My guest on this week’s Radio Free Enterprise is Louise Brogan, a LinkedIn marketing expert and host of the LinkedIn with Louise podcast.
In the years following Microsoft’s acquisition of LinkedIn for 26 billion dollars in 2016, a lot has changed.
Right now, LinkedIn is THE social networking platform for business people with over 700 million users – up from 433 million in 2016.
In this conversation, Louise shares three critical strategies for leveraging LinkedIn to build your business.
Learn more about Louise: https://louisebrogan.com/
Connect with Louise on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/louisebrogan/
What follows is a computer-generated transcription of our entire conversation. Please excuse any typos!
Welcome back to Radio Free Enterprise. My guest today is Louise Brogan. Louise is a LinkedIn marketing expert and the host of the LinkedIn with Louise podcast, Louise Brogan welcome to the program.
Louise Brogan
Thank you so much, Frank for inviting me.
Frank Felker
Well, we have an exciting topic today, Louise, which is LinkedIn. It’s a pretty hot property right now. Since being acquired for $26 billion back in 2016, or 17. by Microsoft, the platform has grown from about 433 million members to right at 700 million members right now. And it has definitely become the go to spot for businesspeople in terms of a social marketing platform.
The three things we’re going to talk about today, that are critical success factors, are number one, building a network of people that you enjoy – I like how you put that in there – and that can help you grow your business. The second thing that you stress is that it’s important to always send a message when you’re trying to connect with somebody. And I want to make sure I get this third one, right, that it’s important to comment on your networks posts every day.
How can we build a network that we both enjoy and can help us build our business?
So let’s start with the first one. What do you mean? Or how can we build a network that we both enjoy and can help us build our business?
Louise Brogan
Okay, so Frank, this is something I’m really passionate about. Because when you go to LinkedIn, and if you if you connect with anybody and everybody, when you go to LinkedIn, and you look at your newsfeed, it’s full of content that’s not really relevant to you. And it’s full of people who either you’re not interested in what they have to say, or they’re not going to be potential customers or clients or people you can collaborate with. And it actually puts people off using LinkedIn. And then they think that’s a boring and stuffy place.
And because they’ve connected with people that they aren’t really interested in, and it makes it much harder to actually engage with a network that you don’t really have any commonality with. Or you know, you do work in the same field, they do want to buy your products or services, there’s nothing that they have that’s really offering you anything interesting to engage with.
And they’re not interested in anything you have to say. which means that when you do you actually post any content on the platform, and it’s much harder to get people to engage with your content, because there, they may have just connected with you to build as large network as possible without being really strategic about why they’re connecting with somebody.
Frank Felker
That is fantastic. I mean, that was quite a quite a revelation, what you just said for me, because I have been focused almost entirely on quantity rather than quality of connections. And I didn’t realize, but as I heard you speaking, I did realize I’m having that exact experience. I’m like, Well, I don’t care about this. But it didn’t occur to me that that also means they don’t care about me or what I have to say.
And so it seems as though I didn’t see those two things as being the same enjoying people you enjoy, and people who can build your business. But I can see how they directly correlate with each other. So are you saying then that, and I guess it makes sense. But a smaller network of better contacts or better connections could help you build your business faster?
Louise Brogan
Absolutely. So it’s really interesting. I literally just had this conversation with a client today. And she’s come to me because she worked for somebody previously who said accept as many people as you can into your network, just grow, grow, grow. And she says, Now I’ve got this network full of people who are really not interested in what they’re talking about. I find it really like I do enjoy what they’re posting about. It’s not relevant to me, I find it really hard to comment on what they’re talking about. And I thought, Well, the first thing we need to do is really stripped down your network so that you’re building like a small but mighty network of people. So my mike my own personal connections on LinkedIn to my 5100 at the moment.
And that’s a great number for me because when I share content, the reason people connect with me on LinkedIn is because they want to know how to use LinkedIn. And that’s the kind of stuff that I share. I share what people have connected with me for In the first place, and therefore I get loads of engagement because they want to know what I’m teaching them. And so if I went off base and start talking about something completely different, they would lose interest. They think, why are we following Louise? Why are we connected with her? We don’t we’re not interested in, you know, metrics about Instagram, we’re interested in with her because well, no, but LinkedIn. So it kind of all falls together, Frank, I think,
Frank Felker
Yeah, it’s funny. This is each thing that you’re saying is such a revelation to me? Why don’t I have a better response? Why isn’t there more engagement? Well, maybe it’s because the people you’ve connected with really don’t care about what you’re talking about. I never thought of that. And so, you know, 5000 doesn’t sound small and mighty, or it sounds mighty, but it doesn’t sound small. Okay. You know, let’s say for an average person, do you know what, like, an average person’s number of connections is? Most people over 500? Which is the maximum that platform displays? Or do you have a feel for that?
Louise Brogan
Yes. I think that most people who are proactively trying to build a network, probably when I, when they come to work with me, I would say they have between 500 to 1000 people in the network, unless they have been told go and connect with as many people as possible, in which case, some people have got networks full of 1000s of people who are just not invested in what they were talking about. And so the other, the other clients that come to me might be people who have a couple of 100 in their network, and then they run into a different issue, because so few people actually engage with your content, that if you’ve already got a couple of 100 people in your network, so saying, post something on Tuesday morning, and there’s 200 people in your network, the chances of 200 people, first of all, seeing your content.
But second of all, only 9% of people on LinkedIn, well comment on any content. So 9% of 218 people in comments would be amazing. But those people aren’t on LinkedIn every day. And if they’re not engaging with your content already, or they’re not interested in what you’re talking about, it’s gonna be really hard to get anybody to engage with your content. So you do need to build a good enough size network to be able to get engagement. Well, let’s speak to that for a moment,
What are some strategies for identifying people who would be good LinkedIn connections for you?
Frank Felker
What’s a good way? Or what are some strategies for identifying people who would be good connections for you? Okay,
Louise Brogan
so this actually comes along in line with the second question, which is about commenting. But basically, when you’re on LinkedIn, so if you’re following or connected with people who could possibly have a similar audience to yours, or you are, so say, for example, you work in manufacturing, and you’re following a few different people who work in the same industry as you. When you see people comment underneath their posts through and see their headlines. Those are the people that you think actually, this is somebody I want to connect with, who’s within my industry, they’ve got something interesting to say. So I’m going to add those people to my network, as opposed to just adding as many people as possible.
Frank Felker
I see. And, and so I kind of was trying to use that as a segue into the end of the next question. Um, you know, I’m still I guess, I want to hang on to this one like a bulldog? Should you like go through demographics? How specific Do you feel an individual LinkedIn members should get about exactly who they want to connect with?
Louise Brogan
Okay, so if you are, say you’re a local service based business, and a great place to start would be your chamber of commerce, or people who work within your trade locally, and start connecting with those people, maybe people who are in a local business networking group that you’re in, that’s a perfect place to start. And one of the things that LinkedIn groups, unfortunately, are not a grant resource at the moment, it’s a shame, because I’m hoping that they’re going to change that.
But following people who are authorities within your industry, and seeing who is connecting with them, and who’s commenting on their stuff. The other thing is Frank, you want to have people who are actually going to engage and interact with you and have conversations with you. So if they’re already commenting on somebody else’s stuff, Oh, that’s great. I’m doing your industry that looks like a good person to connect with to me.
Frank Felker
Well, let’s go then move on to the second question. And I have a great example of this. That just happened to me, but I’ll let you speak to this. First, I think you’ll get a laugh out of how this worked out. Which is that it’s always important to send a note along with a connection request. Why do you say that and what do you suggest we send?
Louise Brogan
Okay, so there’s a couple of reasons why I recommend this. So if you’re connecting with somebody because you have come across their profile, and you think that they would be somebody that you would be interested in Working with, they might be interested in your product or service, I want you to go to their profile and find something that you can comment on when you send a note, which explains why you’re connecting with them. So quite often, like anyone who’s watching this, who wants to come and connect with me, explained that you saw me on this call.
And that’s why you wanted to connect with me. And that’s perfect. The reason why, first of all, if someone sends you a connection request, and doesn’t say why they’re connecting with you, in which you kind of think, ooh, they’re gonna jump straight into your sales pitch here, right? But secondly, when you send a note with the connection request, all of a sudden, you’re in a one to one conversation with that person, which takes you out of the hole. I’m in a huge newsfeed of other people into Actually, no, we’re talking one to one. And I can find out about you and your business, and then maybe offer ways that I could help you.
Frank Felker
Beautiful. Well, let me tell you the note I got yesterday, I had just done a promotion to try to drive a lot of new connections. And you know, I sure wish we had had this conversation before I did that, because I’m learning so much. But this guy sent a connection request to me, and I thought, was he in the list of pay anyway, I couldn’t remember. And I was processing so many. It didn’t matter.
But here’s the note he sent me. He said, “Dear Frank, you remind me, your profile reminds me of one of my favorite clients. I hope we can connect.” And I thought, you know, that sounds a little BSE. You know, I like it, I want to see where we go from here. So I accepted this morning, immediately first thing in the morning, he reaches out and tries to pitch me on taking a phone call with him. And, and so I sent him a little note that said, I find this very objectionable. But apparently it’s working for you. So good luck, and disconnected from the guy. But, you know, that seems like a perfect example of what not to do.
Frank Felker
He kind of halfway followed your suggestion, which I don’t think he really looked at my profile. But he gave me that charming little thing about you know, I remember this favorite customer? What? What do you think let’s say somebody does, I reach out to somebody, I found something for us to that we have in common. And they accept? What should I do next?
Louise Brogan
Okay, so when I am working with clients, I always say imagine that LinkedIn is a virtual networking event that you’re out. So you’re out, say, you’re at a big conference industry conference, and you walk in the door, this is you logging onto LinkedIn, you walk in the door, and you see some people and you’d have a conversation with them. You meet somebody new at the coffee stand to your lineup to get your coffee, and there’s somebody new there, and you introduce yourself this is you sending your connection request.
What would you do with that person? You probably ask them about their business? And what were they up to? You’d have conversations with them, you would not say Hi, I’m Frank on this is what I do. And here’s my card and walk away. You know, you LinkedIn is all about building relationships.
Frank Felker
Great. Okay. So we’ll just go down this rabbit hole a little bit farther and then move on, take it. At what point do you think it’s appropriate to go ahead, you know, the Gary Vaynerchuk, Jab, Jab, Jab, left hook, or right cross or whatever it is? How many how many jabs? How many, you know, notes, until we say, Would you be interested in having a discovery call? Or how would you handle it?
Louise Brogan
Honestly, I think this is where a better practice and instinct comes in. So I connect with several people a day because people reach out to me because they’ve seen my content, they reach out to connect with me. And it’s kind of like you put feelers out. And you say, Thanks for connecting. So that yesterday, I did a big webinar for 87 people. And a lot of people connect with me afterwards. And some of them said, were literally said, we’re interested in hearing more about your services. Brilliant. Let’s get a call booked in.
Other people just said, I’d like to, I really enjoyed your webinar, I’d like to connect with you. And I would say, Oh, I’m really glad you enjoyed the webinar. If you need any help with LinkedIn, please reach out. Because they connect with directly after seeing me do a LinkedIn training. If I connect with somebody, because I’ve seen something interesting, they’ve said, and they come back and just say, Thanks for connecting with me. And that’s it. I’m going to kind of leave that Frank because I’m going to then rely on my content to bring them closer into me and that’s when if that person that starts leaving comments and is looking at my profile, not stage I might possibly say look, would you like to have a quick chat about how to use LinkedIn for your business? I honestly I would leave it like
But I, I take kind of warm cues from people as opposed to sending a stock message every time going, Oh, would you if you’d like to have a call about how I can help you with LinkedIn? And to me, it’s very much, let’s, let’s put out, you know, kind of little breadcrumbs here. They pick them up, then I’ll say that students.
Frank Felker
Great. Okay, now, is there anything else you want to add about that before we move on to your third strategic point?
Louise Brogan
I think it’s really a bite. I mean, maybe it’s a it’s a, it’s a woman’s instinct, I don’t know. But I do think it’s having conversations in that messaging box. That always leads to people saying, actually, we’d like to know more about what you do. And you’re the guy Vaynerchuk thing I really I do believe in that. But I would have the jab, jab, jab, punch, whatever he calls it. In terms of my contents, I might share yours. Hi, I have served valued, here’s something to help you, here’s something to help you. And then the fourth post out of my four posts might be that if you want to know more about how to do this and hear you get in touch and give me a call.
Frank Felker
That’s great. The you and I had been speaking earlier about Tom Schwab, who’s the guy that helps people grow their business through podcast guest interviews. And he referred to this Gary Vaynerchuk thing and he says, instead of Jab, Jab, Jab, punch, he calls it serve, serve, serve, ask.
Louise Brogan
Ah, yes. Love that. Tom, I need to connect. Yeah, yes.
Frank Felker
Now the third thing that you had suggested as a critical tactic was to comment consistently on your networks posts. For people who may be beginners to LinkedIn, if you could explain what that means. And then tell us why that’s so important.
Louise Brogan
Okay, so statistically, still in 2020, even though traffic to LinkedIn is up by 25%, this year, which is phenomenal. And there’s lots of reasons behind that just more people working from home or wanting to network online, basically. And but 1% of people share content on LinkedIn, out of over 700 million people creating 1%, honestly. So I really would love people listening to think right, I’m going to start sharing a post a week or two posts a week. For a lot of people, they have a bit of a fear of that, but are overwhelmed and not really sure what kind of content to write.
What you should do is start commenting on your networks, posts, because right, so imagine we’re back in the conference hall, we’ve just heard me speak on stage, we would probably go up to them if we could and say I really love what you said there. And then the speaker leaves that day. And you might sound this is this is back on the virtual and the conference scenario. And if you said that person later you say, Oh, I was the person who spoke to you, they are going to remember you above other people who just didn’t bother, they stopped there and clap their hands. So this is like the person up in their hands is the effects the like button, right? So when you comment, there’s loads of things happen here, the person who’s shared the content is going to remember you.
And if you just connected with them, because you met them a couple of weeks ago, you’re gonna stay top of mind with them above the other people who do what you do, because you’re commenting. The second thing is when you comment, we see your name, your profile photograph and your headline. And the headline in your LinkedIn profile, should attract your ideal customer or client to click through to your profile to read your LinkedIn profile, find it what do you do? And then they’ll decide if they want to connect with you or not. If you are not commenting, hi, are people going to come across you or find you on LinkedIn, it’s gonna be far harder to get find. So one of the things I do Frank is I help people optimize their LinkedIn profiles. And the headlines are really key piece of that.
Frank Felker
You know, that wasn’t on our list, but you’ve definitely piqued my interest on that. Would you be willing to share a couple of points and ideas about the headline and your profile?
Louise Brogan
Absolutely. And if you don’t write your own headline so for anyone who’s listening to us, who doesn’t really isn’t really familiar with LinkedIn so much, and your headline is the bit at the top where it says mine says Luis Brogan and then underneath that says LinkedIn consultant, Speaker podcaster. And if I’m speaking that particular event, I have that in there as well. So if you do it, write your own headline, LinkedIn takes whatever you have written at your current work experience, and puts it in your headline. So it could just say Louise Brogan and solicitor or Louise Brogan attorney. Well, we have got really valuable online speakers here to say what it is that we Do who we work with how we can help them. And if we work in, say, we work in California, only, you would have California in there. So for example, Louise Brogan family attorney and helping people have less messy divorces or something like that, remember, off the top my head in California. So if you’re looking for a divorce attorney, you’re going to pick that person above the person that just says attorney
Frank Felker
So, what I hear you saying is make sure your headline speaks to the solution you offer? And who it is that helps.
Louise Brogan
Yes, exactly. Yeah, you said that much more concisely than I did.
Frank Felker
Well, I’m not gonna take too much credit. Because directly after this interview, I’m going to run out and change my headline. Excellent. That’s great.
Frank Felker
Now, I wanted to talk a little bit about the direct services that you offer. Now, I believe I saw you have a workshop. Is that correct? Or is it an online course? Or workshop? What What am I thinking of?
Louise Brogan
Yes, so I have an online course that people can purchase on work through in their own time. And I also have a group where people do that course, but then come to my calls twice a month for a QA. So that’s pretty much for the people who want to work through it in their own time. And and then I work with people one to one, some people, and people who are really pressed for time. No, they need to use LinkedIn, just want to get it done and have a plan moving forward. They book what’s called a LinkedIn VIP intensive with me, and we do it in a three hour block. I also do that with teams, actually, which is really fun. And our people book a one hour strategy session. And for people who would just rather have someone else write their LinkedIn profile for them, I do I have a LinkedIn profile writing service as well.
Frank Felker
And I will put links to your website and whatever else we talk about, or you share with me links, after our call to make sure that people reading the show notes can get to that. But I would imagine I have this right here. Your website address is Louise Brogan calm. And so if somebody goes there, will they be able to find most of the stuff you just spoke of?
Louise Brogan
Yes, it’s across the top, there’s a menu across top for one to one services and corporate services as well. Yes.
Frank Felker
Beautiful. And the way you described it, it sounds as though you’ve done a very strategic job with that. You have the free content. And then you have the do it yourself, which is your online course. And there’s I’ll do it with you, which is the people calling in and so forth. And then you’ve got the I’ll do it for you level for people to get zero time and just I just want it done. And so you’ve covered all the bases with that. Yes. Now with that being this, go ahead.
Louise Brogan
Hi. Sorry. No, I’ve been I’ve been helping people with social media for over seven years. So I knew that there’s people who just want to do it for you. for them. There’s people who want their hands held and there’s people won’t do it on the written.
Frank Felker
A friend of mine calls that fast lane slow lane sidewalk. Excellent. Now, is there a particular way? I mean, I guess the default way for somebody to reach out to you would be through LinkedIn. But if somebody watching or listening is very interested, as I am very interested in what you’ve had to say, and would like to reach out to you beyond your website, what’s the best way for them to do that?
Louise Brogan
Oh, definitely Frank m connecting with me on LinkedIn and sending me the personalized note to say why you’re connecting? Because then I know you’ve been listening.
Frank Felker
That’s great. So remember, folks, you better hear on Radio Free Enterprise. So be sure to include that in there. Well, we’re just about out of time. We’ve talked about a wide variety of things. So anything I have not asked you, or an idea that’s come to you that you’d like to share before we go.
Louise Brogan
Oh, my goodness, there are so many things about LinkedIn, Frank, that you they’ve brought so many new features that she here that we could honestly talk, I could talk about how to use LinkedIn for three days straight. And but
Frank Felker
I wouldn’t be very happy for that be a lot of great content for me.
Louise Brogan
One tip I do is when LinkedIn brings it a new feature, use it because they will promote your content above other people who are not testing their new features. So keep an eye on the new features that are released. And I share those features in my newsfeed. So follow me and you’ll find out what they are.
Frank Felker
So for example, I just started using the LinkedIn live functionality. And I imagine there are a number of people watching us right now through that. That’s a relatively new feature and I’ve noticed that they are promoting my content.
Louise Brogan
Yes, you Yes. So they will they do they reward people who try out the new features. There’s the LinkedIn stories. There’s LinkedIn live, there is sending video messaging, there is Skype, you can schedule and meetings on zoom directly inside your LinkedIn messaging. There’s so many things. It’s brilliant. It’s really, really come along this year, I think.
Frank Felker
Louise Brogan, thank you so much for joining me today.
Louise Brogan
Thank you. Enough say lovely.
Frank Felker
Thanks again to Louise. And thank you for joining us. Until next time, I’m Frank Felker saying I’ll see you on the radio.
