
With a staggering one billion users worldwide, LinkedIn is a gold mine for lead generation. What makes it even more exciting is that 4 out of 5 of those users are driving business decisions.
LinkedIn lets you connect with potential customers, build relationships and gain their trust by sharing your expertise. In fact, 80% of all B2B social media leads come from LinkedIn.
However, without a clear strategy to locate, attract and convert those leads into customers, your company will miss out on a huge opportunity to grow its brand. That’s why we’ve created this marketer's guide to LinkedIn lead generation.
In this article, we'll provide the strategies, tools and tips to help you master LinkedIn lead generation.
LinkedIn lead generation is the process of finding and attracting potential customers on LinkedIn. It involves creating connections and relationships with individuals or businesses that might be interested in your products or services.
Marketers use this platform to identify and nurture leads, turning them into valuable contacts.
But much more than that, you can leverage the professional network of LinkedIn to engage with the target audience, share valuable content and establish credibility. This strategic approach helps generate interest, drive traffic and convert prospects into customers.
Understanding how to use LinkedIn for lead generation can significantly impact your business's success.
Use these eight proven strategies to transform connections into potential leads, fueling your business growth.
Your LinkedIn business page is a key tool for generating leads. Not only does it represent your company, but it's the first thing people see when they visit your page.
The rule of thumb is to create a positive first impression. This shouldn't just apply to your LinkedIn page but to every other customer touchpoint.
When optimizing your business page, consider the following:
Visuals not only enhance the aesthetic appeal but also increase credibility. Choose a high-resolution logo and a banner image representing your company's brand, culture or initiatives.
Here’s Visme’s LinkedIn business page for your inspiration:
Briefly explain what your company does, whom you serve and how you solve customers' problems. It's a good practice to include industry-related keywords to enhance your page's searchability.
Fill in all other sections, such as location, industry, company size, etc., to provide complete information about your business. This also helps LinkedIn suggest your page to relevant users.
Use action-oriented language in your About section and posts to nudge users toward a desired action. Include a CTA button on your page like "Visit Website," "Contact Us," or "Learn More," linked to the associated landing page.
Make sure to add links in your About section, posts and Call-to-Action (CTA) buttons that redirect to your website. This ensures interested visitors have a smooth journey from your LinkedIn page to your site.
Once they're on your website, use Visme forms to capture leads. Embed a Visme website pop-up form to convert your webpage visitors into potential prospects by collecting essential contact information.
According to LinkedIn, pages that post weekly gain 5.6 times more followers and grow their following seven times faster than those that post monthly.
Consistently publishing content and actively engaging with your audience on LinkedIn is crucial to building brand awareness and nurturing potential leads.
Let’s hear the importance of content marketing on LinkedIn from the CEO of LeadWizard, Allan Fine:
CEO, LeadWizard
To make the most out of your content strategy and audience engagement efforts, consider the following tips:
Produce informative and relevant content that resonates with your target audience. Strike a balance by sharing a mix of industry news, company updates, original blog posts, articles, infographics, webinars and videos.
In this LinkedIn post, Kalyn Lewis, our Head of Sales and Customer Experience, shares interesting insights about content centralization.
Visme takes away the pain of content creation by providing you with an extensive template library and a drag-and-drop editor. Choose from thousands of customizable templates to create LinkedIn posts, ebooks, whitepapers, infographics, presentations and more.
Establish a regular posting schedule to maintain your presence and showcase your commitment to staying updated in your niche. A consistent posting cadence builds trust among your followers and helps gain new ones.
Here's the ideal posting schedule for LinkedIn according to Hubspot:
Use Visme's social media scheduler to schedule your LinkedIn posts in advance. Connect your LinkedIn and all the social media platforms with Visme and create and schedule your posts from one place.
Read this article about creating a social media calendar to learn its importance and how to create one.
Initiate conversations and humanize your brand by asking questions, conducting polls and seeking opinions on industry trends. Encourage your followers to interact with your content and foster a community around your brand.
Ensure you actively respond to comments, messages, and inquiries on your posts and page. This signals that you value your audience's opinions and are available to address their concerns, thereby building trustworthy relationships.
Encourage user-generated content and testimonials by requesting your clients or partners to showcase their experiences with your brand.
According to a recent survey, 79% of people say user-generated content highly impacts their purchasing decisions.
Here's how we at Visme utilize user testimonials to showcase our community's real-life experiences with Visme.
We are also constantly looking for businesses that use the tool to create case studies that we can feature on our blog.
These user-generated content pieces help us get exposure and reach new audiences.
LinkedIn is not just about showcasing your professional persona; it's a social media platform teeming with opportunities for meaningful interaction.
One such avenue is LinkedIn Groups. It offers an interactive hub for industry professionals to share and discuss interests, insights and trends.
Imagine the benefits of joining such a group with your clients or customers. You get to understand their perspective, challenges and expectations. This amplifies your ability to cater to or even anticipate their needs more effectively.
Don't just be a silent observer; engage actively. Share insightful posts, start industry-relevant discussions and offer your expertise by answering queries posed by other members. It positions you as a reliable authority in your industry, enhancing trust among your potential leads.
Tailor your messages, comments and discussion topics in a way that's helpful for the community. You're not just creating a rapport with potential leads but also nurturing relationships, strengthening your professional network and subtly promoting your brand in the lead generation process.
Hosting LinkedIn events is a powerful way to strengthen your community, build relationships with your audience and get leads. These events can be anything from webinars, online workshops, Q&A sessions and product launches to networking gatherings.
Here’s what a LinkedIn lead generation expert, Miran Bacun has to say about hosting LinkedIn events:
“The LinkedIn Events feature is the best and only 100% LinkedIn-compliant way to convert your LinkedIn connections into email subscribers.”
Now, let’s get back to how you can use LinkedIn Events effectively:
Clearly define the purpose, topic, date and time of your event. Make it appealing to your target audience so it captures interest and encourages participation.
Utilize LinkedIn's Event feature to create an event page. Include all the necessary details and a compelling description to attract attendees. Use this space to highlight the benefits of attending your event.
Here’s an example of Visme’s LinkedIn event page.
Share your event on your LinkedIn feed, in relevant groups, and via private messages to your connections. Using LinkedIn lead generation ads can extend your reach beyond your network.
Before the event, build anticipation by sharing content related to your event topic. Engage with participant comments, answer questions, and send reminders to attendees.
After the event, keep the conversation going. Share event key takeaways and express gratitude to those who attended. Also, consider sending a personalized message to participants with a call to action, like signing up for your newsletter or arranging a one-on-one meeting.
With LinkedIn Ads, you can target more than 950 million people across the globe.
Launching LinkedIn Ads lets you cut through the clutter, enabling you to put your brand, products or services in front of the eyes of the exact demographics you wish to target.
This specificity significantly increases the chances of your ads getting noticed by potential leads.
With LinkedIn's user data, you can tailor your ads based on industry, job function, professional interests, geographical location and more. It's like creating a perfect recipe for your advertisement with various ingredients that appeal to your target audience.
LinkedIn offers a wide variety of Ads and here are four of them:
Sponsored Content: Native ads that appear directly in the LinkedIn feeds of professionals you're trying to reach, allowing you to deliver relevant content, improve brand awareness and attract more leads.
Customize Visme's LinkedIn sponsored content templates to match them with your brand identity and share them with your audience.
Sponsored Messaging: Sponsored Messaging lets you deliver personalized, direct messages to your target audience's inboxes, amplifying engagement and fostering one-to-one connections.
Dynamic Ads: Dynamic Ads generate personalized advertisements using LinkedIn data, enabling you to create customized, attention-grabbing campaigns for each viewer.
Text Ads: Quick and easy-to-create ads that appear on various LinkedIn pages, driving more traffic to your website or landing pages through enticing headlines and short descriptions.
LinkedIn Sales Navigator is a powerhouse tool designed to propel your lead generation efforts by making prospecting smarter and more efficient. With its advanced search filters, customized lead recommendations and actionable insights, you can zero in on potential leads and tap into a wealth of opportunities.
Simplify your prospecting by using targeted search filters to discover high-quality leads, and save your search criteria to receive alerts when new opportunities match your preferences.
Use the TeamLink feature to leverage your colleagues' professional networks, identifying common connections and warm introductions to effectively initiate meaningful conversations with potential prospects.
The Sales Navigator tool also seamlessly integrates with your CRM, enabling you to synchronize your LinkedIn leads and customer data efficiently. This amalgamation streamlines your sales process, creating a seamless experience from lead generation to successful sales conversion.
Embrace the efficiency and time-saving benefits of automation; it can work wonders for your LinkedIn lead-generation efforts. You can focus on nurturing relationships and closing deals by automating specific processes while the tools work behind the scenes to keep your pipeline flowing.
Consider these automation options to boost your LinkedIn lead generation:
Equip yourself with tools like Dux-Soup, LeadFuze, or Octopus CRM to automate tasks such as viewing profiles, sending connection requests and messaging prospects. These tools help position you at the forefront of potential clients' minds, increasing the likelihood of meaningful interaction.
Plan, create and schedule your content using Visme's social media scheduler. Consistent posting boosts visibility and fuels lead generation, while automation ensures you maintain that consistency without fail.
Connect your LinkedIn with CRM systems like Salesforce or HubSpot to automatically import leads, track interactions and monitor analytics. Centralizing data in one place streamlines your sales process and supports informed decision-making.
Use marketing platforms like Marketo, Pardot or Eloqua to automatically send relevant content to leads obtained through LinkedIn. Incorporate follow-up emails, nurture sequences and personalized campaigns to keep your B2B sales leads engaged throughout the sales funnel.
LinkedIn social activity shouldn't just be left to the social media executives or the customer relationship team. Everyone in your organization should have joined forces to boost your presence.
You can use the personal profiles of your team members as extensions of your business page, and having an engaging online presence may increase the reach and visibility of your brand significantly.
Follow these tips to enhance the LinkedIn presence of your team:
Encourage team members to maintain fully completed, up-to-date profiles.
Using all features—including a professional picture, compelling headline, detailed 'About' section and list of skills—can boost credibility and attract more visits.
Here’s an example of the LinkedIn profile of Visme’s founder, Payman Taei.
Ask team members to actively post content, engage with others' posts, join industry-related groups and participate in relevant discussions. Increased activity often leads to more visibility and engagement.
Team members sharing company posts or writing about their experiences at your company can bring a valuable personal touch. This kind of authentic content often works to build higher trust among potential leads.
Team members should align their LinkedIn activities with your company's branding and values. Consistent messaging enhances brand recognition and sets clearer expectations for potential leads.
Elevate your brand presence with Visme's brand design tool! Create and apply your branding assets effortlessly, ensuring your content reflects your brand personality.
Just copy and paste your website URL and the tool will automatically pull your branding elements, such as brand colors, brand fonts and the company logo. Then, you or anyone from your team can apply these elements to your design in just one click.
Explore our comprehensive guide to creating creating a branding kit in Visme
Visme's advanced design capabilities are helping businesses worldwide save their time, effort and cost.
The combined network of your team can be a gold mine of potential leads. So you should encourage team members to expand their professional network and exploit the possibilities of shared connections.
Here’s a simple, step-by-step process of creating a LinkedIn lead generation form.
1. Log in to your LinkedIn account and go to your organization's LinkedIn Page.
2. In the Page admin view, click “Edit page” in the left menu.
3. Find the "Leads" section on the left navigation, and click "Lead Gen Forms."
4. Create your form by filling out the requested information, such as form name, offer headline and offer details.
5. Make sure to include a link to your company's privacy policy.
6. After completing all the necessary details, save your lead generation form.
In addition to using LinkedIn forms, having a mix of different forms is crucial for effective lead capture. Without various forms, capturing leads becomes a challenge.
Visme offers a straightforward, no-code form builder. It lets you create customized forms effortlessly with a drag-and-drop interface, allowing you to add diverse fields and arrange them anywhere on the canvas.
This versatile tool enables you to create different forms like website pop-ups, email sign-ups, lead generation forms, registration forms and more.
Visme Forms is flexible so you can tailor it to meet specific needs. This enhances the overall effectiveness of your lead capture strategy. We've tested these forms on 700K organic visitors and received a 205% increase in form engagement and a 207% increase in conversion.
There are powerful tools that can boost your LinkedIn lead generation strategy and efforts. They help automate various processes and enhance overall efficiency.
Here are five such LinkedIn lead generation software along with some unique features each one offers:
Octopus CRM is a powerful automation tool that addresses the pivotal need to streamline your LinkedIn lead generation and networking efficiency. As a multi-featured platform, it automates your social selling processes and offers detailed performance insights for monitoring your activities on LinkedIn.
Dux-Soup is an innovative solution that accelerates your prospecting efforts on LinkedIn—revolutionizing how you network online by automating lead generation, tracking, and nurturing and facilitating seamless integration with your existing CRM platforms, redefining your LinkedIn outreach strategy.
Dripify is a comprehensive LinkedIn marketing automation tool that enhances sales prospecting and outreach. Its software suite includes messaging automation and safety features, which help nurture your LinkedIn leads and ensure your activity aligns with LinkedIn's usage policy.
Lusha stands apart as a lead enrichment platform that excels at retrieving essential B2B contact and business information. Designed to elevate your lead sourcing capabilities, Lusha provides much-needed accuracy and efficiency while integrating fluidly with your preferred CRM tools.
Expandi transforms the LinkedIn ecosystem for businesses, enabling exceptional lead generation and networking. With unique features like strategic campaign implementation, detailed analytics and extensive personalization options, Expandi emerges as an advanced solution to mimic human behavior and significantly boost organic reach.
There is no fixed cost for LinkedIn lead generation. The expense depends on various factors, including premium LinkedIn subscriptions, targeted ad campaigns and investments in LinkedIn lead generation tools or services.
LinkedIn offers different premium subscription levels tailored to the specific needs of its users, like Premium, Sales Navigator and Recruiter Lite, which range from approximately $60 to $270 per month.
Additionally, LinkedIn advertising operates on a bidding system, so ad costs vary depending on the competition, targeting criteria, campaign duration and your budget.
Yes, LinkedIn is excellent for lead generation, especially for B2B businesses. Its professional user base, advanced search and targeting and industry-specific content aid in effectively identifying and nurturing leads.
The platform is also ideal for attracting decision-makers and building trusted networks, which is crucial in the B2B sales process.
LinkedIn ads can be pricier than ads on other social platforms due to the high value of its professional, targeted user base. LinkedIn allows precise ad targeting, reaching decision-makers directly, which often results in higher conversion rates, providing a better return on investment despite the higher initial cost.
LinkedIn is best for B2B lead generation for several reasons:
In our journey through LinkedIn's lead generation world, we've discovered key strategies, utilized practical tools and gleaned insightful tips.
To truly maximize your impact on LinkedIn, incorporating striking visuals is key. That's where Visme comes in, a dynamic tool that can significantly elevate your content creation game.
Customize Visme's professional templates for designing e-books, white papers, and reports that serve as compelling lead magnets. What sets Visme apart is its user-friendly interface and extensive libraries, making content creation a breeze.
But it doesn't stop there. Visme's advanced analytics tool empowers you to refine and optimize your LinkedIn lead generation strategy. Enhance the visual appeal of your content with Visme to propel visibility and engagement and take your LinkedIn lead generation to new heights.
Create a free account in Visme and start your lead generation journey today!
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