Scott Ingram - Finding Sales Success on LinkedIn: 108 Tips from 36 LinkedIn Sales Stars

Published by: Top 1% Publishing, Austin, Texas top1.fm/publishing

Copyright 2020 by Sales Success Media, LLC All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system without written permission, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.

Disclaimer: The material in this publication is of the nature of general comment only, and does not represent professional advice. It is not intended to provide specific guidance for particular circumstances and it should not be relied on as the basis for any decision to take action or not take action on any matter which it covers. Readers should obtain professional advice where appropriate, before making any such decision. To the maximum extent permitted by law, the author and publisher disclaim all responsibility and liability to any person, arising directly or indirectly from any person taking or not taking action based on the information in this publication.

Cover design by: Tomsha Design

Book design by: Alex Head

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CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

T heres no better forum for sales professionals to build their personal brand, learn more about their customers and prospective buyers, and connect with them directly than LinkedIn.

This professional networking site represents so much opportunity and potential for sales and business professionals. In my view, theres no other place to accomplish these goals quite as effectively as you can on LinkedIn. Ive personally been a huge fan of LinkedIn for over a decade, and recently saw the opportunity to double down on my involvement in the platform for a whole host of reasons. Im a tactile learner and, as such, Ive learned a lot by doing. Ive had some solid success, but if youve followed my work in building the Sales Success community through the Sales Success Stories podcast , the Sales Success Summit and Sales Success Stories books , then you know that Im also a big believer in learning directly from those who are actually doing it the best and achieving the most. Why not apply that same approach to success on LinkedIn? What could we learn from those in the sales community on LinkedIn who are driving the most engagement and experi encing the

best results?

MEASURING LINKEDIN SUCCESS

How do we determine whos utilizing LinkedIn the right way to yield the best results? Thats the question I asked myself as I began this process. What actually matters? In my estimate, connections and followers are somewhat irrelevant. This was especially evident as I looked at individuals who had tens and even hundreds of thousands of followers, yet rarely generated any engagement on their posts at all. To me, engagement is what matters the most. I think its the best external sign that youre doing something thats working. If other people are liking your content and commenting on your thoughts, then you are inciting meaningful conversations among an engaged audience. That, in my view, is a solid indicator that youre doing something right. To determine how I would bring together this series which includes a webinar, a PDF, and this more complete eBook we curated a simple model that would allow for the quick and easy evaluation of engagement that could be performed with publicly available data. Heres the model that we used to evaluate the engagement rate of the participants in this project, and one that you can use to measure your own levels of engagement and measure your progress over time. Start by simply adding up the total number of likes and comments on your last 10 posts on LinkedIn. To do this go to your profile page, or anyone elses profile page, and click see all activity in the Articles & activity section. On the resulting page, click the posts button. Dont include anything posted in the last couple of hours and skip any shared posts as these rarely generate much e ngagement.

Add up all of those likes and comments on the last 10 posts and divide that total by the total number of followers, which is conveniently displayed on the same page. Convert that to a percentage and voil, youve got your engagement rate. The bar for contributors to these resources was anyone with 2500 or more followers and an engagement rate of 5% or above. Youll see those numbers in the stats associated with each contributor. Of course, there are many more in the sales space who would have qualified to contribute to this project. My initial goal was 20-25 people and, as you can see from the end-result, we far surpassed that goal as nearly everyone I asked to contribute said yes! That said I want to help you continue to find, follow and learn from the best of the best. Therefore, Ive committed to maintaining a list of the top 50-100 and will update it at least quarterly over the next 12 months or longer. If you, or someone that you follow and admire meets the criteria:

• Actively works in or provides a product or service to the s ales space
• Has at least 2500 followers
• And an engagement score of at least 5% using the aforementi oned model

Then feel free to drop a link to your/their LinkedIn profile in the comments section on https://top1.fm/LinkedInSalesStars Thats where well include the top 50-100 as measured by their engagement rate. Thats also where youll find a more visual PDF with just the tips from this ebook Check it out, and, of course, wed love it if youd post about those resources and about your biggest takeaways on LinkedIn! Use the hashtag #LinkedInS alesStars

Kyle Coleman

VP, Revenue Growth & Enableme nt @ Clari

Connect with Kyle on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/kyl etcoleman/

FOLLOW ERS: 4,795

AVERAGE LIKES + COM MENTS: 230

ENGAGEMENT R ATE: 47.9%

*As measured on 3/21/2020

GENUINELY ENGAGING WITH OTHER PEOPLES CONTENT

Not just throwing people a like here and there, but reading, thinking, and thoughtfully responding to their content is key. This is how you learn, how you get a sense for the type of content that resonates, and how you build a network.

SPEAK FROM EXPERIENCE

Prove your expertise by having strong opinions on things youre well-versed in. But keep an open mind to change or evolve your opinion when you get input & feedback from others. You need to post with conviction, and in my opinion, its far easier to do this if you have expertise on the topic.

FORMAT REALLY MATTERS

Your content needs to be easy to read & digest, and be a bit provocative. Its okay to say things that people already know, but you have to bring a unique perspective that gives a new way of thinking. And if you do that with enormous blocks of text, no ones going t o read it.

My LinkedIn Why

Kyle Coleman

T he main motivator in my professional life is to help others succeed. This is what drove me down the management path in the first place I genuinely find more satisfaction in the success of others than in my own individua l success.

This motivation extends to my approach to social posts. I always want to provide a perspective or opinion that offers actionable and helpful advice. I try to stay within the bounds of things that I have experience or expertise in to ensure that Im not overreaching or speaking out of turn. I want my posts to be authentic, and thats difficult to do if the subject matter Im offering advice on is fore ign to me.