“We shouldn’t be ever trying to really truly sell ourselves on LinkedIn or brag about a product that we have or a new product release or something.” – Katie Mullen in today’s Tip 761
What do you learn about the LinkedIn Algorithm?
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Katie Mullen on LinkedIn
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Transcript
Scott Ingram: You’re listening to the Daily Sales Tips podcast and I’m your host, Scott Ingram. As I record this I have power again, thank goodness, but now our water is out. Nothing like living in a disaster, but… the show must go on. Today’s tip comes from Katie Mullen. Katie is the founder of MMS Consulting, which provides specialized research, sales training, and consulting. Prior to founding MMS, Katie spent many successful years carrying her own quota and selling into multiple different industries, including medical devices, reinsurance, fund-raising, and online media. She also earned the #3 spot in the most recent LinkedIn Sales Stars update. Here she is:
Katie Mullen: So the LinkedIn Algorithm, it is a very tricky situation there to navigate that. And a lot of the things that we do on different social platforms that we think are going to work actually don’t work very well on LinkedIn. So I spent a lot of time over the past six months or so learning about the LinkedIn Algorithm. I really wanted to make sure that I understood it and was doing it right so that I could try to get, you know, more leads, more engagement, more interactions. And so I invested in myself and enrolled in a pretty expensive course and spent a ton of time studying and tweaking and trying and researching. And here’s some of the stuff that I learned that I think that would be helpful for other people to learn as well.
So number one, the LinkedIn Algorithm actually does not want us to post links to something outside of LinkedIn. This is probably the most important thing that we should do because it actually punishes us for this. And so if you’ve ever noticed, there are certain people who will they’ll post like a video message or even just a text post that does really well. It gets a ton of engagement and a ton of use. And then they’ll post a couple of days later, there’ll be thinking, “Oh good, I’m starting to get some real interaction going.” And then they’ll post something new. And at this time it will not go over well at all. And that’s because it’s a link to something outside of LinkedIn. LinkedIn actually punishes us for doing that. It does not want us to go outside of their platform.
So text posts do really well on the LinkedIn Algorithm. If you are going to post something to outside, for example, if you have a podcast and you want to promote it, do a text post, and then in the comment section, you can post something specific to, or post your link that you need to people to go to.
Now, let’s start to talk hashtags. So with LinkedIn, I’m sorry with Instagram and places like that, you know, the more hashtags, the better with LinkedIn, you really don’t want to get very many hashtags going. A lot of people say too, I’ve had good luck with up to four or five, but you definitely don’t want to get more than that. And there is a way within LinkedIn that you can go search for hashtags and see how often they’re used because sometimes you’ll think you’re doing a good hashtag. And then it turns out there’s like, you know, 25 followers of that or something.
So go to the search feature and type in the hashtag and type in the number signs with a hashtag symbol and then whatever it is that you’re, that you’re thinking about using, and then it will show you how many followers that are of that. I would make sure that you’re not using a hashtag unless it’s got at least, you know, tens of thousands of followers. Otherwise, it’s just a waste of a hashtag and a waste of your, of your space.
And then as far as the rest of the LinkedIn Algorithm goes what it really wants is people to provide value. We shouldn’t be ever trying to really truly sell ourselves on LinkedIn or brag about a product that we have or a new product release or something. LinkedIn is really rewarding people who are providing value and it’s about branding. So you’re really branding yourself as you’re doing this. And you’re trying to show yourself as an expert. And then hopefully when they go to your profile, that’s where you can sell yourself. In your summary, you can talk about yourself and your job description. You can talk about yourself. So hopefully somebody will get value out of your content, go to your profile, to check out who you are. And then they’ll feel like, “Oh, you know, actually hired this person to do such and such for me.” So, anyway, that’s just a little bit about that I’ve learned about the LinkedIn Algorithm that’s working for me, and I hope it works for you too.
Scott Ingram: For more about Katie, including of course a link to connect with her on LinkedIn, just click over to DailySales.Tips/761
Once you’ve done that. Be sure to come back tomorrow, to see if my water has come back on and for another great sales tip. Thanks for listening!