We’ve all seen and heard of the influencer marketing and the power a personal recommendation impacting businesses worldwide. More so, we’ve seen it particularly excel in B2C space when referring and selling consumer products and services across social media platforms as Instagram, Facebook.
As LinkedIn is mainly dominant platform for B2B, this social media channel is not far behind when it comes to social advertising, sponsored partnerships and influencer marketing. The space is all open and full with endless opportunities.
Also interesting: 6 Reasons why to run a LinkedIn B2B influencer campaign
LinkedIn has with an incredible success attracted over 660 million professionals to join the network in search of new job, finding latest industry trends and discovering companies. Over 30 million companies have registered an account and so does their team members. Among the users are key decision makers as well as highly engaged and connected influencers who have established their own direct network.
Once you establish a relationship with influencer on LinkedIn you have an opportunity to introduce, promote and showcase your product to completely new audiences with an ease. This type of direct referral is a tremendous exposure attracting more eyeballs on your post, spicing up the engagement and driving large value sales deals for B2B businesses.
To open up new LinkedIn opportunities and run influencer campaigns is simpler than ever before. Companies as BrandRefer, now offer their clients full managed service – starting from influencer search and qualification, campaign running and requirement matching, even LinkedIn content strategy and account management.
Only thing that’s left to your team are following steps:
1. Define your audience
Before you start it’s important to understand what audience you would ideally like to speak to with your content. Most important areas we see when working with LinkedIn influencers are clear understanding what industry you are targeting and what region or specific location is on your radar. As x% on LinkedIn users are decision makers one way or the other we all are eventually connected with influential team members and the key is to drive right engagement in targeted company network. Therefore, we suggest not to focus so much on the role specification rather than the potential reach.
2. Decide your unique positioning
To be heard and understood correctly you have to think of the right messaging or in other words what is your value proposition. How are you positioning your service in the market. Think if it’s instantly clear what challenge your solution is solving. The trick here is the simpler the better, be sharp, precise and clear. Don’t lose someone’s attention by writing a novel and explaining your product in 5 paragraphs.
3. Pick engaging content
The medium you choose to use for your influencer posts will essentially be the key to get the first interest. Of course, each company makes sure it’s align with brand values you possess. However, remember the key here is to catch someone’s eye first – look back in your marketing repertoire if you have already some interesting blog articles, video content, interviews, podcasts, infographics? Of course, you can always go back to good old white paper with an interesting presentation. The brilliant thing here is most of us have made so much great content already, that there is no need to invest more time in producing something new. Play with what you already have. If you do want something fresh you can always add new pieces.
4. Share content with the help of influencers
As soon as interested and passionate influencers share and refer your post with their direct network of professionals, the most exciting part kicks off. Essentially you open the doors to new audiences with an ambassador at the front line. It has a tremendous potential as a hidden marketing and sales force to any B2B company looking for extra exposure, brand awareness and optimized lead generation.
5. Connect with new leads
The cherry on top is left for your team to connect with all engaged users showing an interest in your campaign post. Remember to reach out all interested professionals whether it’s a like, a comment, click through or even a request for a demo they all potentially can be your next customer.
6. Repeat
As for any sponsored ads or influencer marketing campaign, it is indeed, a play and try game at the beginning while you fine tune the right criteria that drives most results for your campaign. But as it’s fun, effortless and in most cases super fruitful it’s always great to repeat with jet another interesting peace of content.
To sum up, new year comes with new opportunities for brands all size and industry to reach new audiences, engage and connect with their customers, share their message, brand values and create large following based turning into loyal customers sooner or later.
With influencer marketing at the top peak, LinkedIn professional network is not far behind. New professional influencers on LinkedIn are interested to connect, refer and share their favorite brands, companies with shared values, interesting missions and passion for products and service that improve our lives and drives business innovation a step further.
To open up new LinkedIn opportunities and run influencer campaigns is simpler than ever before. Especially exciting time for all B2B companies.
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This article was prepared by BrandRefer, your trusted full service influencer marketing agency for LinkedIn.