your industry, your product, your service, your mission, all those things need to be wrapped in that consistent piece. So yes, push for the visibility, share the personal stuff, make sure you try and find ways to sew it in. I mean, Will here’s another example. I took a selfie of me in my garden cooking a barbecue, nice insight outside of work post. But the text said after a busy week of LinkedIn training, nice to cook my family some barbecue. So it’s there. It’s there wrapped in, not noticeable, not in your face, but it’s there. So we always look at those little ways because it makes a huge difference.
Is There Value in Driving Content From Outside LinkedIn to LinkedIn? · [18:35]
Will Barron:
I’ve got one final question for you, Daniel and this is probably a topic for a whole podcast so we don’t need to go too in depth into this, right? But as you say this, a lot of salespeople will spending a lot of time on LinkedIn, but what happens if we have an audience, if we have influence if we’ve got other social media accounts outside the LinkedIn bubble. Is the value, and I can give you an example of YouTube here in a second, but is the value in driving traffic from outside of the LinkedIn platform to the content on LinkedIn, does LinkedIn reward you for doing that? And I’ll just give a wider context of if you take someone who’s not viewing YouTube, is not on YouTube, right now dot com, and you take them onto YouTube and they start watching your video then another video and another video.
Will Barron:
YouTube massively, the algorithm promotes your content on the back of that. Because you’re taking someone who’s not doing anything to do with YouTube and then throwing a load of adverts in front of them over time, right? So YouTube, it goes out of their way to reward content creators who are embedding videos on their own websites or whatever it is or linking via websites to specific YouTube videos. Does LinkedIn have any system in place that rewards us for taking traffic attention, whatever it is from even the real world. Having, I know people don’t really have business cards, but having LinkedIn on your business card or stuff like this. Does LinkedIn reward us for pushing traffic to the platform?
Daniel Disney:
So they don’t at the moment Will and I think we should maybe make the next episode about this because there are a few little insights I can share that have happened quite recently within LinkedIn. Changes that will probably work towards that type of process. So no, right now there is no massive reward system built into the algorithm or into the analytics there to push it but they’re heading that way and it is something we should definitely explore in a bit more depth because the creator community is something that’s probably the next big wave on LinkedIn.
Parting Thoughts · [20:28]
Will Barron:
Cool. I’m physically writing this down because we’ll record it at some in the future. We’ll tease it with that. So with that anything else to wrap up on Daniel? Or is that, is that the end of this one?
Daniel Disney:
No, go out there. Share great content, open up your personal stories, try and gain that extra visibility. Just always make sure it’s relevant.
Will Barron:
Amazing stuff that was Daniel Disney, the king of social selling, my name is Will Barron founder of Salesman.org and that was the Social Selling Show and I will speak with you again next week.
Daniel Disney:
See you next time.
