The New Way To Use LinkedIn, Plus 3 Easy Steps To Get Started!

By J.J. Peller

If there was a place where you could meet more than 700 million other people who could potentially benefit from your products and services, would you invest some of your time and energy in that place? Well, such a place exists. It’s called LinkedIn.

LinkedIn reports that it has more than 774 million members in more than 200 countries and territories around the world. Not all 774 million people are your ideal clientele, but enough of them are for you to make it worth your time and effort using the platform.

LinkedIn offers you a massive pool of potential prospects who can become great clients. If you’re not yet using LinkedIn to connect with and meet more people, you need to change that now. And this article will help you to get started or ramp up what you’re already doing.

LinkedIn Has Changed

I first started using LinkedIn in 2009. At the time, it was mostly used as a place for people to host their résumé online. It was a pretty static site. You would create a profile telling who you are and where you went to school and where you work now.

LinkedIn has evolved tremendously over the past decade. In the past few years, LinkedIn has become more like Facebook – very social and engaging.

It is an incredibly powerful platform if you use it correctly. LinkedIn can transform the way you do business development if you’re willing to make the effort.

Whether you dabble on LinkedIn or barely have a basic profile established, this article will give you three quick and easy steps to start leveraging LinkedIn to get your name out there, attract more clients and meet more people to grow your business faster.

1. Commit To Consistently Using LinkedIn

This sounds simple, but it’s the thing most people never do: commit. Don’t take the “I’ll test the waters for a little bit and see what happens” approach. I can tell you what will happen if you do that: nothing. What have you accomplished in your career by “testing the waters”? I can almost guarantee that your greatest results in life happened by first committing to whatever you were doing. LinkedIn works the same way.

Just like exercising 20 minutes per day for three to four days per week can help you build physical strength and stamina, intentionally investing time and effort into using LinkedIn 20 minutes per day for three to four days per week will help you build a network of valuable, strong connections. Commit to it or stay out. Don’t dabble.

2. Connect with Everyone You Know

Creating content to post on LinkedIn isn’t the only way to leverage LinkedIn successfully. LinkedIn is only as powerful as the connections you have.

First, find every client you already work with who is on LinkedIn and send them a connection request. Then, find every center of influence you’ve ever met and connect with them. Find your friends. Find your family. Find the people you went to college with. Bolster your future prospecting efforts on LinkedIn by first connecting with more of the people you already know.

Invest an extra 60 seconds when you send connection requests, and add a brief, personalized message with the invitation.

Pick a certain number of people you’ll send connection requests to every week and start reaching out. Your goal can be as easy as five new connections per week. You can do that! Over time, the benefits of that activity will build, and you’ll start to see the fruits of your labor.

3. Meet Your Connections

There’s no question that the most successful people in business were and are excellent at meeting and building relationships with the right people. Whether these people are clients, centers of influence, team members or business partners, you must be meeting more of the right people. Connecting with people on LinkedIn is a great first step.

Next, get to know them! Whether you ask your connections to grab coffee, breakfast, lunch or to simply hop on a Zoom video call, you need to meet the people you connect with.

Are you going to meet with every single person you’re connected with on LinkedIn? Likely, no. The point is that you need to start meeting with as many of your connections as you can. As you get face-to-face with your LinkedIn connections, new doors will open.

The “ask” doesn’t need to be complicated. But it must happen. Set a goal of sending a message to three of your LinkedIn connections every week to schedule a time to meet them in-person or via a Zoom video call.

Your Next Steps: Commit, Connect and Meet!

Set your goals for how much time you’ll invest on LinkedIn every week. Block the time on your calendar. Follow through with connecting with everyone you know who is on LinkedIn. Start scheduling meetings. It sounds simple – and it is. The key is doing this consistently over time if you want to create great results. Will you commit to leveraging LinkedIn?

About the Author
J.J. Peller is an Executive Business Coach with Carson Coaching. He is an Associate Certified Coach through the International Coaching Federation. J.J. offers services to help financial advisors unleash their full potential and accelerate growth and success.