A Practical Guide to

LinkedIn for:

Economic Development

Marketing and Attraction

LinkedIn helps connect you to the network you �need to achieve your goals �

(ie. Marketing, research, business development, executive leadership)

P

B

S

L Board Members

Community Partners

Leads

Supporters of Your Brand T

Talent

S

Leveraging LinkedIn's Network

Strengthen relationships !with Leads Find the right quality Board members quickly Identify key community or Company partners Identify top talent to work !for your organization/ Build your brand and spark dialogue among supporters

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B

L

T

An introduction to new business prospect

A board member with strategic connections

A company with a particular skill set

A new Business Developer

Professionals following your organization’s LI page

Build Relationships With Leads Chances are you have connections to many of the Leads or Prospects you are currently pursuing. Use LinkedIn to uncover those ties and improve your relationship with your prospects.

–  Work with your business development and marketing to identify prospects

–  Explore your network to uncover your ties and inroads

What if instead of cold calls, you had warm introductions?

Your Prospect You

L

Quickly Connect With Companies And

Board Members

LinkedIn makes it easy to explore your existing connections to find potential board candidates. Connect with your current board in order to fully leverage their connections.

Use “advanced search” and filter by: Keyword •  Geographic location •  Desired skills •  Company or affiliation

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Find And Engage Community Partners

Looking for a particular skill set? Interested in building relationships with partners from a particular company or industry? §  LinkedIn’s advance search feature makes zeroing in on the exact

talent you need easy.

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A strategy consultant to help build your 3-year plan

A local Bank to maintain invest in your EDO

A Leading Employer to provide additional project

support

Identify Top Talent For Your Organization

With LinkedIn you can use “advanced search” to identify potential candidates and then see shared connections. Speed up your talent search and cut through the crowd to find a perfect match

LinkedIn Confidential ©2013 All Rights Reserved

T

Build Meaningful Supportive Relationships

With Companies

LinkedIn is a vibrant community with hundreds of millions of professionals worldwide. Your friends, fans and supporters are already on LinkedIn. Invite them to become your advocates.

–  Create a company page, grow your follower base, and post updates to spread your message across the LinkedIn network.

–  Ask your supporters to list your organization on their

profile in the Volunteer & Causes section. –  Join a Linked Group that is relevant to your cause

and help drive the conversation.

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Use LinkedIn Ads and Sales Navigator For Targeting Prospects

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Knoxville Estimated Reach

3Million Target Users By Title, Geography, Group And More

5 Things To Do With LinkedIn

LinkedIn is the most valuable social tool at your disposal for ED marketing and attraction. Make

sure you’re using it right and it will pay dividends.

Right Now

Your profile shouldn’t be about you, it should be about the prospects you’re trying to attract. After all, your intended targets aren’t recruiters, they’re leads. But most economic developer’s profiles are digital resumes, or worse, a copied and pasted marketing value proposition. By the way, don’t use these types of photos…

1. Create a Buyer Centric Profile

•  Connect with anyone with whom you’ve had a meaningful interaction. Want to reach out to people you’ve never actually met? There’s a right way to go about it. Check out all the NEW profile sections and fill them in (LinkedIn has changed for the better)If there is not a group around your area of interest or expertise, start one

2. Grow your Network with a Purpose

•  Connect with anyone with whom you’ve had a meaningful interaction. Want to reach out to people you’ve never actually met? There’s a right way to go about it.

3. Share Relevant Content (Often)

3. Share Relevant Content (Often)

Remember Professional – Save this for

Facebook, unless you work for the CDC

•  Look for three types of information: role-specific, goal-specific, and common ground.

–  Role-specific: What are they responsible for? –  Goal-specific: What are the targets they need to hit in their role? –  Common ground: Find some sort of tie back to you, whether it’s a common

connection, a college, a hobby, or an experience.

•  You should also try to glean trigger events from your prospect’s LinkedIn profile, although this can be tricky. Look at the stream of content they’ve shared recently to see if you can find any press releases or other articles about new leadership, acquisitions, or significant changes.

4. Leverage Business Intelligence Tools

4. Leverage Business Intelligence Tools

•  Just like emails, InMails are an appropriate -- and perhaps even more effective -- channel for an introduction to your product or service. Research from InsideSales.com found that:

InMail with the exact same copy as an email will get a 33%

higher response.

•  Pair emails and InMails. Send the email first, and then follow up with

an InMail. Insert one or two lines at the beginning of your InMail, explaining that while you sent an email, you’re also reaching out on LinkedIn since you weren’t sure which channel was preferable. Then simply copy and paste the email copy into the InMail, and send. If your buyers are social, this is an easy way to boost response rates.

5. Use Multiple Tools for Effectiveness

We Asked Site Selectors: What is the

applicability of LinkedIn to your

profession?

“I have used it along with Hoovers to check who is on LinkedIn and contact people for business meetings.”

“I think it has good application. I have gotten proposals through this tool.” “Good for seeking independent information.”

“Good for finding contacts, and to keep in touch with peers.”

“More of a business site”

Useful networking tool Don’t know yet.

An indication of what is to come?

“Young companies are all about social media. Their whole concept is open source everything. They rely on an online community. They’re building enthusiasts for their product online. I have a current client in the auto manufacturing space that loves social media. These guys are choosing their locations based on what their online community says they want. “If you can find companies on social media, you can reach them. Big corporations not using it this way (Yet), but small guys are for sure. “As people who live in the community find these great companies, they could connect ED with companies. Blog with your citizens about what they like and what they know about. Tips are good. Fear is how do you know you have the good information in these channels? I am just learning myself.”

-A Site Selector, early October 20013

Social Prospecting for LinkedIn

As an Economic Development marketer or business developer, you already understand the importance of social media as part of your Business Attraction Strategy. With more than 3 million companies on Linkedin, one billion monthly active users on Facebook, and over 230 million monthly active users on Twitter, smart marketers know there’s more potential than ever  to use social platforms to get their name out there, spread their community’s information, and draw more people to their site.

Awareness Engagement

Interest

Action Only the best economic developers practice social

prospecting – the art of scouring the social web, identifying potential prospects or partners for your

community, and engaging them

LinkedIn Workshop Exercise - Prep

(1) Prep Write down the top three keyword phrases that people use to find you

on search. You'll be able to use this content to draw prospects back to

your profile or economic development website.

1.

2.

3.

    Pro tip: Remember, more business-focused keywords are favored on

LinkedIn.

  Write down three pieces of content that are related to the search results

of your keyword phrases.

1.

2.

3.

LinkedIn Workshop Exercise – Get Started

(2) Get Started: Sign into LinkedIn, and to the left of the top search bar, select “Groups”

from the drop-down icon menu, which will search all LinkedIn groups.

  Pro tip: You can narrow your search results in the menu on the left by

choosing what your relationship is to members of the groups, for

instance if you want a category of “Open” or “Members only,” or if you

want search results for groups that are in one or multiple Languages.

  Notes:

Based on the group’s description (and a quick scan), identify five

LinkedIn Groups that could have potential prospects for your business

and join them.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

LinkedIn Workshop Exercise - Action

(3) Take Action: Now it’s time to start sharing the pieces of content you identified earlier.

Start engaging with potential prospects by:

Joining in on conversations in the group where you can add value with

your content “Liking” content that others are sharing in the group

Sharing your own content and posing your own questions to the group

 

Marketing: When you find a particular post within the group you want to monitor,

you can choose to “Follow Discussion” so you’ll be updated when content

for that post is added.    

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The image cannot be displayed. Your computer may not have enough memory to open the image, or the image may have been corrupted. Restart your computer, and then open the file again. If the red x still appears, you may have to delete the image and then insert it again.The image cannot be displayed. Your computer may not have enough memory to open the image, or the image may have been corrupted. Restart your computer, and then open the file again. If the red x still appears, you may have to delete the image and then insert it again.

LinkedIn Approach for Business

Development and Marketing

Improve your EDO

competitive position in

the new economic environment • Put out relevant content • Execute as part of a larger campaign

Enhance awareness and

positive perceptions of

your EDO’s business

climate both locally

and nationally

• Collaborating with • Driving leads and conversations

Focusing on the

targeted industry

sectors with highest impact and opportunity

for sustained growth

!Use Research!• Sales Navigator • Groups • Competitive markets and geographies • Services & programs

Developing a

meaningful profile that

is built for your prospects, not you

!Profile Strategy !• No Frat Pics • Fill out completely • Increasing community visibility and engagement

Take Home Exercise – Extra Credit Take-home exercise]

Spend 20 minutes a week:

- Reviewing the content in the groups you’ve joined (5 mins)

- Commenting and adding value to posts from others in the group (5 mins)

- Evaluate those you engage with the most to see if a prospect is a good fit (5 mins)

-  Share one piece of organic content to the groups you've joined (5 mins)

And if your profile picture looks like this, change it.    

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Thank you!

Contact information: 929 Broadway Denver, CO 80203 Contact: Guillermo Mazier t: 303.292.3300 x 232 Guillermom@Atlas-Advertising.com www.Atlas-Advertising.com LinkedIn Profile | LinkedIn Group | Twitter | Blog | Slidespace